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Mobile with an agency: Negotiating the spatiotemporalities of the temp migrant worker
Mid Sweden University, Faculty of Human Sciences, Department of Tourism Studies and Geography.ORCID iD: 0000-0001-6176-3595
Universitetet i Oslo, Norge.
Universitetet i Oslo, Norge.
Mid Sweden University, Faculty of Human Sciences, Department of Social Sciences.
2018 (English)In: Geoforum, ISSN 0016-7185, E-ISSN 1872-9398, Vol. 93, p. 40-47, article id GEOF_2541Article in journal (Refereed) Published
Abstract [en]

Several calls have been made by labour geographers in support for a more thorough investigation and theorization of labour as an active agent in the production of economic geographies. The present paper responds to this challenge by examining how Swedish agency warehouse workers and temp nurses working in Norway act and think in relation to mobility and how certain spatiotemporalities come into play in the mobility agency of individual workers. Though we are particularly concerned with the ambiguities involved in the relationship between mobility, agency and power, a second objective is to contribute to the theorization of how space and time matters to mobile workers. Drawing on data from twenty interviews with Swedish temp nurses and six focus group interviews with Swedish agency warehouse workers, and by combining several strands of literature ranging from current research on mobilities and migration to the work of classical scholars in geography and sociology, we propose that a ‘trialectics of spatiotemporalities’ is part and parcel of workers’ mobility agency. Furthermore, our findings suggest that the purposive agency as emphasized for instance by the notion of ‘mobility strategy’ needs to be complemented by a conceptualization of agency that includes what we term (erratic) probing. We conclude that labour mobility may be strategic and a sign of power, but not always and everywhere, and not in any pure sense.

Place, publisher, year, edition, pages
Elsevier, 2018. Vol. 93, p. 40-47, article id GEOF_2541
Keywords [en]
labour mobility, agency, spatiotemporalities, migrant worker, Norway, Sweden
National Category
Social Sciences
Identifiers
URN: urn:nbn:se:miun:diva-33615DOI: 10.1016/j.geoforum.2018.05.003ISI: 000441117400005Scopus ID: 2-s2.0-85046693447Local ID: ETOUROAI: oai:DiVA.org:miun-33615DiVA, id: diva2:1205642
Projects
The Impact of Temporary Work Agencies on the Politics of Work
Funder
The Research Council of Norway, 227021Available from: 2018-05-14 Created: 2018-05-14 Last updated: 2018-09-26Bibliographically approved

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Zampoukos, KristinaOlofsdotter, Gunilla

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