Work beyond the bounds: a boundary analysis of the fragmentation of work

Abstract

Scholars have examined many different types of labour, including ‘nonmarket’, ‘informal’ and ‘underground’ work. Such studies elucidate the conditions and consequences for workers in these jobs, while also generally accepting as unproblematic the basic distinctions between such categories of labour and ‘market’ work. Yet such distinctions should be a central point of interrogation. This article probes these distinctions by analysing the overlapping social and legal boundaries which fragment work into categories of ‘market’, ‘nonmarket’, ‘informal’ and ‘underground’ labour. Instead of reifying these categorizations, however, this analysis shows them to be socially constructed categories that mutually constitute one another. By systematizing their points of connection and departure, the boundary map presented in this article provides the analytical structure for new comparative research across seemingly dissimilar categories of work, which will extend scholarly understanding of the fragmentation of work and the relationship between work and inequality.