Although the “mobility turn” has captured the critical imaginations of researchers studying an array of topics, its possible contributions to analyses of the spectrum of employment-related geographical mobility have only begun to be defined. Studies of work have engaged with the growing body of mobility theory in limited ways; by the same token, mobilities studies have taken a somewhat narrow and sometimes uncritical view of work, labor, and employment. This article draws on a major interdisciplinary research project into the socio-historical patterns, contexts, and impacts of employment-related geographical mobility in Canada to build a conceptual bridge between these two literatures. We re-visit established bodies of work on migration, work, and political economy and look at new avenues for conceptualizing employment-related geographical mobility. We then examine a case study from the Alberta Oil Sands and suggest an agenda for future research on mobility and work.
Alberta Oil (2014) Private aviation serving the Oil Sands continues to soar. Alberta Oil Magazine May 16. Available at: www.albertaoilmagazine.com (accessed 29 April 2016).
3.
BakkerI (2007) Social reproduction and the constitution of a gendered political economy. New Political Economy12: 541–556.
4.
BalibarE (2004) We, the People of Europe?: Reflections on Transnational Citizenship, Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
5.
BarnesT (2005) Borderline communities-Canadian single industry towns, staples, and Harold Innis. In: van HoutumHKramschOZierhoferW (eds) B/ordering Space, Hants, England: Ashgate, pp. 109–122.
DorayB (1988) From Taylorism to Fordism: a Rational Madness, London: Free Association.
23.
DorowS (2015) Gendering energy extraction in Fort McMurray. In: StefanikLShrivastavaM (eds) Alberta Oil and the Decline of Democracy in Canada, Athabasca, Alberta: Athabasca University Press.
24.
Dorow S, Cassiano M and Doerksen C (2015) Live-in caregivers in Fort McMurray: A socioeconomic footprint. Available at: www.onthemovepartnership.ca (accessed 29 April 2016).
25.
DorowSDoguG (2011) The spatial distribution of hope in and beyond Fort McMurray. In: DavidsonTKParkOShieldsR (eds) Ecologies of Affect: Placing Nostalgia, Desire, and Hope, Waterloo, Ontario: Wilfrid Laurier Press, pp. 271–292.
26.
ElliottAUrryJ (2010) Mobile Lives, London: Routledge.
27.
FaulconbridgeJRBeaverstockJVDerudderB (2009) Corporate ecologies of business travel in professional service firms working towards a research agenda. European Urban and Regional Studies16: 295–308.
28.
FergusonJ (1999) Expectations of Modernity: Myths and Meanings of Urban Life on the Zambian Copperbelt, Berkeley: University of California Press.
29.
GilbertMR (1998) “Race,” space, and power: The survival strategies of working poor women. Annals of the Association of American Geographers88: 595–621.
30.
Glick SchillerNSalazarNB (2013) Regimes of mobility across the globe. Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies39: 183–200.
31.
GustafsonP (2006) Work-related travel, gender and family obligations. Work Employment and Society20: 513–530.
32.
HannamKShellerMUrryJ (2006) Mobilities, immobilities and moorings. Mobilities1: 1–22.
33.
HansonS (2010) Gender and mobility: new approaches for informing sustainability. Gender, Place and Culture17: 5–23.
34.
HansonSPrattGJ (1995) Gender, Work, and Space, London, New York: Routledge.
35.
HarpvikenKB (2014) Split return: transnational household strategies in Afghan Repatriation. International Migration52: 57–71.
36.
HeiszALaRochelle-CôtéS (2005) Work and Commuting in Census Metropolitan Areas, Ottawa: Statistics Canada.
37.
KatzC (2001) On the grounds of globalization: a topography for feminist political engagement. Signs26: 1213–1234.
38.
KesselringS (2014) Mobility, power and the emerging new mobilities regime. Sociologica1: 1–30.
39.
KingR (2012) Geography and migration studies: retrospect and prospect. Population Space and Place18: 134–153.
40.
LassenC (2006) Aeromobility and work. Environment and Planning A38: 301–312.
41.
LawR (1999) Beyond ‘women and transport’: towards new geographies of gender and daily mobility. Progress in Human Geography23: 567–588.
42.
LindquistJA (2009) The Anxieties of Mobility: Migration and Tourism in the Indonesian Borderlands, Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press.
43.
LuxtonMBezansonK (2006) Social Reproduction: Feminist Political Economy Challenges Neo-Liberalism, Montreal, London: McGill-Queen's University Press.
44.
Martin JP and Grubb D (2001) What Works and for Whom: A Review of OECD Countries' Experiences with Active Labour Market Policies, Working Paper, Uppsala, Sweden: IFAU-Institute for Labour Market Policy Evaluation.
45.
MasseyD (1998) Power-Geometries and the Politics of Space-Time, Heidelberg: University of Heidelberg.
46.
MayhewCQuilanM (2006) Economic pressure, multi-tiered subcontracting and occupational health and safety in Australian long-haul trucking. Employee Relations28: 212–229.
47.
McDowellL (1995) Bodywork: Heterosexual gender performances in city workplaces. In: BellDValentineG (eds) Mapping Desire: Geographies of Sexualities, London: Routledge, pp. 75–95.
48.
McDowellL (2009) Working Bodies: Interactive Service Employment and Workplace Identities, Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell.
49.
McEvoyJ (2012) Gendered mobility and morality in a South-Eastern Mexican community: impacts of male labour migration on the women left behind. Mobilities7: 369–388.
50.
MezzadraSNeilsonB (2013) Border as Method, or, the Multiplication of Labor, Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
51.
MitchellJ (1951) A note on the urbanization of Africans on the Copperbelt. Human Problems in British Central Africa12: 20–27.
52.
Nakache D and Kinoshita A (2010) The Canadian temporary foreign worker program: do short-term economic needs prevail over human rights concerns? IRPP Study Montreal, Quebec, 5: 1–49.
53.
NewhookJTNeisBJacksonL (2011) Employment-related mobility and the health of workers, families, and communities: the Canadian context. Labour/Le Travail67: 121–156.
54.
NotarB (2012) ‘Coming out’ to ‘hit the road’: temporal, spatial and affective mobilities of taxi drivers and day trippers in Kunming, China. City & Society24: 281–301.
55.
NovoaA (2014) ‘A country on wheels’: a mobile ethnography of Portuguese lorry drivers. Environment and Planning A46: 2834–2847.
56.
OngA (1999) Flexible Citizenship: the Cultural Logics of Transnationality, Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
57.
PahlR (1988) Epilogue: on work. In: PahlR (ed.) On Work: Historical, Comparative and Theoretical Perspectives, Oxford: Blackwell, pp. 744–752.
58.
ParryJTaylorRPettingerL (2005) Confronting the challenges of work today: new horizons and perspectives. Special Issue: Sociological Review Monograph Series: A New Sociology of Work?53: 1–18.
59.
ParreñasRS (2010) Homeward bound: the circular migration of entertainers between Japan and the Philippines. Global Networks10(3): 301–323.
60.
PessarPRMahlerSJ (2003) Transnational migration: bringing gender in. International Migration Review37: 812–846.
61.
PicchioA (1992) Social Reproduction : the Political Economy of the Labour Market, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
62.
PrattG (2004) Working Feminism, Philadelphia: Temple University Press.
63.
RosemanSR (2000) Vendiendo la labor, vendiendo los conocimientos: un estudio antropológico de las modistas de taller y de las costureras ambulantes gallegas. Semata: Ciencias Sociais e Humanidades12: 361–383.
64.
RosemanSRBarberPNeisB (2015) Towards a feminist political economy approach to employment-related geographical mobility. Studies in Political Economy95: 173–201.
65.
Ruhs M (2002) Temporary foreign worker programmes: policies, adverse consequences, and the need to make them work. Center for Comparative Immigration Studies, UC San Diego.
66.
RyserLRajputAHalsethG (2012) Long Distance Labour Commuting Contributions to Community Capacity in Mackenzie, BC: Summary Report, Prince George, BC: Community Development Institute, University of Northern British Columbia.
67.
SalazarN (2011) The power of imagination in transnational mobilities. Identities: Global Studies in Culture and Power18: 576–598.
68.
SchneiderNFLimmerR (2008) Job mobility and living arrangements. In: CanzlerWKaufmannVKesselringS (eds) Tracing Mobilities: Towards a Cosmopolitan Perspective, Farnham: Ashgate, pp. 119–140.
69.
ShawJ (2010) Transport, geography and the ‘new’ mobilities. Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers35: 305–312.
70.
ShawJSidawayJD (2011) Making Links: On (re)engaging with transport and transport geography. Progress in Human Geography35: 502–520.
71.
ShellerMUrryJ (2006) The new mobilities paradigm. Environment and Planning A38: 207–226.
72.
ShieldsR (1991) Places on the Margin: Alternative Geographies of Modernity, London: Routledge Chapman Hall.
73.
SikkaALippelKHanleyJ (2011) Access to health care and workers' compensation for precarious migrants in Quebec, Ontario and New Brunswick. McGill Journal of Law and Health5: 203–269.
VerstraeteG (2001) Technological frontiers and the politics of mobility in the European Union. New Formations43: 26–43.
80.
VoskoLF (2006) Precarious employment: towards an improved understanding of labour market insecurity. In: VoskoLF (ed.) Precarious Employment: Understanding Labour Market Insecurity in Canada, Montreal and Kingston: McGill-Queen's University Press, pp. 3–42.
81.
VoskoLFCampbellIMacDonaldM (2009) Gender and the Contours of Precarious Employment, London and New York: Routledge.
82.
WhiteleggD (2007) Working the Skies: the Fast-Paced, Disorienting World of the Flight Attendant, New York: New York University Press.
83.
Willems-BraunB (1996) Colonial vestiges: representing forest landscapes on Canada's west coast. BC Studies: The British Columbian Quarterly112: 5–39.
84.
Wilson G (1941) An Essay on the Economics of Detribalization in Northern Rhodesia (part 1). Rhodes Livingstone Papers No. 5. Livingstone, Northern Rhodesia: Rhodes-Livingstone Institute.
85.
WinsonALeachB (2002) Contingent Work, Disrupted Lives: Labour and Community in the New Rural Economy, Toronto: University of Toronto Press.
