I’ve Got Your Back: Danger, Volunteering and Solidarity in Lifeboat Crews

Abstract

This article considers solidarity as a dynamic interrelationship between intersubjective and structural processes that underpin webs of meaning in dangerous work conditions. Conceptual links are developed to integrate previously unconnected aspects of work and relationships between danger, volunteering, edgework and solidarity – revealing how a distinct form of solidarity is engendered and experienced. Drawing on 43 in-depth interviews with Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI) workers operating in the UK and Ireland (12 paid and 31 volunteers), the analysis illuminates experiences of solidarity in a dangerous working environment. Findings reveal that solidarity is constituted by the interplay between volunteering work practices, shared experiences of rescues, and the meaningful purpose of safeguarding human life. This empirical study provides a basis for theorising distinct conditions relating to solidarity as differentiated from previous work on the concept. Further implications are discussed for contexts where various forms of danger and solidarity might be experienced.

Solidarities In and Through Work in an Age of Extremes

“…However, as Scarborough (2017) demonstrated in his study of firefighters, in such jobs a series of enmeshed tensions can be generated around the value workers put on their own lives, co-workers’ lives and the lives of the public. Such solidaristic tensions are also evident in the fourth article, a study by O’Toole and Calvard (2019) of lifeboat crews in the UK and Ireland, but in this case, there is a significant difference: the crew members are unpaid volunteers.…”

“…legal status) and opportunities, the articles in this special issue describe different forms of ‘communities of coping’ (Korczynski, 2003) emerging from below among workers in workplaces and even across national borders (see Fox-Hodess, 2019; this issue). Despite all being in and through work, each one is not necessarily evidence of a nascent form of trade unionism in the waged workplace, as with the case of volunteer workers (O’Toole and Calvard, 2019; this issue) and social factory cultural activists (Strauß and Fleischmann, 2019; this issue). Even if there is trade union-based solidarity in the waged workplace, it is not necessarily socially progressive in content and purpose, as is commonly the case with police trade unionism (see Thomas and Tufts, 2019; this issue).…”

“…O’Toole and Calvard’s (2019) study extends our understanding of solidarity among workers doing dangerous work by drawing on Lyng’s (1990) concept of edgework to explore voluntary risk-taking in extreme work contexts. They in turn build on Granter et al’s (2019) edgework-framed study of ambulance crews’ negotiation of work intensity – and risk – by reprising edgework’s original focus on the voluntary aspect of risk-taking.…”

“…Therefore, their individual and shared meaningful purpose for doing dangerous work takes on added importance compared to those workers who are also subject to paid employment contracts, such as other emergency services workers. O’Toole and Calvard (2019) show how crew members are tied into an explicit and tight-knit solidarity by their training and routine ‘safety-first’ work practices, shared experiences of rescues – and loss – and their common purpose of safeguarding human life, including the lives of other lifeboat crew members. However, their volunteering does not occur in a social vacuum.…”

Solidarity in Action at a Time of Crisis: The Role of Employee Voice in Relation to Communication and Horizontal Solidarity Behaviour

“…The concept of solidarity in the literature has traditionally focused on identity politics, industrial relations, class struggle, inequalities and ideological conflicts (O'Toole and Calvard, 2020). Workers’ solidarity is often conceptualized as the basis for collective actions within and beyond the organization (Hyman, 2011).…”