Experiencing Production and Politics in the Service-based Capitalist Democracy

* Book: Isabelle Ferreras, What Is Work ? Experiencing Production and Politics in the Service-based Capitalist Democracy. under contract with Harvard University Press

Discussion

Isabelle Ferreras:

'My focus is on understanding the logic of work in the context of Western capitalist democracies. At a time where more than 70% of jobs are in the service industries, it is crucial to better understand the logic of work from the perspective of those who perform it as its consequences on the way work is managed, and firms are governed could not be higher. This decade long research endeavor has led me to develop an exploratory agenda around the different dimensions of what I call the ‘capitalism/democracy contradiction’, i.e. the potential problems that arise when we organize our economy along capitalist terms while, at the same time, nurturing as our political ideal the democratic creed that assumes the equality of all. I pursue both the normative and the efficiency issues that this situation generates, combining empirical, sociological research with political theory. I am committed to help address the current economic and democratic crisis, and at an academic level, to make a contribution to the critical, political sociology of the economy."

More Information

Other books by the same author:

• Isabelle Ferreras, Hélène Landemore, La démocratie doit-elle s’arrêter aux portes de l’entreprises ? under contract with Textuel, Paris (Philippe Corcuff)

• Gouverner le capitalisme? Pour le bicamérisme économique. PUF, 2012 (in english: Governing Capitalism: Economic Bicameralism and the Firm.