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The work of Anthony Giddens is indicative of much contemporary social and political theory which posits the new neo-liberal global order as the paradigm of progress. Giddens' theoretical arguments, concerning reflexive modernisation and the virtues of the third way, have become hugely influential, not only in academia but, more significantly, within political circles: underpinning, among others, the former Clinton administration, Schroder's Social Democrats and the policies of the New Labour government. This paper argues however that structuration - the theory which underpins Giddens' sociological take on the world - is inherently flawed and is inadequate in accounting for many of the real issues of power and inequality that many individuals face in today's world. As such, it is argued that, in appropriating the core principles of this flawed sociological interpretation of human behaviour, the third way promoted by New Labour serves to legitimize rather than to regulate the structuring principles of economic globalization. While this paper acknowledges many of the arguments postulated by Giddens and Blair regarding the realities of the contemporary world and the uncertainties surrounding the modernization project, through the work of Beck and an exploration of some of the differences in the French and Swedish welfare regimes, it seeks to ask whether the concept of the third way that has been developed through the Blair/Giddens model is necessarily the political blueprint through which to reinvigorate social democracy. © 2006 Brill Academic Publishers.

The paper examines, from a Southeast Asian perspective, the issues of globalization, regulation and gender and labor regimes in relation to the recent papers by Sylvia Walby (2001, 2002). The comments are linked to the conceptual debates and empirical evidence from the UK experience, which I argue, is too narrow a focus if one wants to discuss a process as broad as globalization. The paper then looks at the processes of the modernization of the gender regime and its connections to changing capital/labor relations by re-visiting the nation state, the impact of European Union regionalism and the relative power of the gender regime.

In this paper, we utilise Jørgensen’s concept of what precarity does to make sense of stalled industrial development in a regional Australian community. In 2008–2009, a Chinese-owned multinational company proposed the development of an alumina refinery near Bowen, Queensland, offering residents the prospect of economic and local job growth, before the proposal was shelved in 2010. In direct contrast to the imagined ‘secure employment’ residents hoped the development would offer, past experiences of multinational developments had instead compounded economic and social precarity. Through a qualitative study of community and business perceptions in Bowen in 2008–2009, we explore how a regional community understands and resists histories and experiences of precarity. Despite recognising the changing economic and social structures that have contributed to insecurity, actors position themselves as malleable and aspirational potential workers, rather than resisting employment insecurity through collective means. This study provides a way of understanding the forces that impact aspirations of work in regional Australia and the gap between these aspirations and the tangible social impacts of a neoliberal economy.

The fate of the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP), currently under negotiation, has been called into question. At issue is the inclusion of the investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS) mechanism that has been included in the NAFTA, CAFTA, and many bilateral agreements. Authorizing corporations and investors to bring disputes directly against governments for adopting regulations negatively impacting market share or future profitability, this mechanism has generated significant opposition, particularly in Europe. This paper probes the factors driving the struggle over this political project. Revealing the mechanisms operating to secure the inclusion of ISDS in the TTIP, these findings contribute to the interdisciplinary debates that have emerged around the rise of a transnational capital class and the transformation of the state. These developments have significant normative implications, the analysis of which contributes to a critical tradition that seeks to uncover processes that have been naturalized and reveal strategies for political contestation.

Philanthropic practices allow the dominant classes to generate knowledge about society and regulatory prescriptions, in particular by promoting the development of the social sciences. The 19th century industrialists had often invested their resources in the definition and treatment of relevant social issues, in order to institutionalize the new form of capitalism they represented. In the late 20th century, the new transnationalized social strata representing the hegemony of financial capital, whose power depends on their capacity to perpetuate the new socioeconomic order, used similar strategies. Philanthropy offers a privileged strategy for generating new forms of “policy knowledge” convergent with the interests of their promoters. Focusing on the Central European University founded by the financier George Soros, the paper argues that, far from seeking to curb the excesses of economic globalization, such efforts are actually institutionalizing it by laying the foundations of its own regulatory order.

This paper is a critique of the social movement unionism (SMU) theory. Arguing that characteristics of social movement unions reflect the very contradictory nature of unions under capitalism, it renders a view that the SMU theory romanticizes so-called social movement type unions (the COSATU in South Africa, the CUT in Brazil, and the KCTU in South Korea) and falls short of prescriptive measures for social transformation and a clear vision of a future society. Focusing on the case of the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions (KCTU) and Democratic Labor Party (DLP) in South Korea, it examines whether the SMU theory can adequately address the limitations of the current trade union movement in South Korea.

Advances in information technology (IT) have been critical to the USA for maintaining its competitive edge in the global economy, and the role of workers on the H-1B visa has been central in this process since the 1990s. The H-1B visa program, which allows US employers to hire skilled foreign workers on a temporary basis, enabled the recruitment of thousands of IT professionals, the majority of whom has been from India. Based on 40 in-depth interviews with Indian IT workers in the USA, this paper illustrates how the interplay between visa policies and flexible hiring in IT marginalizes this workforce. As a result of their fragile immigration status under H-1B visa terms, these workers are disproportionately employed as contract labor in an exploitative system of subcontracting. As an employment-based visa, the H-1B makes these workers dependent on their visa-sponsoring employers for immigration status and livelihood. The compulsion to remain employed and legal drives H-1B employees to accept severely exploitative work conditions, including wage cuts, deduction of commissions from hourly wages, lack of benefits, and frequent relocations. Theoretical insights from Asian-American studies, which foreground the historical nexus between US immigration policies and the gendered racialization of immigration, anchor the analyses of how current visa policies sustain the exigencies of late-capital.

The social science literature contains competing theories on the relationship between economic globalization and class compromise. According to supporters of the “strong globalization thesis,” over the last few decades many important national-level economic processes have been subsumed into a worldwide “borderless” economy in which global market forces, rather than electorates, now dictate national economic policy. This argument implies that globalization has significantly eroded the ability of democratic governance to create a genuine class compromise. Conversely, supporters of the “weak globalization thesis” maintain that the strong version of globalization is largely a “myth,” and that as a result national economic policy geared towards egalitarianism is still possible. After analyzing changes in four social and political indicators associated with class compromise — for 16 advanced capitalist countries over the period of 1960 to 1999 — I find qualified support for the weak globalization thesis. In particular, the data reveal that countries with substantially mixed economies and high levels of market regulation have participated in the global economy without substantially eroding their preexisting levels of class compromise. Conversely, for countries with low levels of state involvement in the economy, globalization has seemingly undermined class compromise. This is especially true in the United States. The paper concludes by suggesting that the unique structure of the American political economy explains the exceptionally low levels of class compromise found in the United States.

Nation-states are faced with multiple contradictions as they mediate the insertion of their domestic economies into the global economy. Drawing on a case study from the Caribbean country of St. Lucia, this paper explores how local community resources may infl uence the terms of their integration in the global economy. It is argued that socially embedded economic institutions that are typically neglected in discussions of economic development are in some ways better suited to the task of infl uencing the terms of globalization than state policy-making.

Analysis within or influenced by a labor process tradition has largely failed to capture the complexities of relations between capital, labor and the state, and has tended to leave policy issues to the optimistic scenarios of post-Fordist and related perspectives. Focusing on the political requires a comparative perspective. In this paper we want to examine the interplay between international competitiveness, national institutions and workplace politics. The central paradox facing us is that just as the nation has been written into debate, the power of the global marketplace and what some see as the 'hollowing out' of the national economy has increased significantly. We explore that paradox analytically by exploring the multi-faced transactions between the nation, state, and international political economy that condition changes in labour-capital relations at workplace level Empirically we focus on a comparison between British and Australian experiences: a sharp contrast between a form of economic restructuring not only without, but explicitly aimed at the expense of labor, and one of the few cases of a modernizing project that was labor-led or at least mediated. We argue that proponents of the globalisation theses and universalist paradigms of production systems underestimate the resilience of institutional diversity within nation states. Secondly, that the operations and choices of TNCs themselves help to shape the diversity in that they do not simply accommodate to local 'rules of the game' (Sorge, 1995: 122) nor their own home-country practices, but create 'hybrid' forms of adaptation which local capital may seek to emulate. Thirdly, we argue that state industry policies are not simply barriers or filters to the homogenising effects of corporate interests, but through their own competitiveness strategies, can remake their own 'niche' within the international division of labor.

This paper uses a case study methodology and a Critical Theory framework to interpret corporate crimes committed by the transnational corporation Ferruzzi. Building upon the literature on the crisis of Fordism, the globalization of the economy and society, and corporate crime, it is argued that Ferruzzi was involved in a systematic violation of laws. The analysis points to the fact that these behaviors are endemic to capitalism as they are rooted in the contradiction between capital accumulation and substantive democracy in advanced Western societies. Democratic calls for the establishment of broader participation of subordinate classes in the direction of society create obstacles to the action of profit-seeking corporations. Corporations bypass these obstacles through illegal maneuvers which, today, are made possible by the transnational nature of their activities.