Workers Without Companies: Towards a New Way of Working

by Sylvie Célérier, Alberto Riesco-Sanz

Overview

Workers Without Companies contributes to the debate on the future of work in a productive landscape that is now global, while ways of working diversify at an unprecedented pace.

Faced with several decades of mass unemployment in Europe and the activation of self-employment—especially through intermediary platforms—this book examines the transformation of the wage system not only in traditional salaried sectors but also in self-employment, agriculture, and the field of science and knowledge production. The authors identify a common movement: the growing detachment between companies and their employees. This deep-rooted and enduring trend is reshaping the wage relationship at the core of modern societies, continuously altering and destabilising workers’ lives. Recognising this shift is essential to interrogating what work—and our lives—will become in the years ahead. The book, therefore, concludes with a proposed research agenda structured around five key axes.

As such, Workers Without Companies will appeal to sociologists with interests in work and industry, employment and unemployment, organisation studies and labour relations.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781040435977
Publisher:	Taylor & Francis
Publication date:	09/22/2025
Series:	Routledge Studies in the Sociology of Work, Professions and Organisations
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	204
File size:	2 MB

About the Author

Sylvie Célérier is an Emeritus Professor of Sociology at Lille University, and a member of the Lille Centre for Sociological and Economic Research and Studies (CLERSE)— CNRS UMR 8019.

Alberto Riesco-Sanz is an Associate Professor of Sociology at the Complutense University of Madrid and an Associate Researcher at the Complutense Institute for the Study of Contemporary Social Transformations (TRANSOC).

Table of Contents

Introduction Part I: Shaping the wage system in Europe 1. Ambiguities in the European model Compulsory insurance under state control The legacy of an industrial and political history The formation of the chief players in the labour exchange Work in Europe: convergences and national differences 2. Transformations in the wage system The Golden Age of capitalism? A new mutation of capitalism A profound remodelling of the wage system 3. Silent mutations in labour exchanges Value sharing and widening inequalities Working remotely and intermittently A more complex and interconnected labour mobilisation Part II: Variations in the wage system 4. The incomplete wage system of self-employed workers The dismantling of the wage system The expansion of the wage system A new type of self-employed worker Conclusions 5. The agricultural wage system The same players as in the wage system Constantly accompanied production Regulations and tension among the agricultural wage system 6. Mobilisation and organisation of scientific work under state protection What can the structure of Spain’s science system teach us about the dynamics of the wage system? The creation of a science and innovation system in Spain Mobilisation and organisation of scientific work under state protection Challenges facing the current system of scientific labour mobilisation in Spain In conclusion: some proposals for future research on work The primordial alienation of workers from their work A transformed system of valorisation States under pressure A new way of organising production Professional trajectories outside the company sphere