TY - JOUR
T1 - From precarity to precariousness and back again : labour, life and unstable networks
AU - Neilson, Brett
AU - Rossiter, Ned
PY - 2005
Y1 - 2005
N2 - This article explores the distinction and passage between "precarity" and "precariousness". In surveying the various ways in which these terms have circulated, we wish to establish a framework within which questions of labour, life and social-political organisation can be understood. The various uncertainties defining contemporary life are carried over - and, we argue, internal to - the logic of informatisation. Our aim, however, is not to collapse respective differences into a totalising logic that provides a definitive assessment or system of analysis; rather, we seek to identify some of the forces, rhythms, discourses and actions that render notions such as creativity, innovation, and organisation, along with the operation of capital, with a complexity whose material effects are locally situated within transversal networks. Where there are instances of inter-connection between, say, the work of migrants packaging computer parts or cleaning offices and that of media labour in a call centre, software development firm or digital post-production for a film studio, we see a common expressive capacity predicated on the dual conditions of exploitation and uncertainty.
AB - This article explores the distinction and passage between "precarity" and "precariousness". In surveying the various ways in which these terms have circulated, we wish to establish a framework within which questions of labour, life and social-political organisation can be understood. The various uncertainties defining contemporary life are carried over - and, we argue, internal to - the logic of informatisation. Our aim, however, is not to collapse respective differences into a totalising logic that provides a definitive assessment or system of analysis; rather, we seek to identify some of the forces, rhythms, discourses and actions that render notions such as creativity, innovation, and organisation, along with the operation of capital, with a complexity whose material effects are locally situated within transversal networks. Where there are instances of inter-connection between, say, the work of migrants packaging computer parts or cleaning offices and that of media labour in a call centre, software development firm or digital post-production for a film studio, we see a common expressive capacity predicated on the dual conditions of exploitation and uncertainty.
KW - Job security
KW - Labor market
KW - Social aspects
KW - Social networks
KW - Work
UR - http://handle.uws.edu.au:8081/1959.7/10320
UR - https://five.fibreculturejournal.org/fcj-022-from-precarity-to-precariousness-and-back-again-labour-life-and-unstable-networks/
M3 - Article
SN - 1449-1443
JO - Fibreculture Journal
JF - Fibreculture Journal
IS - 5
ER -