work

Essays

Navigating Jefes Fantasmas in New York City’s Urban Platform Economy

Jackson Todd - 3 March 2023

How has the “platform economy” altered urban life, infrastructure, and labor? Jackson Todd examines New York City’s...

Debates

Reimagining Skill

Nichola Lowe - 12 October 2021

Nichola Lowe argues that skill needs to be reimagined, not erased from efforts to strengthen the institutional...

From the Field

Cleaning and Care Worker Cooperatives in NYC: Empowerment Through Collectivization of Labor

Nora Komposch - 8 December 2020

Worker cooperatives have been shown to reduce precariousness and economic exclusion of marginalized groups. However,...

Reviews

Aubervilliers: Portrait of a Working-Class Suburb

Anaïs Albert & translated by Oliver Waine - 21 February 2020

The republication of an early-20th‑century realist novel set in the northern Paris suburb of Aubervilliers brings the...

From the Field

Open-Air Auto Shops: Subsistence Jobs in Working-Class Neighborhoods

Collectif Rosa Bonheur & translated by Oliver Waine - 25 October 2019

The informal activities of street mechanics observed by Collectif Rosa Bonheur in northern France attest to a much...

From the Field

Projecting Supply and Demand for Middle-Skill Occupations in US States and Metro Areas

James Orr & Ofronama Biu - 10 October 2017

Analysts have long noted difficulties in quantifying and projecting skill mismatches in local labor markets....

From the Field

Swept Away: Public Work and the Politics of Employment in New York City’s Parks

John Krinsky & Maud Simonet - 6 September 2017

Upwards of 4,000 unionized civil-service workers once cleaned and maintained New York City’s parks. Today about 1,800...

From the Field

Looking Inward, Across the Border

Harel Shapira - 19 April 2016

In the constellation of anti-immigrant politics in the United States, groups like the Minutemen, civilians who patrol...

Debates

Reskilling Urban Manufacturing: Workforce Solutions from the Inside Out

Nichola Lowe - 15 December 2015

In the United States, a four-year college education has gradually come to be assumed as a prerequisite for entry into...

Essays

In Cathedrals of Craft: Workplaces for the New Elite Service, Retail, and Manual Labor Jobs

Richard E. Ocejo - 12 May 2015

As artisanal economies emerge in postindustrial cities, the symbolic language and craft culture of the industrial...

From the Field

The Other Side of Austin, Texas

Caitlyn Collins & Katherine Jensen & Kristine Kilanski & Javier Auyero - 2 March 2015

Despite a booming economy, Austin, Texas, is a city where inequalities persist and grow in the shadow of neoliberal...

From the Field

The world of the blue-collar worker: changed, but not gone

Julian Mischi & Olivier Pasquiers & Caroline Pottier & Nicolas Renahy & translated by Oliver Waine - 19 February 2014

Despite deindustrialisation and increasingly acute economic difficulties in the former strongholds of heavy industry,...

Essays

Could harmonised working times spell an end to the rush hour?

Emmanuel Munch & translated by Oliver Waine - 12 February 2014

Efforts to coordinate working hours across urban territories have increased in recent years. By exploring the...

Essays

Explaining the periurban right-wing vote: “social frustrations” of low-income households or the reshaping of the working classes?

Violaine Girard & translated by Oliver Waine - 13 June 2012

There is a growing interest in voting patterns in periurban areas, which tend to lean to the right or even far right....

Reviews

From home to the workplace: “Mad Men” or the irresistible rise of women

Nicole Rudolph - 14 March 2012

Mad Men is often viewed as the ultimate sexist TV series. Through an analysis of the behavior of men and women at...

Navigating Jefes Fantasmas in New York City’s Urban Platform Economy

Reimagining Skill

Cleaning and Care Worker Cooperatives in NYC: Empowerment Through Collectivization of Labor

Aubervilliers: Portrait of a Working-Class Suburb

Open-Air Auto Shops: Subsistence Jobs in Working-Class Neighborhoods

Projecting Supply and Demand for Middle-Skill Occupations in US States and Metro Areas

Swept Away: Public Work and the Politics of Employment in New York City’s Parks

Looking Inward, Across the Border

Reskilling Urban Manufacturing: Workforce Solutions from the Inside Out

In Cathedrals of Craft: Workplaces for the New Elite Service, Retail, and Manual Labor Jobs

The Other Side of Austin, Texas

The world of the blue-collar worker: changed, but not gone

Could harmonised working times spell an end to the rush hour?

Explaining the periurban right-wing vote: “social frustrations” of low-income households or the reshaping of the working classes?

From home to the workplace: “Mad Men” or the irresistible rise of women

Series

Featured

Covid-19 Transformed New York’s Destination Food Markets

Moving Inside City Limits: The Urban Mobility of Undocumented Youth

Filming Ethnic Diversity in New York

Looking Inward, Across the Border

The Political Aesthetics of Drag

Disarm the Police

Other resources online

“Our hallway’s big enough to play football in!” The council housing...

Saudi Arabia: How is Mobility Being Transformed in the Oil Kingdom?

Transport for Suburbia: Beyond the Automobile Age (Paul Mees)

Geopolitics and Electric Vehicles: The Rise of Climate Protectionism

One Way to Fight Rising Food Prices: Public Grocery Stores

The Quiet Power of Car-Free Neighborhoods

Partners