Labour and Inequality

Workers in Arms by Thomas Hawk

People engage in a whole range of livelihood activities and our contemporary societies are inhabited by manifold laborers, who are insecure, precarious and stable, waged and unwaged, formal and informal, bonded and free. Labour relations are shaped, determined and constantly re-arranged by evolving economic, social and political processes and labourers are engaged in various struggles involving state, market, capital and workers themselves. As capital and labour accumulation is an intrinsically uneven process it produces a wide range of inequalities.

GRIP’s focus on labour and inequality has been dedicated to tracing historical developments of labour movements, shedding light on the current challenges of labour, as well as thinking about the future forms and equality-struggles in relation to labour as we are currently witnessing a reimagination and rearticulation of structures of labour, new divisions of labour and labour identities, changing organizational forms and alliances connected to labour, new ideas around value production and resource consumption, in addition to mobilization of dispossessed populations by different political forces. As the components shaping the labour relations are changing along with the social, economic and political relations behind the production and accumulation, it is important to keep a lens on the myriad of ways labour and inequality are interlinked.

GRIP initiated the thematic focus on labour and inequality in relation to the 2023 GRIP Annual Lecture and continuously works on the topic through various public engagements, writings and other academic initiatives.