Linking Gentrification and Labour Market Precarity in the Contemporary City: A Framework for Analysis

Abstract

The interplay between intensifying labour market precarity and gentrification constitutes a hitherto under-researched topic in the fields of labour and urban geography. To rectify this lacuna, we argue that gentrification and labour flexibilisation are both socio-spatial manifestations of capital's efforts to confront crises of accumulation. Distinguishing between what we call "weak" and "strong" links between them, and drawing upon the concepts of "gentrification-supporting" and "gentrification-fostered" labour flexibility, we outline a framework for connecting gentrification and precarity. This allows us to make links between the restructuring of the built environment and the reorganisation of work in the post-industrial city; it also allows us to show how workers, through their agency, can shape rent gaps in the contemporary city.R esum e: L'interaction entre l'intensification de la pr ecarit e du march e du travail et la gentrification constitue un sujet encore peu etudi e dans les domaines de la g eographie du travail et de la g eographie urbaine. Pour rem edier a cette lacune, nous soutenons que la gentrification et la flexibilisation du travail sont deux manifestations socio-spatiales des efforts du capital pour faire face aux crises d'accumulation. En distinguant ce que nous appelons des liens «faibles» et «forts» entre les deux, et en s'appuyant sur les concepts de flexibilit e du travail «soutenant la gentrification» et «favoris e par la gentrification», nous d efinissons un cadre pour relier la gentrification a la pr ecarit e. Cela nous permet de faire des liens entre la restructuration de l'environnement bâti et la r eorganisation du travail dans la ville post-industrielle; cela nous permet egalement de montrer comment les travailleurs, par leur agentivit e, peuvent combler les ecarts de loyers dans la ville contemporaine.

Inter-regional underemployment and the industrial reserve army: Precarity as a contemporary Greek drama

“…This is because the large (typically foreign) firms that dominate the industry generally hire seasonal workers fulltime during the summer high season but then lay them off when the tourists dry up. This illustrates that labour casualization comes in myriad forms and is shaped by the nature of the underlying labour market (Gourzis et al, 2019). Importantly, low rates of parttimerism in those island regions dominated by tourism do not mean that the tourist sector in other regions necessarily behaves in the same way.…”

The student urban leisure sector: Towards commercial studentification?

“…While residential studentification should keep its focus on student accommodation, since there are still relevant questions to be answered in this field (Nakazawa, 2017), its commercial counterpart might benefit the studentification debate by paying attention to students' leisure and work in the context of urban change. The close link between students' leisure and work should be the focus of commercial studentification research from the very beginning since the experience of gentrification studies teaches us that the issue of labour should not be overlooked (Gourzis et al, 2019).…”

On the recursive relationship between gentrification and labour market precarisation: Evidence from two neighbourhoods in Athens, Greece

“…Of these, Sassen (1997) detailed the involvement of a reserve labour force in construction and renovation carried out in sweat-equity gentrification whilst Curran (2007) argued that, in displacing urban manufacturing, gentrification has stripped the urban working class of a source of stable employment. Lastly, Gourzis et al (2019b) presented a largely theoretical argument that gentrification and labour precarisation come as mutually reinforcing responses to crises of overaccumulation – the former as a spatial fix and the latter as an organisational fix to waning profitability in manufacturing. Hence, gentrification often spawns worksites with poor employment conditions in retail and hospitality (‘gentrification-fostered precarity’), whilst capitalising on such conditions in construction for its swift and costless materialisation (‘gentrification-supporting precarity’).…”