Hostname: page-component-8448b6f56d-m8qmq Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-19T08:35:57.425Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Autonomous precarity or precarious autonomy? Dilemmas of young workers in Hong Kong

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2023

Victor Wong  and
Tat Chor Au-Yeung
Victor Wong*
Affiliation:
Hong Kong Baptist University, Hong Kong
Tat Chor Au-Yeung
Affiliation:
The University of Sheffield, UK
*
Victor Wong, Department of Social Work, Hong Kong Baptist University, Academic and Administrative Building, 15 Baptist University Road, Kowloon Tong, Kowloon 999077, Hong Kong. Email: vicwong@hkbu.edu.hk
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Informed by autonomist perspectives on precarious work and labour subjectivity, this article discusses the dynamics between autonomy and job precarity. Based on purposive sampling, the qualitative findings, drawn from interviews with precarious workers aged 18–29 years in Hong Kong, reveal tensions among four types of aspirations. First, the desire for achieving freedom and individual ambition in work made the respondents critical of the notion of employment-related stability. Second, a determination to break with mainstream career paths empowered young people to take alternative pathways to new modes of work and life. Third, precarious employment was seen as a stepping stone for realising plans for travel or study. Finally, tolerance of precarity was perceived as a transitional stage in their striving for future stability. However, the findings also show the structured dilemmas experienced by young workers regarding the complex relationship between autonomy and precarity in a neoliberal labour market. Some young workers pursued work–life autonomy, constrained by precarious employment relations, acknowledging and bearing the costs, while some strategically used precarity in individual negotiations with employers to realise their goals. This article analyses young workers’ subjectivity through the lenses of autonomy and age and pushes the boundary of precarity studies beyond an implicit dichotomy between determinism and voluntarism.

Keywords

I38J38J62Autonomismcreative workHong Konglabour market flexibilitylabour subjectivityneoliberalismnon-unionised workprecarious workprecarityworker autonomyyoung workersyouth labour market
Type
Youth precarity
Information
The Economic and Labour Relations Review , Volume 30 , Issue 2: Symposia: Australian Regulatory Failure: Labour Markets and Banking Practice Youth Precarity , June 2019 , pp. 241 - 261
Copyright
© The Author(s) 2019

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Amable, B (2011) Morals and politics in the ideology of neo-liberalism. Socio-Cconomic Review 9(1): 3–30.Google Scholar
Armano, E, Murgia, A (2013) The precariousnesses of young knowledge workers: a subject-oriented approach. Global Discourse 3(3–4): 486–501.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Berg, BL (2009) Qualitative Research Methods for the Social Sciences. Boston, MA: Allyn and Bacon.Google Scholar
Bloom, P (2016) Authoritarian Capitalism in the Age of Globalization. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bove, A, Murgia, A, Armano, E (2017) Mapping precariousness: subjectivities and resistance. In: Armano, E, Bove, A, Murgia, A (eds) Mapping Precariousness, Labour Insecurity and Uncertain Livelihoods. London: Routledge, pp. 1–12.Google Scholar
Bowring, F (2004) From the mass worker to the multitude: a theoretical contextualisation of Hardt and Negri’s. Empire.capital & Class 28(2): 101–132.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bruff, I (2014) The rise of authoritarian neoliberalism. Rethinking Marxism 26(1): 113–129.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Burrows, S (2013) Precarious work, neo-liberalism and young people’s experiences of employment in the Illawarra region. The Economic and Labour Relations Review 24(3): 380–396.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cahill, D (2014) The End of Laissez-faire? On the Durability of Embedded Neoliberalism. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar.Google Scholar
Campbell, I, Price, R (2016) Precarious work and precarious workers: towards an improved conceptualisation. The Economic and Labour Relations Review 27(3): 314–332.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Census and Statistics Department, Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (2002) Hong Kong 2001 Population Census – Thematic Report: Youths. Available at: https://www.statistics.gov.hk/pub/B11200292001XXXXB0100.pdf (accessed 27 February 2019).Google Scholar
Census and Statistics Department, Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (2008) Hong Kong 2006 Population By-Census – Thematic Report: Youths. Available at: https://www.statistics.gov.hk/pub/B11200522006XXXXB0300.pdf (accessed 27 February 2019).Google Scholar
Census and Statistics Department, Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (2012 [2009]) The movement of the unemployment rate (annual). Available at: https://www.censtatd.gov.hk/hkstat/sub/sp200.jsp?productCode=FA100095 (accessed 26 February 2019).Google Scholar
Census and Statistics Department, Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (2013) Hong Kong 2011 Population Census – Thematic Report: Youths. Available at: https://www.statistics.gov.hk/pub/B11200632013XXXXB0100.pdf (accessed 27 February 2019).Google Scholar
Census and Statistics Department, Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (2017 [2013]) The profile of the unemployed population, Hong Kong (annual). Available at: https://www.censtatd.gov.hk/hkstat/sub/sp200.jsp?productCode=FA100095 (accessed 26 February 2019).Google Scholar
Census and Statistics Department, Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (2018 [2014]) Hong Kong Annual Digest of Statistics (annual). Available at: https://www.censtatd.gov.hk/hkstat/sub/sp140.jsp?productCode=B1010003 (accessed 27 February 2019).Google Scholar
Census and Statistics Department, Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (2018) Hong Kong 2016 Population By-Census – Thematic Report: Youths. Available at: https://www.statistics.gov.hk/pub/B11201042016XXXXB0100.pdf (accessed 27 February 2019).Google Scholar
Chan, RK (2016) From transitional to permanent uncertainty: employability of middle-aged workers in Hong Kong. Asian Social Work and Policy Review 10(3): 358–374.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chan, S (2013) ‘I am King’: Financialisation and the paradox of precarious work. The Economic and Labour Relations Review 24(3): 362–379.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
de Peuter, G, Cohen, NS (2015) Emerging labour politics in creative industries. In: Oakley, K, O’Connor, J (eds) The Routledge Companion to the Cultural Industries. London: Routledge, pp. 305–318.Google Scholar
Eden, D (2012) Autonomy: Capitalism, Class and Politics. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Esser, I, Olsen, KM (2012) Perceived job quality: autonomy and job security within a multi-level framework. European Sociological Review 28(4): 443–454.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Farrugia, D (2018) Youthfulness and immaterial labour in the new economy. The Sociological Review 66(3): 511–526.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Frase, P (2013) The precariat: a class or a condition? New Labor Forum 22(2): 11–14.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Frayne, D (2015) The Refusal of Work: The Theory and Practice of Resistance to Work. London: Zed Books.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gill, R, Pratt, A (2008) In the social factory? Immaterial labour, precariousness and cultural work. Theory, Culture & Society 25(7–8): 1–30.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gorz, A (1999) Reclaiming Work: Beyond the Wage-based Society. Cambridge: Polity Press.Google Scholar
Greer, I (2016) Welfare reform, precarity and the re-commodification of labour. Work, Employment and Society 30(1): 162–173.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hardt, M, Negri, A (2000) Empire. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Hardt, M, Negri, A (2004) Multitude: War and Democracy in the Age of Empire. New York: Penguin Press.Google Scholar
Hodder, A, Fullin, G, Kahmann, M, et al . (2018) Walking the tightrope: the imperatives of balancing control and autonomy for young worker groups. Work and Occupations 45(4): 475–500.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jørgensen, MB (2016) Precariat – what it is and isn’t – towards an understanding of what it does. Critical Sociology 42(7–8): 959–974.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Junankar, PN (2015) The impact of the Global Financial Crisis on youth unemployment. The Economic and Labour Relations Review 26(2): 191–217.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kalleberg, AL (2018) Precarious Lives: Job Insecurity and Well-being in Rich Democracies. Cambridge: Polity Press.Google Scholar
Kalleberg, AL, Hewison, K (2013) Precarious work and the challenge for Asia. American Behavioral Scientist 57(3): 271–288.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kalleberg, AL, Vallas, SP (2017) Probing precarious work: theory, research, and politics. In: Kalleberg, AL, Vallas, SP (eds) Precarious Work (Research in the Sociology of Work: Volume 31). Emerald Publishing Limited, pp. 1–30.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kretsos, L (2010) The persistent pandemic of precariousness: young people at work. In: Tremmel, J (ed) A Young Generation Under Pressure? Berlin: Springer, pp. 3–21.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lee, CK, Kofman, Y (2012) The politics of precarity: views beyond the United States. Work and Occupations 39(4): 388–408.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lopes, H, Lagoa, S, Calapez, T (2014) Work autonomy, work pressure, and job satisfaction: an analysis of European Union countries. The Economic and Labour Relations Review 25(2): 306–326.Google Scholar
McDonald, P, Pini, B, Bailey, J, et al . (2011) Young people’s aspirations for education, work, family and leisure. Work, Employment and Society 25(1): 68–84.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
MacDonald, R (2016) Precarious work: the growing precarité of youth. In: Furlong, A (ed) Routledge Handbook of Youth and Young Adulthood. London: Routledge, pp. 156–163.Google Scholar
Maxwell, J (2013) Qualitative Research Design: An Interactive Approach (3rd ed). Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications.Google Scholar
Means, AJ (2017) Generational precarity, education, and the crisis of capitalism: conventional, neo-Keynesian, and Marxian perspectives. Critical Sociology 43(3): 339–354.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Misra, J, Walters, K (2016) All fun and cool clothes? Youth workers’ consumer identity in clothing retail. Work and Occupations 43(3): 294–325.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mojsoska-Blazevski, N, Petreski, M, Bojadziev, M (2017) Youth survival in the labour market: employment scarring in three transition economies. The Economic and Labour Relations Review 28(2): 312–331.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Morgan, G, Wood, J, Nelligan, P (2013) Beyond the vocational fragments: creative work, precarious labour and the idea of ‘flexploitation’. The Economic and Labour Relations Review 24(3): 397–415.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Munford, R, Sanders, J (2019) Harm, opportunity, optimism: young people’s negotiation of precarious circumstances. International Social Work 62(1): 185–197.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Neilson, B, Rossiter, N (2008) Precarity as a political concept, or, Fordism as exception. Theory, Culture & Society 25(7–8): 51–72.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ng, SH, Ip, O (2011) Labour markets in Hong Kong – changes and advances after the 1997 reunification with China. In: Benson, J, Zhu, Y (eds) The Dynamics of Asian Labour Markets–balancing Control and Flexibility. Abingdon: Routledge, pp. 107–133.Google Scholar
Nunez, I, Livanos, I (2015) Temps ‘by choice’? An investigation of the reasons behind temporary employment among young workers in Europe. Journal of Labor Research 36(1): 44–66.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Prosser, T (2016) Dualization or liberalization? Investigating precarious work in eight European countries. Work, Employment and Society 30(6): 949–965.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Quinlan, M (2012) The ‘pre-invention’ of precarious employment: the changing world of work in context. The Economic and Labour Relations Review 23(4): 3–24.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rubery, J, Keizer, A, Grimshaw, D (2016) Flexibility bites back: the multiple and hidden costs of flexible employment policies. Human Resource Management Journal 26(3): 235–251.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Standing, G (2011) The Precariat: The Dangerous New Class. London: Bloomsbury Academic.Google Scholar
Stewart, A, Stanford, J (2017) Regulating work in the gig economy: what are the options? The Economic and Labour Relations Review 28(3): 420–437.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tam, M, Ip, CY (2017) Experience and coping of employment risks in Hong Kong. International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy 37(3–4): 166–185.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tomlinson, J, Baird, M, Berg, P, et al . (2018) Flexible careers across the life course: advancing theory, research and practice. Human Relations 71(1): 4–22.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tridico, P (2017) Inequality in Financial Capitalism. New York: Routledge.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Trott, B (2013) From the precariat to the multitude. Global Discourse 3(3–4): 406–425.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Vallas, S, Christin, A (2018) Work and identity in an era of precarious employment: How workers respond to ‘personal branding’ discourse. Work and Occupations 45(1): 3–37.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Vallas, S, Prener, C (2012) Dualism, job polarization, and the social construction of precarious work. Work and Occupations 39(4): 331–353.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Weeks, K (2011) The Problem with Work: Feminism, Marxism, Antiwork Politics, and Postwork Imaginaries. Durham: Duke University Press.Google Scholar
Wheatley, D (2017) Autonomy in paid work and employee subjective well-being. Work and Occupations 44(3): 296–328.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Williams, CL, Connell, C (2010) ‘Looking good and sounding right;: aesthetic labor and social inequality in the retail industry. Work and Occupations 37(3): 349–377.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wilson, S, Ebert, N (2013) Precarious work: economic, sociological and political perspectives. The Economic and Labour Relations Review 24(3): 263–278.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wong, V, Au-Yeung, TC (2018) Expediting youth’s entry into employment whilst overlooking precariousness: flexi-employability and disciplinary activation in Hong Kong. Social Policy & Administration Early View. Epub ahead of print 8 July. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/spol.12418.Google Scholar
Xia, B (2018) Capital accumulation and work in China’s internet content industry: struggling in the bubble. The Economic and Labour Relations Review 29(4): 501–520.CrossRefGoogle Scholar