Bending over Backwards: Flexibility, Freedom, and Domination in Contemporary Work

In October 2011 a report commissioned by Downing Street, arguing that the UK government should ban unfair dismissal compensation to boost economic growth, sparked outrage among unions and senior members of the Liberal Democrats. In response to the furor, the Prime Minister's official spokesperson stated that the government was going to review [existing employment law] so that employers and employees can ensure they have maximum flexibility whilst protecting fairness and providing a competitive environment that we need for enterprise and growth. Earlier that year, but on the other side of the Atlantic, the state of Wisconsin passed a law dramatically restricting the collective bargaining rights of most state, county, and municipal workers. The office of the recently elected Republican governor, Scott Walker, explained that the reform had addressed the state's fiscal crisis by reducing 'government spending, while giving government increased flexibility to provide services.' These statements provide just two examples of the pervasiveness of the idea of flexibility in contemporary political and economic discourse. In fact, following Nancy Fraser, we might say that flexibilization (the process of rendering institutions and individuals flexible) is a 'ubiquitous buzzword of globalization.' As the two examples suggest, flexibility serves as a guiding principle of almost unquestionable value thanks to its connotations of freedom and efficiency. Like most buzzwords, moreover, flexibility arguably draws its rhetorical power from the ease with which different actors can assign meanings to it that align with their own interests. The apparently amorphous character of flexibility, however, should not lead us to dismiss it as just another piece of management-speak, lacking substance or effect. On the contrary, this essay shows that flexibility lies at the center of the neoliberal organization of work and labor markets, and its construction of subjects as workers. Adapted from the source document.