Rethinking the Sociology of Work from the Global South New and Old Challenges to Understand Work’s Social Processes in Globalized Capitalism

Abstract

In 1995, the authors of this paper wrote an article asking whether Sociology of Work, with its “normal” disciplinary paradigms, could account for the new realities that were emerging at that time as a consequence of Post-Fordism in the globalized phase of capitalism. In 2012, a critical reading was carried out, as well as an update of those concepts, in an attempt to establish new challenges for social studies of work. On both occasions it was claimed that Sociology of Work faced a crisis marked by an economic reductionism that tends to consider social actors of the labor process as mere categories of the “factory model.” It was also stated that the radical transformation of the 20th century socio-labor actors -that was becoming increasingly evident in the 90’s and clearly developed in the 21st century- was modifying the ability to keep the focus on the discipline’s mainstream. As a result, it was necessary to incorporate both subjective and collective dimensions into the context of disciplinary analysis. This paper aims at advancing theoretical issues that need to be reviewed and changed so as to understand the new global scenario and its consequences for labor relationships and workers.