Market returns? Gender and theories of change in employment relations

Bibliographic Data

ID2138995
AuthorsSusan Irwin (0000-0001-9591-147X, University of Leeds), Wendy Bottero Sarah Irwin (corresponding author), Sarah Irwin (0000-0003-2930-3569), Wendy Bottero (0000-0003-1423-7562)
Year2000
Volume51
Issue2
Pages261-280
Publication date2000-06-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueBritish Journal of Sociology (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0007-1315 • E-ISSN: 1468-4446
PublisherWiley (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1111/j.1468-4446.2000.00261.x
PMID10905000
OpenAlexW2112016085
LanguageEN
Citations received27
References cited36

This paper explores recent arguments about the marketization of female labour, in the context of a wider analysis of the role of concepts like 'the market' and 'individualization' in sociological accounts of change in employment relations. It will be argued that within sociology there has been a tendency for rapid, large-scale changes in employment relations to be characterized as the breakdown of social influences or structures and as the emergence of atomized, individuated market forces. In the most recent models, change in the nature of gendered positions within employment are presented in terms of a decline of social structuring and social constraint. These emergent accounts hold similarities to classical economics, and to Marx's and Weber's accounts of employment, which also characterized new forms of employment relations in terms of the emptying of their social content and their replacement by market forms. We offer an alternative, moral economy, perspective which foregrounds the continued significance of social relations in the structuring of employment and employment change. We develop the argument through an analysis of gendered patterns of employment and change in family form

Argument (complex analysis · Capitalism · Constraint (computer-aided design · Context (archaeology · Economic geography · Economics · Gender relations · Labour economics · Marketization · Political science · Politics · Positive economics · Social science · Sociology · Structuring · Employment and Welfare Studies · Gender Studies · Gender, Labor, and Family Dynamics · Labor market dynamics and wage inequality · Labor Movements and Unions · Law · Social Policy and Reform Studies

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