University of Hertfordshire Business School: 7th March, Is there a European Precariat? Debate between Guy Standing and Kevin Doogan

Is there a European Precariat?

The Research Forum will take the form of  a debate between Guy
Standing (Professor of Economic Security at Bath University) and Kevin
Doogan (Jean Monnet Professor of European Policy Studies at Bristol
University) on the question  “Is there a  European Precariat?”

With the current economic and financial crises across Europe this
debate will be of considerable interest to staff,  students and
visitors.

Professor Guy Standing is author of The Precariat: The New Dangerous
Class (2011, Bloomsbury.  He argues the case for the presence of a
global Precariat – an emerging class comprising the rapidly growing
number of people facing lives of insecurity, moving in and out of
menial jobs that give little meaning to their lives. The instabilities
this can produce could lead, Guy argues, to a ‘politics of inferno’.
To avoid this we have to reconstruct the concept of work in the 21st
Century.

Professor Kevin Doogan is author of New Capitalism?  The
Transformation of Work (Polity 2009) and will argue a different case,
posing a critique of theories of increasing precariousness in
employment. We are told that companies are outsourcing, jobs are
migrating to China and India, and  job for life is a thing of the
past. Kevin argues that the resulting precariousness is not a natural
consequence of a fast changing global economy, but a manufactured set
of insecurities which come from neoliberal policies and the exposure
of the economy to market forces.

Larry Elliot, Economics Editor of the Guardian, who was awarded an
Honorary DLitt by the University in November 2011 and is a Visiting
Fellow in the Business School, will Chair the debate.

Registrations begins at 5.30 with tea and coffee, the debate will
start at 6.00pm with refreshments/networking taking place afterwards
between 7.30-8.30

Participation in the event is free but places must be booked.

For more information or to book your place contact bs.events@herts.ac.uk