Labour-process-related Racism in Transnational European Production: Fragmenting Work meets Xenophobic Culturalisation among Workers

Hürtgen, Stefanie

doi:10.15173/glj.v11i1.4018

Cited by 11 publications

(6 citation statements)

References 41 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…crisis with discourses on 'lazy Greeks', 'brave Germans', 'successful Eastern Europeans' and so on (Hadjimichalis 2018). With regard to precarious workforces, we find similar stereotypes in companies (Hürtgen 2014(Hürtgen , 2019b. Social fragmentation and destruction are externalized through racist and xenophobic culturalization, again: on all scales and across Europe, and also trade unions often enough on their part sustain fundamental stereotypes.…”

Section: Competitive Europeanization and Labourmentioning

confidence: 58%

Precarization of work and employment in the light of competitive Europeanization and the fragmented and flexible regime of European production

Hürtgen

2020

Capital & Class

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

In current debates on precarization in Europe, a transnational and more class-based perspective is demanded. While fully supporting this request, this article nevertheless notices that, often, when it comes to the economic logic of current Europeanization, scholars have only taken a one-sided look at financial capital and financialization. What is needed is a deeper conceptual understanding of European labour and production processes and how their transnational organization is interwoven with both the European integration project and rising precarization. In an inter-disciplinary approach, combining critical political economy, economic and social geography, and the sociology of work and industry, this article seeks to tackle the problem and develops three main arguments. The first is that, long before the 2008ff. crisis, a mode of Europeanization as multi-scalar competitive integration developed, one that, basically, takes socio-spatial unevenness as a competitive advantage. The second argument is that the backbone of this competitive Europeanization mode is a transnationalized European regime of fragmented and flexible production. This regime particularizes labour and labour processes on all social scales, within and beyond nation-states, by putting them in a competitive relation to each other. The third argument is that due to permanent transnational restructuring and technological (digital) modernization, no stable socio-spatial division of labour within and among the European countries arises. Instead, permanently changing forms of labour's social polarization occur, a finding that questions classic ideas

show abstract

Section: Competitive Europeanization and Labourmentioning

confidence: 58%

Precarization of work and employment in the light of competitive Europeanization and the fragmented and flexible regime of European production

Hürtgen

2020

Capital & Class

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…As a result, this approach divides society into natives and immigrants through processes of exclusion and inclusion (Jonsson, 2019). However, xenophobia and racism have not emerged in the case of Indonesian migrants in Malaysia as they have in European countries (Hürtgen, 2020).…”

Section: Antecedent Factorsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Agricultural Land Conversion and Human Trafficking in Northern Java Island, Indonesia

Rochadi

Sadiyatunnimah

Salim

2022

5005

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

This study examines human trafficking, its causes, and the survival abilities of victims using qualitative interpretive methods and thematic data analysis. Previous studies have not linked human trafficking with agricultural land conversion; however, in Indonesia, this problem is mainly caused by agricultural land conversion, which resulted in a floating mass comprising farmers and their families when this process was not carried out carefully, involving local officials and capital owners. The cooperation between the two forces was assisted by field operators who suppressed landowners in various ways. The owners of large pieces of land managed to reinvest the money from the sale of the land. On the other hand, owners of less than 0.5 hectares tended to share the proceeds from the sale of their land with relatives, as a provision for finding work in other cities or countries. Consequently, they are easily persuaded by the promises of brokers to be trafficked as plantation or sex workers. There are no significant differences in the characteristics of labor and sex trafficking victims. For instance, they both come from economically unstable families with little education. The former farmers do not participate in the industrial sector but work in the informal sector with long working hours and low wages. Nevertheless, they act as the backbone of the family's economy. Therefore, agricultural land conversion policies in developing countries should protect farmers from poverty and vulnerability.

show abstract

“…Migration and race often appear as proxies for each other. Of course, racism also exists independently from migration (Hürtgen, 2020), and structural racism within migration policies may vary. At the same time, migration policies are always in one way or another connected to racist repertoires of knowledge and symbolic interpretation frameworks.…”

Section: Migration Racism and Unfree Labourmentioning

confidence: 99%

Unfree Labour, Migration and Racism: Towards an Analytical Framework

Carstensen

2021

GLJ

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

When it comes to analysing exploitative and unfree labour, most research refers to “othering” or “race”. Race is often treated as a given category rather than a social phenomenon that needs explanation. In this article, I draw attention to the question of how racism is preserved, reproduced and changed within and through unfree labour relations. I do this by discussing the conceptual interlinkages between unfree labour, migration and racism. While the role of migration policies should not be underestimated, this should be accompanied by an analytical account of their racist background and outcomes. Based on this I present a framework for the analysis of racism as it relates to unfree labour and migration. I draw attention to three different levels of analysis (historico-structural, discursive-symbolic and everyday practices) and the interrelations between them. For empirical illustrations, I draw on my research on modern slave labour in two production sectors in Brazil: charcoal and clothing. I discuss the empirical findings with regard to three analytical problems in the analysis of unfree labour and racism: the impact of generalising knowledge on (future) migrant workers; the role and responsibility of global production networks; and the need to critically reflect on initiatives and policies aimed at the eradication of unfree labour. KEYWORDS: labour migration; unfree labour; racism; Brazil; workers’ rights

show abstract

Labour-process-related Racism in Transnational European Production: Fragmenting Work meets Xenophobic Culturalisation among Workers

Cited by 11 publications

References 41 publications

Precarization of work and employment in the light of competitive Europeanization and the fragmented and flexible regime of European production

Precarization of work and employment in the light of competitive Europeanization and the fragmented and flexible regime of European production

Agricultural Land Conversion and Human Trafficking in Northern Java Island, Indonesia

Unfree Labour, Migration and Racism: Towards an Analytical Framework

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About