"Towards an Enlivened Political Economy of Work:
Industrial Relations Meets Geography"
A joint symposium of the
Economic Geography Study Group of the Institute of Australian Geograpbers
and
Work and Organisational Studies Discipline, University of Sydney
at
The University of Sydney
13-14 November 2001
This symposium aims to enhance the emerging conversation between
researchers in geography and industrial relations, work and organisation
studies. Amongst the latter group, there has been a growing interest in the
evidence of geographical particularity and in the conceptual arguments
around space, place and scale. At the same time, there has been a growing
attention by human and economic geographers to the complexities of labour
market processes and work relations. These developments have seen the
publication, on one hand, of a small but growing number of 'spatialised'
studies of a range of industrial relations topics even, perhaps, the
emergence of a new sub-discipline of labour geography.
The symposium will enable intensive discussion, dialogue and development of
ideas across these domains and will feature contributors from a range of
other disciplines such as sociology, history and political economy. We are
hoping that this meeting will go some way towards generating an enlivened
understanding of the political economy of work at a time of immense change
in work and social relationships, and at a time when many of the
traditional approaches struggle to produce new understandings.
The organisers are drawn from both geography and industrial relations. They
are Professor Bob Fagan (Human Geography, Macquarie University), Dr Bradon
Ellem and Dr Susan McGrath-Champ (both in Work & Organisational Studies,
University of Sydney) and Dr Phillip O'Neill (Geography, University of
Newcastle).
The keynote speaker will be Professor Jamie Peck of the University of
Wisconsin-Madison at Madison. Peck is the author of Work-Place: The Social
Regulation of Labor Markets (Guilford, 1996), a path-breaking study of
local labour markets and more recently Workfare States (Guilford, 2001). In
this latest book, Peck traces the development of workfare policies across
the US, Canada and the UK, how reforms have been shaped by labour markets
and political conditions within the broader context of neoliberal economics
and globalization. Previously, Peck held a research appointment at the
University of Melbourne.
Details of the symposium are contained in the attachment.
Phillip O'Neill
************************
Phillip O'Neill (Dr)
Director, Centre for Urban and Regional Studies
The University of Newcastle
Callaghan NSW 2308, Australia
Ph +61-2-49215080
Ph +61-2-49215095 (dir)
Fax +61-2-49215877
http://www.newcastle.edu.au/curs/
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