Precarious Academic Labour in Germany: Termed Contracts and a New Berufsverbot

Gallas, Alexander

doi:10.15173/glj.v9i1.3391

Cited by 17 publications

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“…It needs to be noted that, in accordance with the differences in the type and degree of previously existing job security, the process of precarization in the academic sector followed a slightly different trajectory in each context (i.e., direct adjunctification and erosion of tenure in the US as opposed to gradual increase in the number of non-tenured positions at German universities). However, in both contexts, the end result has been in sync with the qualitative connotations of 'feminization', reflected in an overall increase in short-term employment and a subsequent devaluation of academic labor [18,26].…”

Section: Conceptual Framework: Exploring the Relationship Between Precarized Academic Work And Feminized Resistancementioning

confidence: 99%

Feminization of Resistance: Reclaiming the Affective and the Indefinite as Counter-Strategy in Academic Labor Activism

Vatansever

2021

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‘Feminization’ is used either quantitatively to indicate an increased female labor market participation or qualitatively to refer to labor devaluation and to types of work that supposedly require “feminine” skillsets. This article cautiously hews to the qualitative interpretations but suggests an affirmative reconstruction of the concept in the context of collective action. It argues that contemporary grassroots academic labor movements rely more explicitly on collective emotions and aim at building long-term bases of solidarity, instead of performative activism and mass mobilizations. This ‘affective turn’ in academic labor activism is argued to signal a “feminization of resistance”, characterized by a pronounced propensity for affective and relational groundwork. This argument is substantiated in view of the Network for Decent Work in Academia (NGAWiss), a nation-wide precarious researchers’ network in Germany, and the New Faculty Majority (NFM), an adjunct advocacy group in the US. The aim is twofold: first, the article contributes to a better understanding of contemporary labor activism by elucidating the precarious collective’s incremental achievements, often ignored by the outcome-oriented labor movement literature. Second, by reframing it as a mode of affective resistance, the article extends the analytical scope of the term “feminization”.

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Section: Conceptual Framework: Exploring the Relationship Between Precarized Academic Work And Feminized Resistancementioning

confidence: 99%

Feminization of Resistance: Reclaiming the Affective and the Indefinite as Counter-Strategy in Academic Labor Activism

Vatansever

2021

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“…Nevertheless, there have been several initiatives and collective attempts in many countries including the joining of existing bigger unions as well as autonomous campaigning and strikes. These have occurred both in the US where the adjunctification of academia is most advanced (Gilbert, 2013;Atkins, Esparza, Milkman & Moran, 2018) and in European countries (European Trade Union Committee for Education, 2018; Gallas, 2018;Martinez, 2018;Precademics, 2019). Campaigns included a wide range of issues and repertoires of action including struggles of recognition of academic and employee status, informing colleagues and the wider public about prevailing conditions, symbolic protests and sit-ins and articulating sets of demands to university and state authorities.…”

Section: Precarious Labour In a Neoliberal Context: The Higher Educatmentioning

confidence: 99%

The communicative power of trade unionism: labour law, political opportunity structure and social movement strategy

Ioannou¹

2020

IndBez

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This article argues that more emphasis should be paid to the communicative power of trade unionism because it may constitute a starting point or a privileged standpoint which a trade union may use to counter its weakness regarding its other sources of power. Reviewing the trade union revitalisation literature, it is argued that social movement theory in general and especially ‘political opportunity structure’, can complement and enrich the power resources approach which is a useful tool in the analysis of trade union action. The case study of a weak trade union winning a strike largely as a result of its successful utilisation of its communicative power is presented where the public communication of the two sides to the conflict is subjected to content and discourse analysis. The article argues that trade unions can enhance their position through the adaptation of social movement strategy and campaign tactics into trade union activity because social movements are more accustomed to orienting their action in the public sphere. In this effort trade unions may draw upon the more explicitly normative and substantive dimension of labour law as a resource to legitimise and garner support for the unions’ objectives framing in a more expansive manner the issues at stake so that a significant section of society can identify with the trade union struggle at hand.

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“…In German universities, only about 19 per cent of academic staff have professorships; 80 per cent of academic staff in the age group of 35–45 without a professorship are employed on fixed‐term contracts (Konsortium Bundesbericht Wissenschaftlicher Nachwuchs ). There is no space here to go into a detailed discussion of the immediate causes of this, such as the specific regulations for fixed‐term contracts at universities or the competitive allocation of (public) funds with a concomitant reduction of base funding ( Grundfinanzierung ) to the universities (Gallas ). It suffices here to highlight that the increased precarisation of academic labour formed part of a more general process of neoliberalisation in Germany – and in that sense, of state remaking – in which all governing parties collaborated over the past decades.…”

Section: Precarity: Bringing the State Back Inmentioning

confidence: 99%

Precarity without borders: visions of hope, shared responsibilities and possible responses

et al. 2019

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This precarity debate intends to raise the following questions by proposing an introduction and three replies that come from tenured and non‐tenured track anthropologists. The aim is to think critically about precarity within academia: What does it mean to be a precarious researcher in today's academia, which is ruled by a predatory system? How can this situation be framed in terms of shared responsibilities? Could solidarity and unionisation get us out of this situation?

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Precarious Academic Labour in Germany: Termed Contracts and a New Berufsverbot

Cited by 17 publications

References 0 publications

Feminization of Resistance: Reclaiming the Affective and the Indefinite as Counter-Strategy in Academic Labor Activism

Feminization of Resistance: Reclaiming the Affective and the Indefinite as Counter-Strategy in Academic Labor Activism

The communicative power of trade unionism: labour law, political opportunity structure and social movement strategy

Precarity without borders: visions of hope, shared responsibilities and possible responses

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