Institutional Experimentation for Better Work – the CRIMT Partnership Project – Summary

The CRIMT Institutional Experimentation for Better Work Partnership Project seeks to build knowledge on and understanding of how to make work better. The focus is on actors in the world of work who engage in social experimentation and on whether that experimentation leads to work being better or worse. Work is a major dimension of people’s lives: for their life trajectories, for meaningful activity, for participation in their communities and societies. Succinctly, better work is a key for constructing better societies; worse work weakens their social fabric.

The basic argument underlying this proposal can be summarised by the four following propositions: Major fault lines of change are disrupting the regulation of work (Prop. 1); This leads actors at multiple levels, and in conditions of considerable uncertainty, to embark on what we label processes of experimentation as regards the governance of work (Prop. 2); A key societal challenge is to ensure that these processes lead to better and not to worse work, as defined by people’s economic risk, control over their lives at work, and the possibility to acquire skills and life chances and to exercise voice in their workplace and community (Prop. 3); Collective social actors, with strong sets of capabilities and resources, are central to negotiating the passage from traditional to new forms of work regulation (Prop. 4). The investigation of these four interdependent propositions could not be realised without building an international research partnership.

It is with that in mind that the CRIMT Partnership Project on Institutional Experimentation for Better Work brings together the Interuniversity Research Centre on Globalization and Work (CRIMT) and an international network of leading associated partner centres (20) and coresearchers (144). The project is financed by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada under its Partnership Program, with each Partner Centre contributing organisationally and financially to the realisation of the project.

For inquires related to the CRIMT Partnership, please contact Prof. Peter Fairbrother: peter.fairbrother[at]rmit.edu.au