Critical realism : insights for labour market analysis

![CDATA[Institutional labour market segmentation theory has made significant strides in developing a conceptualisation of labour markets that eschews the atomism and methodological individualism of neo-classical economics. This more realistic and useful conceptualisation of a labour market emphasises ‘emergence’, relations and place; that is, it emphasises connections rather than boundaries. It serves as the basis for appreciating the connection between employers singularly and employers as an interactive group that lies at the heart of labour market mechanics, a connection obscured by the unhelpful notion of the “internal labour market”. This paper describes critical realist ontology and method, as critical realism (with geography) has been the vehicle for recent developments in labour market segmentation theory. This paper’s particular contribution is to identify two ‘glitches’ arising in spatially-informed labour market research relying on critical realist method: the over-simplification of our units of analysis by a tendency to gloss over their ‘emergent’ character, and critical realism’s despatialised distinction between ‘objects’ and ‘structures’.]]