1st Edition

The Global Governance of Precarity Primitive Accumulation and the Politics of Irregular Work

By Nick Bernards Copyright 2018
176 Pages
by Routledge

176 Pages
by Routledge

176 Pages
by Routledge

‘Standard’ employment relationships, with permanent contracts, regular hours, and decent pay, are under assault. Precarious work and unemployment are increasingly common, and concern is also growing about the expansion of informal work and the rise of ‘modern slavery’. However, precarity and violence are in fact longstanding features of work for most of the world’s population. Lamenting the... Read more
Introduction Chapter 1: Irregular Labour in Global Capitalism Chapter 2: The Governance of Forced Labour and the Antinomies of Colonialism Chapter 3: Urbanization, Colonial Crisis, and Social Policy Chapter 4: Irregular Work in the Postcolonial Social Order: The ILO Discovers the ‘Informal’ Chapter 5: Neoliberal Crises and the Politics of Informality Chapter 6: Reviving the Governance of Forced Labour: ‘Traditional Slavery’ and Child Trafficking in West Africa Conclusion

Biography

Nick Bernards is Assistant Professor of Global Sustainable Development at the University of Warwick

"In this extremely well researched book Nick Bernards takes aim at, and dispatches, various theories of precarious and forced labour. His critique of the ILO’s role in generating a mythical ideology of properly functioning contract-based labour markets is excellent. This book represents an important academic and political intervention into debates around, and campaigns against, diverse forms of labour exploitation." - Benjamin Selwyn, University of Sussex, UK

"This is a timely book as the International Labour Organization (ILO) approaches its first century. It shows through meticulous scholarship the ILO’s efforts to regulate forced labour, labour migration and informal labour in sub-saharan Africa. It is the missing story of labours’ marginalised . It is is a must read for students of International Political Economy (IPE) , labour  and development studies." - Edward Webster, University of Witwatersrand, South Africa