Book Review: Work, Society, and the Ethical Self

Work, Society, and the Ethical Self: Chimeras of Freedom in the Neoliberal Era, edited by Chris Hann (2021). New York: Berghahn Books.

Chris Hann’s newest edited volume, Work, Society, and the Ethical Self: Chimeras of Freedom in the Neoliberal Era, provides a collection of research-based vignettes that theorize topics of work and freedom. According to Hann, this serves to bridge the sociopolitical aspects of work with “the subjective experience of a work ethic” (16). In the introduction, Hann defines key terms and reflects on earlier anthropological studies of labor. He highlights the social significance of work, explores the potential distinction between labor and work, and acknowledges the challenges of theorizing abstractions such as “the economy” and “the workforce.” In this vein, Hann traces influential scholars on the subject of work, including Marx, Polanyi, Fourier, Bücher, Veblen, and Malinowski, among others.

In Chapter 1, Rachel Smith explores rural Vanuatu, analyzing how European colonization reshaped the meaning and value of work. She introduces the concepts of indentured and wage labor, particularly in the context of seasonal agricultural work. Smith begins with a concise overview of key debates on different labor systems and work regimes, tracing their evolution from colonial rule to the present. Smith elaborates on Mauss, Marx, and Polanyi’s views of labor and the notion of “prestation” in relation to French colonial history. She observes that the implied perception of volition and reciprocity denoted by prestation masked labor exploitation that upheld and extended colonial infrastructure. Smith urges readers to consider the complexities of working for free or working for money, independently or for others, and how these dynamics depend on a network of relationships and contexts.

In Chapter 2, Katherine Miller discusses the social and moral dimensions of pleasure, inviting readers to consider the enjoyment that people derive from work. Her chapter is based on the 17 months in which she conducted ethnographic fieldwork in Central Hunza (Northern Pakistan). Miller’s initial research aim was to examine development activities but instead she found herself participating in quotidian work activities, such as harvesting apricots and sowing potatoes with community members. She explains that these everyday activities required attention for two reasons. First, they contrast with dominant narratives of agricultural labor, which often depict this work as “unrelenting toil,” closely tied to the state regime. Second, Miller argues that these forms of work provide pleasure and moral value that do not align neatly with development narratives, which prioritize forms of labor in the vein of salaried professionals.

In Chapter 3, Olivia Angé takes us to the Province of Jujuy (Argentina), where many are registered as members of the Kolla indigenous people. She describes miniaturas, or “miniatures” used to celebrate Saint Anne in annual fairs. The chapter includes vivid descriptions of the social transformations that have taken place in the town. A decline in the bartering of miniatures has caused stallholders to sell industrial goods or crudely produced objects instead. Angé argues, however, that the laborious enactment of faith vis-à-vis the miniaturas continues to transform the subjectivity of devotees in a Foucauldian manner. This chapter raises the polemical question: are they (those who craft these intricate objects) motivated by devotion or more concerned with monetary gain?

In Chapter 4, Akanksha Awal elaborates on the concept of finding pleasure in work by illustrating how cultivating an emotional self and strategically employing “affective practices” enable young middle-class Indian women to achieve workplace freedoms. The author begins with debates about emotional labor in a global context, concerning precarity, affect, and autonomy. The second half of the chapter demonstrates women’s conceptualization of various jobs, such as teaching or government work, in relation to emotional labor. Awal subsequently examines call-center work, which many of her interlocutors preferred, with its propensity for creativity and conviviality, despite the constant threat of sexual harassment. The chapter ends with the author’s conjectures about the role of female friendships giving rise to non-unionized forms of workplace bargaining.

Anna-Riikka Kauppinen, in Chapter 5, explores how professional Ghanaian men ethically envision and experience work in the context of inconsistent salaries, ineffective labor laws, and other structural discrepancies that keep white-collar work in short supply in Accra. Young professional men often attain their education and qualifications as a collective and long-term family investment. Kauppinen argues that “professional status is the property of a larger collective that is entitled its rewards” (110). In light of this, young professionals often feel caught in webs of mutual moral obligation and expectation (110). However, Kauppinen argues that for young professionals in Accra, work serves as “a mode of becoming a particular kind of ethical subject” (111). She asserts that these workers demonstrate a genuine dedication to their work, reflecting the evolving construction of Ghana’s middle class rather than the influence of neoliberalism.

In Chapter 6, Gonçalo Santos and his co-authors compare two occupational communities in urban China—IT developers and licensed taxi drivers—to evaluate how workers navigate pressures to extend their working hours. The IT developers generally viewed their demanding schedules as a justified sacrifice benefiting their companies, the country, and themselves. In contrast, taxi drivers faced competition from Didi (the Chinese version of Uber), which increasingly undermined their ability to earn a living. The authors explore the range of motivations behind choosing to work for Didi versus remaining licensed taxi drivers, including preferences for spatiotemporal work arrangements and social autonomy. Santos and colleagues’ comparative analysis highlights a moral tension between two conceptualizations of work, which they present as “personal freedom” as opposed to “social freedom” (152).

In Chapter 7, Ian Rajković outlines experiences of work in socialist Yugoslavia through the case of a Zastava car plant before and after the 1992 country’s dissolution. Rajković highlights how workers negotiated and redefined social freedom amid workplace transformations, through the Polanyian concept of “countermovement.” However, work and its reified role as the moral foundation of value created tensions over who was seen as productively working versus those perceived as “parasitic” for not generating value. A mounting debt and supply-chain disruptions strained the company, which Fiat ultimately acquired, and the shift to neoliberalism and foreign privatization was largely welcomed.

In Chapter 8, Sylvia Terpe engages with Weber’s concept of the Protestant work ethic and Polanyian conception of freedom, responsibility, and social ethic through an analysis of small businesses in post-socialist Halle, Germany. Terpe extends Weber’s notion of the work ethic by emphasizing its reliance on needs and desires rather than adherence to a strict work ethic itself. The chapter examines how business owners embody their work ethics in relation to householding and the conceptualized boundaries between work and home. Additionally, it investigates the extent to which business owners sought to maximize profits and how they perceive individual responsibility and state support.

The platform economy and its impact on work distribution and labor relations is the focus of Chapter 9, which is written by Ilana Gershon and Melissa Cefkin. The authors analyze how online work platforms, such as Uber or Topcoder, function within neoliberal frameworks. While these platforms theoretically allow workers to choose their tasks and dissolve traditional workplace hierarchies, the authors reveal that disciplining mechanisms, such surveillance and competition, instead act as forms of control. As such, Gershon and Cefkin highlight the tension between the autonomy that these platforms promise to workers and the efficiencies that they aim to deliver to users.

In Chapter 10, Johannes Lenhard focuses on venture capitalists (VCs) across Europe and North America, who provide early-stage funding to start-ups. The chapter delves into the incentive structures that shape VCs’ decision-making and considers how these investors rely on “gut feelings” and emotional alignments, often driven by narratives of freedom, to guide their investment choices. The chapter also covers the “ethical tension” between freedom and concomitant objectives for companies to attain monopolistic power.

In Chapter 11, Magdalena Dabkowska examines individuality and teamwork within a “near-shore” financial-services center in Berlin, focusing on its role in risk management following the 2008-09 global economic crisis. The author draws attention to the “contradiction at the heart of neoliberalism—that between the entrepreneurial self and the structure of the workplace” (240). Dabkowska reflects on workers’ discontent with the deskilled, repetitive, and low-complexity process-driven jobs at the center, alleviated only by tightly controlled opportunities for individuality and originality through technical and soft skills. The chapter explores how workers negotiate their desire to cultivate “the entrepreneurial self,” while adhering to the rules and processes that constrain their individual skill progression at the expense of business objectives and teamwork.

In the final chapter, Deborah Jones explores ghostwriting in the contemporary United States, a profession where a paid, often-anonymized author crafts original texts, typically in the client’s voice. She discusses two examples of ghostwriting conducted via email and direct message exchange with 72 ghostwriters—one author (“Glatzer”) with an established brand and repertoire of written work and the other, an academic ghostwriter (“Erin”) who has faced challenges re-establishing herself. The chapter explores the symbiotic relationship between the sellers and buyers of ghostwritten works, as well as the nuanced and widely differing experiences of being a ghostwriter. Jones explores these two cases of ghostwriting through her accounts of Glatzer’s strong internet presence and the credit that she receives for her writing in contrast to Erin’s stigmatized academic work and minimal internet presence. In both cases, however, the ghostwriters expressed finding freedom and pleasure in the process of writing.

The afterword, written by Gerd Spittler, ties together the diverse accounts of work found in the chapters—while discussing future research directions and urging us to decolonize our extant theoretical epistemologies that originate from American and European traditions. Spittler advocates for an ethnographic approach that comprises participation, observation, and interviews in order to (ideally) unpack actual practices of work. Moreover, the afterword nudges readers to consider how neoliberalism, the contextual backdrop for the volume, compares to and also melds with other economic models. Spittler ends by recommending a deeper analysis and theorization of certain concepts, such as the household, a concept highlighted in Terpe’s discussion.

These twelve accounts offer nuanced and detailed reflections that would be beneficial to anthropologists and sociologists of labor and work. Certain chapters offer deeper theoretical analysis than others and largely rely on concepts of Polanyi, Foucault, Weber, and in an implicit manner, Marx. A volume of this sort includes a range of succinct research-based reflections that each offer a blend of ethnographic detail and theoretical discussion. The chapters seem to be loosely organized based on conceptual links or scholarly frameworks, and their unifying tendency considers the relationship between work and freedom. However, the broad diversity of topics, ranging from the rural lifestyles of families in Hunza to the motivations of venture capitalists in the United States, encapsulates the breadth of social scientific research that can be compared and contrasted throughout the volume. In a sense, this offers the reader with a tasting platter of scholarly morsels from the contemporary anthropology of work. As such, it can concurrently provide a detailed overview of studies from within the subfield as well as a series of succinct descriptions and theorizations about work, freedom, and the self.

Author Biography

Harleen Kaur Bal is a Ph.D. candidate in sociocultural anthropology and an NSF Graduate Research Fellow at the University of California, Davis. Her ethnographic research and film projects engage with everyday experiences and negotiations of work, critical food studies, intergenerational immigrant families, and neoliberal subjectivity, with a particular focus on Punjabi diaspora communities in the United States. Her dissertation fieldwork is funded by the Wenner-Gren Foundation.