Arbeitspapier
Innovation and precarity: Workplace discourse in twenty-first century capitalism
This paper analyzes discourse in the workplace in order to explain puzzling patterns of precarity in twenty-first century capitalism. Tech workers' central role in digital transformation endows them with labor market power reflected by their high wages, but during economic downturns, when demand for their skills decreases, even they are vulnerable to downsizing. Comparing workers' responses to downsizing at two sites of an American tech firm, this paper shows how management disempowers workers by framing the employment relationship in a financial discourse. Disposing workers to believe that their jobs are threatened by market forces beyond their control, rather than by managers' decisions, this financial discourse undermines labor's established power resources by persuading workers that mobilizing will be ineffective in protecting their jobs. Relying on detailed case study evidence, this paper demonstrates the importance of discourse to explaining variation in worker power. It argues that the workplace should play a larger role in comparative political economy, particularly in explaining labor market outcomes related to digital transformation.
- Language
-
Englisch
- Bibliographic citation
-
Series: MPIfG Discussion Paper ; No. 19/8
- Classification
-
Sozialwissenschaften, Soziologie, Anthropologie
- Subject
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capitalism
discourse
hegemony
knowledge economy
power
workers
Arbeitnehmer
betriebliche Diskurse
Hegemonie
Kapitalismus
Macht
Wissensökonomie
- Event
-
Geistige Schöpfung
- (who)
-
Rothstein, Sidney A.
- Event
-
Veröffentlichung
- (who)
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Max Planck Institute for the Study of Societies
- (where)
-
Cologne
- (when)
-
2019
- Handle
- Last update
-
10.03.2025, 11:43 AM CET
Data provider
ZBW - Deutsche Zentralbibliothek für Wirtschaftswissenschaften - Leibniz-Informationszentrum Wirtschaft. If you have any questions about the object, please contact the data provider.
Object type
- Arbeitspapier
Associated
- Rothstein, Sidney A.
- Max Planck Institute for the Study of Societies
Time of origin
- 2019
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