Suchergebnisse

Employability has gained renewed attention in contemporary political discussions during the last ten years. The concept has emerged as a signifier which has replaced the previous way of describing the workforce, thereby producing different kinds of pictures of whom is a desirable worker. This article aims to gain a broader understanding of how discourses on employability position care workers in elderly care as responsible for their own employability. Drawing on the Foucauldian concept of governmentality, transnational policy texts and interview transcripts from interviews with care workers are analysed and compared. The main questions are: How are care workers in elderly care made responsible for their own employability and how does this relate to the responsibility assigned to entities such as employers and the state?

This paper outlines the origins and development of union learning representatives (ULRs). It summarises recent research on their profile, role and impact. ULRs have been increasingly recognised by government as intermediaries that can engage with "hard-to-reach" employees and help stimulate and meet their demand for learning and skills. The paper also considers the role of the ULR in relation to trade union representative and public administrative functions. It concludes that a statutory framework is now required which optimises union and ULR leverage on employers over the provision of learning and skills.

Faced with a declining workforce, why does the Swedish Social Democratic Party (SAP) oppose employer proposals for increased labor migration from non-EU countries? This article explores whether perspectives on policymaking in the varieties of capitalism (VoC) literature can account for this puzzle. VoC scholars maintain that policymakers prefer reforms conforming to the national political economy, improving firm capacity and ensuring better economic performance. Employers are also thought to support policies incentivecompatible with the prevailing model of capitalism. My analysis shows that while the SAP backed labor migration policies compatible with the Swedish coordinated market economy, it did not do so for reasons of efficiency or economic performance. The SAP fears that liberal reform, preferred by employers, will damage the Swedish model, undermine active labor market policies and weaken unions. The case of Swedish labor migration policy underscores how economic reform reflects political conflict and not the desire to preserve equilibrium.