This theoretical and empirical study examines the relationship between the organisation of work, industrial relations, production spaces and the dynamics of capitalist investment. Jamie Gough explores the connections between labour process change, products, local economy and society, spaces and forms of competition, and firm's locational strategies. In a path-breaking analysis he shows that these are closely bound up with the business cycle and other rhythms of investment. Differences within the labour process are central to the argument. Gough explores the divisions between workers arising from these differences and from spatial flows of capital, and suggests strategies through which these divisions might be overcome.

Following its rise to prominence in the 1990s work on territory, the state and urban politics continues to be a vibrant and dynamic area of academic concern. Focusing heavily on the work of one key influential figure in the development of the field - Kevin R. Cox - this volume draws together a collection of prominent and well established scholars to reflect on the development and state of the field and to establish a research agenda for future work.

Globalisation, State and Labour combines a new theoretical approach with comparative analysis – ensuring that it will be of vital interest to anyone concerned with the globalization debate, the future of the state, and organized labour. It shows how although the world is undergoing enormous changes involving politics, the economy and society, the position and place of the state, and the significance of state policy in this process, is heavily contested. Presenting a timely opportunity to review and re-assess the modern state with regards to labour, the essays included in this text, written by leading researchers in the area, develop a new theoretical framework that puts work, workers and their organizations at the heart of analyzing state restructuring. Using major studies from four countries (UK, Denmark, Australia and New Zealand), the contributors challenge many preconceptions regarding globalization and labour organization - including the notions that the state is being marginalized by the processes of globalization, and that the trade unions are becoming irrelevant.

The last decade has given rise to a strong public discourse in most highly industrialized economies about the importance of a skilled workforce as a key response to the competitive dynamic fostered by economic globalisation. The challenge for different training regimes is twofold: attracting young people into the vocational training system while continuing to train workers already in employment. Yet, on the whole, most countries and their training systems have failed to reach those goals. How can we explain this contradiction? Why is vocational training seen to be an "old" institution? Why does vocational training not seem to be easily adapted to the realities of the 21st century? This book seeks to respond to these important questions. It does so through an in-depth comparative analysis of the vocational training systems in ten different countries: Australia, Canada, Denmark, France, Germany, Korea, Mexico, Morocco, the United Kingdom and the USA.

Transnational trade union action has expanded significantly over the last few decades and has taken a variety of shapes and trajectories. This book is concerned with understanding the spatial extension of trade union action, and in particular the development of new forms of collective mobilization, network-building, and forms of regulation that bridge local and transnational issues. Through the work of leading international specialists, this collection of essays examines the process and dynamic of transnational trade union action and provides analytical and conceptual tools to understand these developments. The research presented here emphasizes that the direction of transnational solidarity remains contested, subject to experimentation and negotiation, and includes studies of often overlooked developments in transition and developing countries with original analyses from the European Union and NAFTA areas. Providing a fresh examination of transnational solidarity, this volume offers neither a romantic or overly optimistic narrative of a borderless unionism, nor does it fall into a fatalistic or pessimistic account of international union solidarity. Through original research conducted at different levels, this book disentangles the processes and dynamics of institution building and challenges the conventional national based forms of unionism that prevailed in the latter half of the twentieth century.

Contesting Inequality and Worker Mobilisation: Australia 1851-1880 provides a new perspective on how and why workers organise, and what shapes that organisation. The author’s 2018 Origins of Worker Mobilisation examined the beginning of worker organisation, arguing inequality at work, and regulatory subordination of labour, drove worker resistance, initially by informal organization that slowly transitioned to formal organisation. This new volume analyses worker mobilisation in the period 1851-1880, drawing data from a unique relational database recording every instance of organisation. It assesses not only the types of organization formed, but also the issues and objectives upon which mobilisation was founded. It examines the relationship between formal and informal organisation, including their respective influences in reshaping working conditions and the life-circumstances of working communities. It relates the examination of worker mobilisation to both historical and contemporary contexts and examines mobilisation by different categories of labour. The book identifies important effects of mobilisation on economic inequality, hours of work (including the eight-hour day and the beginnings of the weekend) and the development of democracy. It will be of interest to researchers, academics, and students in the fields of social mobilisation, social and economic history, industrial relations, labour regulation, labour history, and employment relations.

The Arab Spring, chat forums, political leaders tweeting, online petitions, and protestors in the Occupy Movement - new media public spheres have without doubt radically altered social and political activism in society. But to what extent is this new activist public sphere stifled by the neoliberal economy and workfare state? Have we in fact become transformed into subjects of online consumption and orderly surveillance, rather than committed social and political campaigners? In this highly topical book, John Michael Roberts employs a political economy perspective to explore the relationship between financial neoliberal capitalism and digital publics. He assesses the extent to which they provide new forms of radical protest in civil society and offers an indispensable guide to understanding the relationship between the state, new media activism and neoliberal practices.

Capitalism produces crises and crises reproduce capitalism. We need an ecosocialist way out If crisis defines our era, we need a coherent socialist policy in response. Ståle Holgersen delves into today’s economic and ecological crises to demonstrate that they are not exceptions to an otherwise functioning system but integral to its operation. It is naive to see these upheavals as opportunities for reform or revolution. They are the bedrock of the status quo. Fortunately, the vicious circle sustaining capitalism is not founded on an iron law. Our historical mission in the face of the climate crisis is to create a historical exception to the rule. It is time for ecosocialism against crisis.

This Handbook provides a state-of-the-art overview of the changing world of global production. Chapters cover the geography of why and where jobs are moving in both manufacturing and services. The authors discuss topics relating to the human and natura

All phases of education from pre-school to post-compulsory, in virtually all parts of the world, have experienced unprecedented reform and restructuring in recent years. Restructuring has largely been driven by a global agenda that has promoted the development of human capital as the key to economic competitiveness in the global market. This book adopts an inter-disciplinary approach drawing not only on education research but also from the fields of industrial sociology, management studies and labour process theory to locate the reform agenda within a wider picture relating to teachers, their professional identities and their experience of work. In doing so the book draws on critical perspectives that seek to challenge orthodox policy discourses relating to remodelling. Illustrating of how education policy is shaped by discourses within the wider socio-political environment and how unionization and inter-organizational bargaining between unions exerts a decisive, but often ignored, influence on policy development at both a State and institutional level, this book is a must read for anyone researching or studying employment relations.