Reproductive Work, Territorial Commons and Political Precarity in Peripheral Extractive Sites in Ecuador and Bolivia

This article examines the labour and political dimensions of non-salaried women workers in the extractive peripheries of Bolivia and Ecuador, to show how the appropriation of racialised and gendered work is a foundational aspect of the extractive logic of capital. We consider extraction in its broadest sense as the dispossession not only of resources but also of informal and reproductive work, and examine the ways in which the territorialised commons produced by, and necessary for, the interdependent activities to sustain life also form the basis of political identification and organisation. Territories as the making of places are fundamental for the constitution of marginalised collective identities. In peripheral sites where extractive logics have been socio-culturally and institutionally established, the literal and figurative common grounds for women’s social reproduction are reduced, individualising livelihoods and increasing physical, economic and subjective vulnerability. As such, the extraction of resources and of territorialised networks intersects with the historical appropriation of reproductive work to configure both material and political precarity. KEYWORDS: informal work; reproductive labour; extractivism; territory; commons

Precarising Formality: Understanding Current Labour Developments in Chile

More than forty years ago, the Chilean economy led the way in a process of flexibilising and privatising a wide range of areas: finance, pensions, education, work and so on. In 1990, with the end of Pinochet’s dictatorship, Chile continued to pursue neo-liberal economic policies and maintained the liberal conception of collective labour rights (imposed in 1979). By 2017, labour informality in Chile was among the lowest in South America. Taking these two factors into account (labour regulation that benefited business spending cuts and only “moderate” informality), this article explores the following questions: What are the features of current forms of labour formality in a paradigmatic neo-liberal context like Chile’s, and what space does informality occupy? Is labour formality far removed from the kind of vulnerability usually associated with informality? How have formality and informality related to each other in Chile in recent years? We address these questions with mixed methods: a literature review, development of a conceptual proposal, processing of statistical data and case studies. We conclude that a particular kind of labour formality currently prevails in Chile, which we call precarising formality. This concept disputes the traditional idea of labour formality, both because labour regulations lack substance and because they are ineffective, which is, of course, politically produced. We consider it precarising based on an analysis of multiple dimensions of precarity in contexts of theoretical labour formality. The article also describes forms of struggle and resistance by workers’ organisations that protest against capitalist action from within this new configuration of labour. KEYWORDS: formality; informality; labour precarity; Chile

Rethinking Working-class Politics: Organising Informal Workers in Argentina

Our article engages with discussions about the implications of precarious work and its impact on workers’ capacity to organise by analysing the case of Argentina’s Confederation of Popular Economy Workers (CTEP, Confederación de Trabajadores de la Economía Popular). The organisation was created in 2011 with the aim of representing a broad and heterogeneous group of workers in varying conditions of informality, precarious self-employment and workfare programmes. We trace the history of the organisation and analyse its development by focusing on the role of social assistance as a crucial expression of the changing relations between precarious workers and the state. Social assistance has provided some resources for addressing the reproduction needs of precarious workers and of the territories in which they live, and also the material means through which an organisation like CTEP has sought to consolidate its political work among precarious workers. Nonetheless, social assistance has also worked as a means to circumscribe broader demands for change into issues to be addressed through social policy. Our argument is that central to CTEP’s trajectory as an organisation of precarious workers was its attempt to break away from the narrow confines of social assistance, pushing for changes that would allow its members to gain some autonomy both materially and institutionally. KEYWORDS: Argentina; precarious worker organisations; CTEP; social assistance policy

The Fragility of the Labour Corridors to Costa Rica and the United States: Precarious Migrant Workers in Central America

Central American migration flows take place mostly through two main corridors: the northern corridor to the United States, and the southern corridor to Costa Rica. Using the concept of fragility, in this article I analyse how migration combines the precarity and vulnerability that Central American workers face, both in their home country and in the corridors toward the destination labour markets. Their movements and the conditions they encounter reflect a new scale of local and transnational labour relationships. Migrant workers constitute a segment of the workforce in transnational corridors, which circulates between several informal activities but also among key sectors of the formal economy; the latter often takes advantage of their social, occupational and even legal difficulties. Keywords: Central America; migrant workers; labour markets; informal economy; labour corridors