Complexities of Flexible Labor

This dissertation deals with the restructuring of the labor process that has been taking place for several decades. It analyzes and compares these processes within the United States and Germany to better understand how complex trends in employment regulation, work, and workers’ representation – often referred to as labor flexibility – affects employers, the individual employee, and the labor market itself. The concept of informational capitalism from Manuel Castells (1996) provides the most important theoretical background used in this study. Informational capitalism is a prominent approach to explain current economic and social changes. Castells takes into account the important role of information and communication technology for societal changes during the last century. In general, the study examines the implications of the ongoing restructuring of labor for workers, employers, and the labor market, addressing how labor flexibility can be characterized taking all relevant dimensions into account. The study applies the SWET analysis approach introduced by Chris Benner (2006), an approach that considers the dimensions of space, work, employment and time. These four fundamental interrelated dimensions of the labor process provide a helpful framework for analyzing the changing labor process in informational capitalism. The SWET analysis combines quantitative and qualitative empirical information. Because IT occupations can be regarded as early indicators for future changes in the labor process, the study focuses on developments within the IT industry and the work of software developers for the SWET analysis. The central thesis of the study is that the complex trends within the labor process have ambiguous impacts on economy, society and workers. The further assumption is that different institutional frameworks do not necessarily lead to different effects on the labor process and for workers. For example, whether labor flexibility leads to uncertainties for individuals or whether it has positive outcomes depends on the specific situation and the particular dimension of labor and not necessarily on the national environment. All in all, this study shows that a thorough understanding of labor flexibility is necessary to explain the current complex trends in the labor market and the workforce