Demande et emploi dans les chaînes d'approvisionnement mondiales

L'essor des chaînes d'approvisionnement mondiales (CAM) éloigne l'emploi de la demande, géographiquement et sectoriellement. Pour mieux comprendre le phénomène, les auteurs mesurent l'emploi lié aux CAM selon sa localisation et celle de la demande, en se fondant sur les données de la base WIOD et en complétant les estimations déjà présentées par le BIT. L'analyse porte sur la période 1995–2013 et sur 40 économies. Elle montre que la Chine, principale bénéficiaire de la demande liée aux CAM autrefois, contribue maintenant à l'alimenter, tout comme les relations de production entre économies émergentes. En outre, le poids des services liés à une demande manufacturière augmente.     

Promouvoir le pouvoir collectif des travailleurs dans les réseaux de production mondialisés: retour sur une occasion manquée

L'auteur s'interroge sur la capacité des ONG de renforcer le pouvoir collectif du travail au sein des réseaux de production mondialisés en utilisant leur pouvoir de pression sur les multinationales pour lancer des programmes d'élections de comités de travailleurs dans les usines. Sur la base d'une enquête empirique menée entre 2012 et 2019 dans le sud de la Chine, il montre que ces programmes ont permis de sensibiliser les travailleurs à l'action collective et de renforcer leur agentivité, mais que l'inégalité structurelle du système de production, l'absence de protection institutionnelle en faveur des représentants élus et le durcissement du régime ont empêché qu'ils perdurent.     

Anticiper ou temporiser : injonctions environnementales et recompositions des identités professionnelles en céréaliculture

Questions about the modernization of farming, given its environmental impact, are leading French farmers to rework their occupational identities. This is studied by comparing cereal growers who practice “integrated protection” — a form of agriculture that saves on input — with their “conventional” colleagues. Given the high degree of uncertainty about the standards that will be imposed, cereal farmers have adopted positions that contrast with regard to: the future (anticipating vs. stalling for time), “professional excellence” (whether or not to accept lower yields) and risks (whether to adopt strategies turned toward vigilance or toward insurance). The diffusion of innovative farming practices is limited owing to their lack of legitimacy, which leads farmers to explore the possibilities for obtaining legitimation from outside the profession.     

Les réseaux de PME en Argentine : une voie alternative ?

Do small businesses in Argentina really form “local networks of production” similar to those in Italy? Institutional, regional (public or private) networks of support for small businesses are identified along with the strategies of various parties and the sorts of agreements worked out between them. A survey of small business networks in four areas chosen for the variety of their output and for their positions in the market and in the chain of production shows that regional networks lack consolidation, except in the Mendoza area, where small businesses, big firms, universities and private as well as public institutions function in an “integrated” network. — Special issue: Latin America.     

Deux définitions de la collégialité et leur articulation: le cas d’un diocèse catholique

Against the background of the conflict observed between managers and professionals, two definitions of collegiality are identified: on the one hand, as a specific organizational form (bottom up) and, on the other, as a procedure of bureaucratic management (top down). A study of networks of priests in a catholic diocese in France is used to explore how these two definitions are related. Questions are raised about the effects of a too narrow organizational rationalization that uses collegiality only as a top down, bureaucratic managerial procedure. This always entails the risk of making the work done by experts sterile because it overlooks the first type of collegiality, which is based on the nature of the nonroutine tasks that members perform jointly thanks to an endogenous organizational structure of a bottom up type.     

L'émergence d'un nouveau mode de gouvernement local des réseaux en Allemagne. Une ville moyenne et son Stadtwerk face au processus de libéralisation

On the basis of a long-term study of a Stadtwerk located in a middle-sized town, questions are raised about changes in the local governance of networks in Germany. Neoliberal reforms and the budgetary crisis at the communal level are powerful factors driving change, which, for municipal authorities, reflects not a loss of power as such but a transformation of the relations it used to have with its Stadtwerk. A new type of interaction is emerging; it is much more formalized and based on standing relatively clear of politics. Municipal authorities are taking back the role of strategic and financial leadership that had been downplayed during the previous period characterized by a monopoly and communal prosperity.     

La sociologie du travail en Amérique latine : un essai de périodisation

Even though some areas in Latin America were already industrialized in the 1930s, labor sociology did not appear there till after WW II. Although this discipline followed in the tracks of its North American or European predecessors, the region’s history has affected its development. Three historical phases over the past half century draw attention: industrialization by replacing imported merchandise with goods produced by national firms; the authoritarian governments or military dictatorships that put a halt to the developing homeland economy; and the competitive restructuring that is programming the abandonment of public firms and advocating an export-driven economic model. During each phase, new questions have arisen but without making ideas from the preceding phase obsolete. — Special issue: Latin America.