TRANSCENDING THE DEPICTION OF MARKET AND NON-MARKET LABOUR PRACTICES, EXPLORING COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT AND THE IMPLICATIONS FOR DE-GROWTH

Colin C Williams : Professor of Public Policy, School of Management, University of Sheffield, 9 Mappin Street Sheffield S1 4DT, UK, E-mail: C.C.Williams@sheffield.ac.uk

Presented byDr. Richard J White : Senior Lecturer in Economic Geography, Faculty of Development and Society, Sheffield Hallam University, City Campus, Howard Street, Sheffield, S1 1WB, UK , Telephone +44(0)114 2252899, E-mail: Richard.White@shu.ac.uk

Second International Conference on Degrowth, Barcelona March 2010

Part I: Moving beyond the economic binary framework

Part II: The geographies of community engagement and their relevance for de-growth.

 Part III toward a Total Social

Organization Labour (TSOL) approach to community self-help

"The Economy haunts and constrains us as social beings – we find our life pathways and visions of social possibility hemmed and hampered by its singular capitalist identity"

J.K. Gibson-Graham (2001) An Ethics of the Local

• "Escaping from the economy: the politics of degrowth"

(Fournier, 2008)

• Putting the economy in its place

"The iceberg model places the reputation of economics as a comprehensive and scientific body of knowledge under critical suspicion for its narrow focus and mystifying effects."

Useful but…

Problematising this formal/ informal binary hierarchy

"The informal economy considers those diverse forms of work and activities that exist beyond formal employment""

Conventional Representations

Formal (Superordinate) Informal (Subservient)

Capitalist Pre-Capitalist

Advanced Primitive

Progressive Residual

Mainstream Marginal

Dynamic Stagnant

Strong Weak

Forward Backward

Extensive Limited

Growth De-growth

Community self-help"Not-for-profit motivated help provided for and by friends, neighbours or other members of ones' community either on (1) and individual basis or (ii) through more organised collective groups and associations.

Unpaid domestic work

More formal institutions charged with delivering services on a paid or statutory basis

Community self-help is the basis upon which communities survive, thrive and evolve

The moral foundations of society are built upon reciprocity

The dependency culture is corrosive of society The state as a welfare provider is in crisis

Burns et al (2004: 6)

Community Self-help Focuses on:

The RealThe local

People (and empowered relations with others)

Community engagement is a common coping strategy to achieve material, social and emotional ends

Identities

The 'Natural', 'The Instinctive'

The Known, the Familiar

Negotiated space

Informal community engagement

Formal community engagement

More desired/ mature participatory culture of engagement

One-to-one reciprocity represents inferior/ immature/ undeveloped cultures of engagement

"Few people go straight...(into) active engagement with their neighbourhood... Most are on a ladder of involvement, with simple acts of good neighbourliness at one end and a regular commitment with a formal or voluntary organisation...at the other. (Home Office, 1999: 30)

Recognising the complex multi-layered 'reality' of the types of

community engagement

Acknowledging how participatory cultures vary spatially

Illustrating how "mainstream" and "alternative" forms of engagement do

not occupy discrete realms

1. Formal paid job in public, private or

voluntary sectore.g., formal job in

voluntary organisation

FORMAL

2. Informal employmente.g., wholly

undeclared waged employment; under-

declared formal employment (e.g.,

undeclared overtime); informal self-employment

3. Paid community exchanges

e.g., paid favours for friends, neighbours

& acquaintances

4. Paid household/ family work

e.g., paid exchanges within the family

INFORMAL

5. Formal unpaid work in public,

private & voluntary sector

e.g., unpaid work in formal community-

based group; unpaid internship

6. Informal unpaid work in public,

private & voluntary sector

e.g., unpaid children’s soccer

coach without formal police check

7. One-to-one unpaid community

exchanges

e.g., unpaid kinship exchange,

neighbourly favour

8. Unpaid domestic work

e.g., self-provisioning of care within household

Typology of forms of community engagement in the total social organisation of labour (TSOL) PAID

UNPAID

Complex, multi-layered interpretations begin to emerge Unpaid community engagement higher in affluent areas Informal community engagement more popular in deprived areas Formal groups rarely figure in material coping practices

Deprived localities engage more in: Informal unpaid activity (e.g. caring for groups of children on an unregistered

basis) Paid favours for kin, friends, neighbours and acquaintances "Illegitimate" forms of community engagement

Vast majority of literature on the voluntary and community sectors has concentrated almost exclusively on unpaid and legitimate forms of community

engagement. Obvious policy implications arise from this…

English Localities Survey (861 face-to face interviews, 1988-2001, rural & urban, deprived & affluent, 44 tasks investigated)

Rethinking community engagement as a spectrum of types

In deprived neighbourhoods there is a need to :

Nurture one-to-one aid Legitimise those who are engaged in remunerated forms

of community involvement (i.e. tally system needed when people conduct favours for each other)

Local Exchange and Trading Schemes (LETS)

Time Banks

There is a great need to recognise how popular binary representations & conceptual frameworks are fundamental in: Framing, de-legitimising and limiting debate and discussion

Overlooking the complex realities of our contemporary economic spaces and

Closing-down the possibility of imagining and harnessing other complex economic futures

In two important ways TSOL acts as a welcome and significant:• Movement away from the stable/ bounded binary

hierarchical debates• Theoretical and policy-making framework for re-thinking

the 'spaces' which we can constructively target for de-growth as well as providing welcome signs of a significant convivial economy that many see as desirable, and wish to harness.

Fournier, V., 2008. Escaping form the economy: the politics of degrowth. International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy, 28, 11/12, pp 528-545

Gibson-Graham, J. K. (2006) A diverse economy: rethinking economy and economic representation (available at http://www.communityeconomies.org/papers/rethink/rethink7diverse.pdf last accessed 12.03.10)

Glucksmann, M., 2005. Shifting boundaries and interconnections: extending the "total social organisation of labour", The Sociological Review, 52, 2, pp. 19-36.

White, R.J. 2009. Explaining why the non-commodified sphere of mutual aid is so pervasive in the advanced economies: some case study evidence from an English City.

International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy, Vol. 29., Nos. 9/10, pp. 457-472

Williams, C.C., 2009. Unravelling cultures of community engagement: a geographically-nuanced approach, paper presented to the ESRC-funded seminar Re-mixing the economy of welfare: what is emerging beyond the market and state?, Nottingham Trent University, 11th November 2009

Williams, C.C. 2004. A Commodified World? Mapping the limits of capitalism, London: Zed

Williams, C.C. Round, J. and Rogers, P., 2007. Beyond the formal/ informal economy binary hierarchy, The International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy, Vol. 34, no. 6, pp. 402-414

Richard J WhiteSenior Lecturer in Economic GeographySheffield Hallam University

E-mail: Richard.white@shu.ac.uk

Colin C WilliamsProfessor of Public PolicySchool of ManagementUniversity of Sheffield

E-mail: C.C.Williams@sheffield.ac.uk