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SOCY 336: Work and Technology
Mondays (4:00 pm) and Wednesdays(2:30 pm)
Office hours: Mondays (1:00 – 2:00 pm) or by
appointment
Chris De Vrij (chris.devrig@queensu.ca)
Emily Kirby (emilly.Kirby@queensu.ca)
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Our
textbook:
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Last Time
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Introductions
How can we define work?
A world without work?
Goals for the course
Course outline
Next class
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Annotated Bibliography
(due Feb 12th)à 20%
Course
requirements:
Essay (due March 18th)
à 30%
Final Exam (winter
exam period) à 40%
In-class participation
assignments à 10%
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Today:
• What is ‘Work’?
• Origins of Industrial
Capitalism
• Canada’s
Industrialization
• Theoretical
Perspectives on Work
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1) What is work?
Work as defined in this
course à “an activity that
provides a socially valued
product or service” (p. xxi).
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What is work?
• “paid” vs. “unpaid”
• What constitutes unpaid
work?
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What is work?
• Formal versus informal economies
• What is the informal economy?
• What types of jobs are found in the
informal economy?
• Can work in the informal economy be
“paid” work?
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The informal economy – Global
perspective
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What is work?
• Shaped by
‘industrialization’ and
‘capitalism’
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What is work?
• Constantly
changing
• Schumpeter’s
“creative
destruction”
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“Creative destruction”?
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Creative destruction?
• “Critics have raised concerns about how services like
Uber create more part-time or freelance workers, instead of fulltime employees with benefits. There is uncertainty about who
will cover the cost of health care, employment insurance, Old
Age Security and other social services since many of these
programs are traditionally paid for by employers and
employees.”
• "If they are not considered employees, they don't have health
benefits, they don't have a pension plan, they have no stability,
said Leslie Shade, a University of Toronto professor who
researches mobile technology. "In many instances it is
increasing the rise of precarious workers who just don't have
any job security."
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Participation Questions:
Family histories of work (*submit to
‘Discussion’ on onQ*)
§ Spend a few minutes jotting notes on the following:
§ What types of jobs did your grandparents work?
§ What about your parents?
§ How many different jobs did they have over the course of
their working life?
§ How similar or different do you envision your future job(s)
to be when compared to your parents/grandparents?
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‘Work’ – Examples
of change:
§ Early 1900s Canada?
§ “When Harry met
Anne” (p. 1-2 of text)
§ Farming, large
families, high
immigration,
household
economies and start
of ‘paid work’
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2) Origins of ‘Industrial Capitalism’
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Work in European Feudal Society
§ Subsistence agriculture
§ High social inequality
§ Little economic or social
change
§ Individual rights of little
account
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Rise of Mercantile Capitalism (1500s-)
• Global trading system
• Colonial empires
• Emergence of wealthy
merchant class
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Industrial Revolution (mid 1700s/1800s)
• Era of rapid social & economic change
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Industrial Revolution
(mid 1700s/ 1800s)
• Era of rapid social &
economic change
• What about the division of
labour (DOL)?
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Defining Industrialization &
Capitalism
Industrialization
• “technical aspects
of accumulation”
VS
Capitalism
• “social system of
production”
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Polanyi (1944)
‘The Great
Transformation’
§ Wage labour
§ New forms of large-scale,
centralized production
§ Decline in agriculture
§ Rapid urban growth
§ Shifts in norms & values –
individual rights, ‘clock time’
§ Rise of ‘scientific
management’
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Video Clip:
Modern Times
What are some of
the workplace
practices that catch
his / your attention?
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3) Canada’s
Industrialization
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§ ‘Late’
industrializer (mid1800s)
3) Canada’s
Industrialization
§ ‘Staples
economy’
§ Heavily rural
population
§ High immigration
§ Pre-market,
household
economy
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Agriculture to
industry
Canada’s
Industrialization
(late 1800s)
Regional
differences
Male breadwinner
model
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Canada’s Population: Urban / Rural
100%
90%
80%
70%
60%
50%
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%
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65
81
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1901
1951
Urban
2011
Rural
Source: Wilson (1996: 18) for 1901 figures; Parkin (2003: 2) A Changing People for 1951 figures; Statistics Canada
(2012). Population counts, for Canada, provinces and territories, census divisions, population centre size groups and
rural areas, 2011 Census.
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Canada: Population by Region
100%
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12
17
90%
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80%
70%
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60%
50%
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40%
41
30%
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20%
10%
0%
BC/Alberta
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5
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1901
1951
Sask/Man
Ontario
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2001
Quebec
Maritimes
Source: Parkin (2003: 2) A Changing People; Statistics Canada (2012). Table 051-0001 – Estimates of population,
by age group and sex for July 1, Canada, provinces and territories, annual, CANSIM.
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Rapid industrial expansion
Rise of ‘scientific management’
Canada’s
Industrialization
(1900-1930s)
High levels of immigration
Poor work conditions, little labour
protection
Corporate capitalism,
bureaucracy, larger organizations
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Immigration Trends, Canada, 1901-2011
500000
450000
400000
Persons
350000
300000
250000
200000
150000
100000
50000
0
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01
20
91
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81
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71
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61
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51
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41
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31
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21
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11
19
01
19
91
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Source: Citizenship and Immigration Canada, Facts and Figures 2002 (2003:3). Catalogue MP43-333/2003E;
Citizenship and Immigration Canada, Facts and Figures 2011 Data; CANSIM Table 051-0004.
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Canada’s
Industrialization
(1900-1930s)
§ High labour unrest
§ What role did the
Winnipeg general strike
play?
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Industrialization & The Gender
Division of Labour
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• Throughout industrialization
and modernization how did
working class families fair?
Modernization
and the family
• How did changes to legislation
in the late 19th century related
to children and women in the
workplace impact their day-today survival?
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1871 à Ontario first province to
pass compulsory schooling laws
Changing
laws and
policy
1890s à factory laws, removal of
children and women from paid work
Other legislation:
• 1918 à women win right to vote
• WWII à emergence of social security
What do these new laws amount to?
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The legacy of
industrialization
& movement to
post-industrial
society
§ Wage labour
§ Intrinsic value of work
§ Gender and the
division of labour
§ Global interdependencies
§ Exploitation
§ Progress?
§ The social, welfare state
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Next Class:
Marx, K. (1844).
“Estranged Labour”
(online – Marxists.org)
Weber, M. (1922).
“Bureaucracy”
(Excerpt)
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