Individualisation, Collectivism and the Management of Risk in a Freelance Labour Market: The Case of the UK Television Industry

Successive legislation throughout the 1980s and 90s, designed to reduce regulation and introduce competition to the UK television industry, has resulted in casualisation of the employment relationship and a largely ‘freelance’, project-based labour market for television production workers. Research suggests that a web of informal networks, word-of-mouth recruitment and repeated contracting among groups of individuals underpins freelance employment in television. A complex relationship exists therefore between individualised competition, collaboration and co-operation. Thus while individualisation is pervasive in the television industry, there is also evidence of workers acting collectively to defend their interests and to manage the risks associated with freelance employment. The paper draws on qualitative data from an ESRC funded project to investigate the rol