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A Desire to Formalize Work? Comparing Trade Union Strategies in B olivia and A rgentina
Author(s) -
Lazar Sian
Publication year - 2012
Publication title -
anthropology of work review
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.151
H-Index - 15
eISSN - 1548-1417
pISSN - 0883-024X
DOI - 10.1111/j.1548-1417.2012.01073.x
Subject(s) - formality , politics , trade union , work (physics) , salient , boundary (topology) , object (grammar) , sociology , political science , economics , labour economics , law , engineering , computer science , artificial intelligence , mechanical engineering , mathematical analysis , mathematics
This article examines understandings of work within trade unions of street vendors in E l A lto, B olivia, and state employees in Buenos Aires, A rgentina. The particular emphasis is on the distinction between formality and informality in both spheres, and the boundary between formal and informal is analyzed both as a way to organize the description of work (as employment) and as an object of union activism understood as a form of political work. The unions deal with that boundary differently in the two countries, and it is more salient for informants in A rgentina than in B olivia. Further, as an object of the political work of a trade union, it is also managed differently by each of the two Argentine pubic sector unions discussed here.