Climate Change Vulnerability and the Politics of Production on Swiss Construction Sites

Simon Schaupp and Jan Meier
Additional contact information
Simon Schaupp: KU Leuven, Belgium

Work, Employment & Society, 2026, vol. 40, issue 2, 337-347

Abstract: Although it is widely acknowledged that vulnerability to climate change is distributed unevenly, the significance of differences in working conditions remains understudied. This article explores workplace climate vulnerability through analysis of the ‘politics of production’, understood as the interaction between negotiations at the level of institutional regulation and those pertaining to the labour process. The matter is considered through interviews with Jan, a Swiss construction worker. Jan’s narrative indicates that a ‘politics of production’ does not represent clashes of pre-existing interests but rather themselves generate definite subjectivities that in turn influence how climate change is negotiated. For example, norms of masculinity which prescribe the silent endurance of pain, can prevent individuals from taking action to protect themselves from the effects of climate change. The perspective of a ‘politics of production’ also aids in the understanding of a persistent maladaptation to climate change now causing further environmental and worker-related strains.

Keywords: climate change; collective bargaining; employer association; health and safety; just transition; labour process theory; sustainability; trade union (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2026
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/09500170251386757 (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:woemps:v:40:y:2026:i:2:p:337-347

DOI: 10.1177/09500170251386757

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Work, Employment & Society from British Sociological Association
Bibliographic data for series maintained by SAGE Publications ().