#12017. Unemployment Experts: Governing the Job Search in the New Economy

November 2026publication date
Proposal available till 06-06-2025
4 total number of authors per manuscript0 $

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Journal’s subject area:
Sociology and Political Science;
Organizational Behavior and Human Resource Management;
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Abstract:
In recent years, sociologists have examined unemployment and job searching as important arenas in which workers are socialized to accept the terms of an increasingly precarious economy. While noting the importance of expert knowledge in manufacturing the consent of workers, research has largely overlooked the experts themselves that produce such knowledge. By offering alternative diagnoses and remedies for unemployment, these experts give job seekers a sense of choice in interpreting their situation and acting in the labor market. However, the multiple discourses ultimately help to secure consent to precarious labor markets by drawing attention to a range of individual deficiencies within workers while obfuscating structural and relational explanations of unemployment. The author also finds that many unemployment experts themselves faced dislocations from professional careers and are making creative claims to expertise. By focusing on experts and their varied messages, this paper reveals how the victims of precarious work inadvertently help to legitimate the new employment regime.
Keywords:
Expertise; new economy; precarious work; unemployment

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