Synopses & Reviews
Today 4.7 million Americans have been unemployed for more than six months. In France more than ten percent of the working population is without work. In Israel itand#8217;s above seven percent. And in Greece and Spain, that number approaches thirty percent. Across the developed world, the experience of unemployment has become frighteningly commonand#151;and so are the seemingly endless tactics that job seekers employ in their quest for new work.
Flawed System/Flawed Selfand#160;delves beneath these staggering numbers to explore the world of job searching and unemployment across class and nation. Through in-depth interviews and observations at job-search support organizations, Ofer Sharone reveals how different labor-market institutions give rise to job-search games like Israeland#8217;s rand#233;sumand#233;-based and#147;spec gamesand#8221;and#151;which are focused on presenting oneand#8217;s skills to fit the joband#151;and the and#147;chemistry gamesand#8221; more common in the United States in which job seekers concentrate on presenting the person behind the rand#233;sumand#233;. By closely examining the specific day-to-day activities and strategies of searching for a job, Sharone develops a theory of the mechanisms that connect objective social structures and subjective experiences in this challenging environment and shows how these different structures can lead to very different experiences of unemployment.
Review
andldquo;In Flawed System/Flawed Self, Ofer Sharone develops a cogent, timely, and compelling account of why American employees blame themselves for their failure to secure employment and why their Israeli counterparts engage in system blame instead. Sharone moves the discussion well beyond global generalizations about the role of culture to make an important contribution to the literature of joblessness.andrdquo;
Review
and#160;andldquo;Imagine two men drawn from Ofer Sharoneandrsquo;s highly insightful and important study of how jobless people search for work. One approaches a job interview as he might a and#160;first date, and the other, as he would an oral exam. The first offers who he is, the second, what he has. As we learn from this book, the first man is likely to be a white-collar American, and the second, his Israeli counterpart. After encountering and#160;a series of andlsquo;no, no, noandrsquo;s,andrsquo; it is the open-hearted American who is likely to blame himself, feel shame, and give up, while the pragmatic Israeli is more likely to shrug it off and keep trying. Here Sharone articulates a central andlsquo;got-yaandrsquo; moment of American market individualism. Called to try to feel personally empowered in the face of a merciless market he cannot control, the jobless man recoils in heart-felt defeat and feels stripped of a dignityandmdash;and powerandmdash;he might otherwise enjoy. Realizing this, Sharone notes, is a first step in mobilizing for social change.andrdquo;
Review
and#160;andldquo;One of capitalismandrsquo;s achievements is to turn unemployment into perhaps the hardest work of all. Such is the startling argument ofand#160;Flawed System / Flawed Self,and#160;which compares the work of re-entering the labor force in the US and Israel and the toll it takes on the individual.and#160;and#160;A brilliant analysis of how we get sucked up into games of self-deception.andrdquo;
Review
andldquo;Sharone examines the experience of unemployment with great insight and deep empathyandhellip;. At once clear and theoretically sophisticated, compassionate and scientifically systematic, Flawed System/Flawed Self gives readers an in-depth understanding of the experience of unemployment and the social institutions that structure it.andrdquo;
Review
andldquo;Flawed System/Flawed Self is a strong contribution to scholarship on work and occupations, organizations, institutional analysis, and economic sociology . . .andnbsp; The bookandrsquo; s value transcends its academic worth, as it shows just how hard unemployed people must work to get a job.andrdquo;
Synopsis
Updated with a new preface -- Newman interviewed men, women, and children who experienced a precipitous fall from middle-class status, and her book documents their stories. For this edition, Newman has updated the extensive data on job loss and downward mobility in the American middle class, documenting its persistence, even in times of prosperity.
Synopsis
Over the last three decades, millions of people have slipped through a loophole in the American dream and become downwardly mobile as a result of downsizing, plant closings, mergers, and divorce: the middle-aged computer executive laid off during an industry crisis, blue-collar workers phased out of the post-industrial economy, middle managers whose positions have been phased out, and once-affluent housewives stranded with children and a huge mortgage as the result of divorce. Anthropologist Katherine S. Newman interviewed a wide range of men, women, and children who experienced a precipitous fall from middle-class status, and her book documents their stories. For the 1999 edition, Newman has provided a new preface and updated the extensive data on job loss and downward mobility in the American middle class, documenting its persistence, even in times of prosperity.
About the Author
Katherine S. Newman is Ford Foundation Professor of Urban Studies, Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University, and the author of No Shame in My Game: The Working Poor in the Inner City (1999), Declining Fortunes: The Withering of the American Dream (1994), and Law and Economic Organization (1983).
Table of Contents
Acknowledgments
Chapter 1. Introduction: Unemployment Experiences
Chapter 2. The American Chemistry Game
Chapter 3. The Chemistry Game Experience and Self- Blame
Chapter 4. A Cross- National Comparison: The Israeli Specs Game
Chapter 5. The Specs Game Experience and System- Blame
Chapter 6. A Cross- Class Comparison: The Blue- Collar Diligence Game
Chapter 7. Conclusion: Job- Search Games and Unemployment Experiences
Appendix A: Methodology
Appendix B: Notes on Social Games
Notes
References
Index