From April 18th KSU is organizing a reading group series about “Work in the 21st Century – Changing labour relations in Holland”. Sign up here

2nd Session: Basic introduction and framework to thinking about “Work”

The idea of this session is to bring everyone onto more or less the same regarding ideas and ways of thinking about “work”. We will read 2 or 3 texts (links will be provided asap). Which will provide and (various?) introductory frameworks.

About the reading group:

Would you like to have more background knowledge about the changing world around you and try and understand it better? Are the mainstream media and your studies no great help? Then this reading group is for you! We will collectively decide which specific texts and topics to study and discuss with the group.

The reading groups will be in English, and consist of five meetings, held once every two weeks on Wednesday evening in the book store de Rooie Rat, Oudegracht 65.

Topics we will certainly consider, depending on the interests of the group, include the precarity of the modern worker, the position of labour migrants and its relation to that of the native workers, the developments in retirement and pension regulations, the effect and
place of education and the dichotomy between the higher and lower educated labour classes and the effects of and developments in unemployment. Further issues that we may want to address would be wage determination, class struggles, trends and perspectives on working hours (should they be longer or shorter), the effects of automation, worker cooperatives, the difference between material and immaterial labour and a comparison of the interests of blue-collar and white-collar labourers. In principle the focus will be on Dutch labour relations. Of course any topics that you would want to address are up for debate!