Work after Globalization provides a lucid analysis of how labour practices have developed from the ‘golden age’ to our current period, dominated by liberalism and globalism. In addition to his analysis, Standing develops a vision for more egalitarian societies. Core to Standing's analysis is the differentiation between ‘labour’ and ‘work’. He contends that, contrary to the ILO's Philadelphia Declaration, labour is a commodity. He writes ‘labour's function is to produce a marketable output of services. Those who control labour usually want to take advantage of others, and often will oppress and exploit those performing labour . . . As for employment, it means stabilized labour based on subordinated labour security . . . [Work] captures the positive side of productive, reproductive and creative activity . . . there is room and respect for inaction and contemplation. When thinking of work in positive terms, we think of personal development, the utility of working, in which pressures come from within, in which we feel in control, so that space is given to activity of stillness . . . Work done because a person wished to do it, in the pursuit of self-chosen goals of development and social participation, is the essence of real decommodification’ (pp. 6–7).

Based on this theoretical differentiation, Standing argues that the often praised ‘golden welfare state era’ was characterised by ‘fictitious decommodification’ and eventually the failure of industrial citizenship. According to him, fixed workplaces facilitated a particular labour politics, in which freedom was neglected and work was interpreted as synonymous with employment, and workers as synonymous with employees. This conceptualisation denied social citizenship to many women or left them as secondary labourers. The decommodification was fictitious because entitlements were conditional on labour. ‘If an employee laboured well, he would have “cradle-to-grave” or “womb-to-tomb” benefits and access to social services. If not, trouble’ (p. 42). This system, created by the world's labour and social-democratic parties, and largely based on the notion of embedded liberalism with the dominance of national markets, could not be sustained during the era of globalisation, subsequently leading to processes of recommodifcation as well as the creation of new inequalities and class structures.

This Global Transformation has led to significant changes in labour markets globally, while governments ‘gave up on progressive income redistribution’ (p. 102). Standing identifies seven distinctive classes: a ‘global elite’, a ‘salariat’, ‘proficians’, the ‘core’ working class, a ‘precariat’, the unemployed and the detached. By differentiating along these classes, he provides a heuristic devise to analyze the increasing inequalities. Most importantly, it becomes obvious that the concept of the ‘standard employment relationship’, that provided permanent employment, a family income and relatively generous enterprise and state social benefits during the Trente Glorieuses, has lost its function as a guiding norm for employment regulation as well as occupational and public social policies. The new ‘global elite’ does not rely on wages or salaries, but has acquired its wealth from international finance and is largely immune to the uncertainties of market risks. Members of the ‘salariat’ are largely detached from commodification as they are said to enjoy a relatively privileged position in stable, permanent, full-time employment, which is highly remunerated. This group is partially globalised and their most valued members negotiate their remuneration at an individual level, detaching them from the mainstream. Standing characterises the ‘proficians’ as the ‘modern equivalent of the yeomen’. As the term suggests, these are mostly professionals and technicians that work on short-term contracts providing entrepreneurial services. They are mostly well compensated, but operate in a climate of insecurity in which an occupational community is very unlikely to form and promote collective policies. The class situated below the ‘salariat’ and ‘proficians’ is the ‘core’. Core workers have typically been men employed in manual jobs that paid relatively high wages and provided generous occupational and state social benefits. The concept of the ‘standard employment relationship’ mostly reflected the regulations and benefits governing the contracts of these workers. Since the onset of deindustrialisation in the 1970s, the numbers of core workers have been declining, and according to Standing ‘they have experienced more recommodification than any other group and more casualization. Worst of all, they have lost access to both social security and protective regulations . . . The industrial working class is in disarray’ (p. 109). Those in the ‘precariat’ wander between jobs, often low paid, without a clear occupational identity and little job security they have only minimal access to state benefits and usually no access to occupational benefits. Whilst workers of the ‘precariat’ had never fully disappeared, their numbers have once again been increasing. Although workers of the ‘precariat’ have been categorised in different groups of non-regular workers, such as ‘temporary workers’, ‘agency workers’ and other casual employees, a key characteristic of them is a lack of employment security and occupational identity. Young people are said to comprise the largest proportion of the ‘precariat’; according to Standing, workers of this stratum ‘appear to be the future’ (p. 110). Finally, he argues that the image of the unemployed has changed significantly. Instead of being viewed as temporarily plunged into unemployment due to cyclical downturns or structural changes, the unemployed are increasingly perceived as people with certain character traits; thus, they can be identified as a distinctive social category. At the bottom of society, he identifies a growing category of ‘detached’ people that are cut off from the mainstream of society, a lumpenproletariat that ‘nobody wants as neighbours’ (p. 115).

What to do? For Standing, a key objective is to ‘enable people to pursue their own sense of occupation, combining work, labour, play and leisure in ways they think are advantageous to the development of their capabilities and their civic friendship’ (p. 285). After analyzing the changes in occupations, many of which have seen their autonomy limited through infringements of the state during the ‘golden’ welfare state era, he returns to the origins of occupations and pleads for ‘occupational citizenship’ to overcome some of today's problems relating to work, as occupations represent ‘a form of community between the market and the state’ (p. 283). Building upon Durkheim, he envisions occupational associations as a source of solidarity. As ‘industrial citizenship’ has declined, Standing argues, ‘occupational identities’ have spread. For him the vision of the twenty-first century is that occupation ‘will be chosen in freedom, allowing individuals to realize vocation as their capabilities develop’ (p. 282). As new forms of work are proliferating outside the realm of labour, this vision cannot be achieved through an extension of protection to those in near-standard employment or a reform of the ILO; moreover, he proposes that labour law should be phased out and become part of common law, creating a ‘common floor of rights for everybody doing all types of work’ (p. 268). This is to be combined with a right to a guaranteed basic income for every citizen, or legal resident. Such a right must be ‘adequate to provide agency or freedom. A basic income must make a difference to economic security, enabling people to survive in dignity if they choose or are obliged to rely on it . . . It would, for the first time, give dignified meaning to the right of work’ (p. 299). For anyone interested not only in a vision, but whether this vision potentially could constitute a real utopia, the core question that must be answered, is how to achieve this. In a short section, entitled ‘Who will fight for a politics of paradise?’, Standing identifies the youth, especially the youth of the ‘precariat’, as the main actors for change (p. 286).

Despite providing a rich analysis and thought-provoking arguments, this book has a number of shortcomings: (1) The analysis relies primarily on qualitative material identifying the direction of change, but rarely provides quantitative empirical evidence of the extent of the changes. (2) The vision does not always, and without contradictions, fit well with the analysis of the identified contemporary labour practices. For instance, in his analytical section Standing identifies an increase in the proportion of proficians and the precariat, both of which are said to have difficulties to establish occupational identities and communities, which seems to be a reasonable argument. But if this is the case, it is not clear how Standing can later make the argument, whereby occupational identities have spread. This is an important point as occupational identities and communities are central elements for the development of his vision. (3) The argument for a right to a basic income is not new and has its supporters in various political camps. It would have been helpful if Standing would have provided a more concrete monetary level, as it is its level that will be decisive in determining whether such a basic income can constitute the basis of freedom. (4) Identifying mainly the youth, especially the youth ‘precariat’, as the potential protagonist of the progressive reform agenda seems a bit naive or shortsighted.

Despite these critical remarks, it must be emphasised that this book is a tour de force, providing a provocative analysis as well as a vision, rooted in normative reflection for a better world to work in. It should be mandatory reading for all students of social policy and industrial relations.