Beyond the vocational fragments: Creative work, precarious labour and the idea of ‘Flexploitation’

Abstract

The subjective experience of employment insecurity may be more contradictory than discourses of 'fragmentation' and 'flexploitation' suggest. For young people seeking careers in creative occupations, the expectation of insecure employment conditions has become normalised. This may be the combined effect of intergenerational changes in the youth labour market generally, and the nature of employment in creative industries at all career stages. The article draws from 80 life history interviews conducted in Western Sydney, Australia, a region with high concentrations of unemployment and low socio-economic status. Their perspectives problematise the common assumption that young creative workers seek to resist insecure patterns of work or long for the stable jobs of the past. Partly, they have accepted the injunction for 'vocational restlessness' in their industries. Both in their 'day jobs' and in their attempts to get into their chosen part of the creative industry, they feel that not staying in one position too long can be both liberating and adaptive. Union campaigns highlighting the perils of insecurity are unlikely to resonate with them. JEL Code: J63

Diamonds are a girl’s best friend …? Examining gender and careers in the jewellery industry

“…In contrast however the 'marginalisation perspective' portrays self-employment as an unstable, low paying form of work involving long hours and performed without the advantages of pensions, benefits or job security (Baruch and Vardi, 2016;Greenhalgh and Rosenblatt, 2010;Young and Richards, 1992). This chimes with more recent literature on precarious work in the creative industries (Gill and Pratt, 2008;Kalleberg, 2009) and the dangers of flexploitation (Morgan, Wood and Nelligan, 2013). From these interviews it seems clear that women face both normative and structural constraints that curtail the options and rewards available to them in the labour market (Hughes, 2012;McRae, 2003).…”

“…Individuals frequently move organization within the BJQ, and part-time work is common, making it difficult to define the difference between employees and the self-employed. Working conditions for the self-employed jeweller can also mirror those found elsewhere in the creative industries whereby benign notions of creative work are underpinned by sometimes precarious and exploitive work processes (Banks and Hesmondhalgh, 2009;Shade and Jacobson, 2015;Morgan, Wood and Nelligan, 2013). This context provides an original and fascinating backdrop to explore the impact of gender regimes on individuals' working lives.…”

Employment flexibility, job security and job satisfaction of knowledge workers in Poland.

“…In the context of job security, a recent study on job insecurity and employment of entry-position workers in creative industry shows that young creative workers do not feel less satisfied with their jobs due to low job security, as it matches their expectations associated with the chosen job. Also, even more significantly, some young creative workers see low job security as an advantage, as they value job mobility and want to depart from the fordist job-for-life paradigm (Morgan, Wood and Nelligan, 2013). We assume that similarly to young creative workers, established knowledge workers value more mobility than job stability and have a sense of high employment security on job market.…”

Creative work and affect: Social, political and fantasmatic dynamics in the labour of musicians

“…One such aspect of creative labour that has been picked up in the literature is widespread precariousness and casualization of creative labour (Morgan et al, 2013;Ross, 2003Ross, , 2009, which has been widely documented in order to counter the excessively optimistic picture painted of creative labour by policy-oriented researchers (see also Hesmondhalgh, 2012). Another salient aspect of creative labour that has been picked up on is the specific functioning of its labour markets, which relies strongly on reputation and networking (Blair, 2001;Lee, 2011).…”

“…This article seeks to contribute to the literature on creative work (Banks, 2010a;Hesmondhalgh, 2012;Lee, 2011;Morgan et al, 2013;Oakley, 2009) by considering alongside each other potentially contradictory aspects of everyday working life in the cultural industries, such as the desire for autonomy, a commitment to networking, accessing relevant labour markets, sharing resources and establishing oneself within communities of peers. By reading these through the lens of social and political logics, it becomes possible to interpret these as part of either dominant social grammars or political counterlogics, which work together to reproduce specific characteristics of creative labour (Hesmondhalgh and Baker, 2012).…”