Control on the ‘Boundary-Work’ in Work-Life Articulation for Flexible Knowledge Workers. Insights into Gender Asymmetries

Anna Carreri
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Anna Carreri: Department of Sociology and Social Research, University of Trent, 38122 Trent, Italy

Social Sciences, 2020, vol. 9, issue 6, 1-15

Abstract: In the sociological literature, several studies have shown that the economic and organizational changes of the last decade, including the growth of the service sector and the diffusion of new technologies, have altered the productive and reproductive processes as well as their spatial and temporal dimensions typical of Fordism. In order to shed light on how knowledge workers facing job flexibility and insecurity position themselves with respect to the practices of (de)constructing the boundaries between productive and reproductive domains, specific analytical tools were applied, originating from the interdisciplinary field of boundary-studies, within a perspective focused on gender differences and the subjective experiences of time. With this approach, a discourse analysis was conducted on 37 qualitative interviews with knowledge workers who handle job flexibility and insecurity and who have care responsibilities to uphold at home. The results show that the permeability and flexibility of new (re)productive practices, often presented in neoliberal economy as new opportunities for knowledge workers, especially if they are female, are experienced differently by men and women: for men they represent a new control source, whereas for women they constitute a fictitious, if not constricting, process.

Keywords: boundaries; knowledge work; flexibility; work-life interface; gender; quality of working life; discourse analysis (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: A B N P Y80 Z00 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
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