flexibility, gender and local labour markets — some examples from denmark

Flexibility, Gender and Local Labour Markets - Some Examples from Denmark

LISE DREWES NIELSEN

Introduction

The basis for working with flexibility is that the western industrial countries are engaged in a decisive modification of the capitalist process of accumulation. This modification is variously accounted for. At times the occurrence of an alleged accumulative crisis, and subsequently, worsening market conditions, are cited. Some give sector displacements as the cause, because the reduction of industry and the increase in the service sector thereby create completely new requirements for production planning, management planning, etc. Then again, others explain it in terms of technological advances in which data technology supports or even encourages possibilities for an entirely new control of production and labour.

Marketing difficulties, stiff competition, new structures of division of labour, changes in economic structures and forms of new technology constitute a complex cause/effect situation in the altered production methods. Defining the dependent and independent variables can be difficult, but the consequences of development are clearly directed towards an increased requirement for rapid changes, conversions and adaptation: in other words, a demand for flexibility.

In this article, I shall seek to throw light on the means of application for the concept of flexibility in describing and explaining the modifications which occur in the regional labour market. In this way, I shall focus on flexibility as it is expressed with regard to the labour force. At the same time, I shall attempt to describe some of the processes which are central from a labour force point of view when relationships between economy, space and social processes are clarified.

Flexibility is relevant to adaptation. It is the way in which businesses adapt to the new structure displacements. It is how the labour force adapts itself to the supply of jobs. Lastly, it is about how local areas are utilized and changed in this adaptation process. The word ‘flexibility’ is often used to describe the changes needed to succeed in achieving the adjustment between two structures. A definite amount of compromise is necessary in which one or both structures change; in other words, a certain degree of flexibility must be displayed. Then again, there is nothing in the concept which states what bearing power has in this adaptation. Can it be so one-sided that the one structure has to change to harmonize with the other? Is force related to adaptation? What are the characteristics of flexibility, and who is flexible in regard to whom? Meanwhile, there is frequently an

1 . This article was first presented at the conference on Trends and Challenges of Urban Restructuring, Rio de Janeiro, September 1988 (International Sociological Association, Research Committee on Sociology of Urban and Regional Development - RC 21).

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Flexibility, gender and local labour markets 43

unfortunate tendency for the concept of flexibility to be used without being questioned in this manner. Furthermore, this concept is often used politically because it so conveniently describes the time’s need for change and conversions. This is accomplished by omitting the determination of power relationships when forming the adaptation process.

The concept of flexibility is used within both science and politics. The discussion about it is intense. Some social scientists have seen flexible production systems, with inspiration from Japan, as the point of departure for a new worldwide change in the production structure, a new flexible mode of accumulation (Storper and Scott, 1987). Others have criticized these attempts to standardize the character of the production structure and the lack of empirical evidence (Sayer, 1986). This article has no ambition to be placed on one side or another of the flexible-accumulation debate, nor to find the grand theory explaining relations between capital and labour force as a worldwide tendency. Rather, it is intended to discuss some consequences for the local labour market of the changes in the production structure, and to focus on another form of flexibility, that between work and home, which is an important everyday female strategy. The main question is, whether the development of the different flexibility strategies, seen from the production process point of v.kw or from the female labour force point of view, has any parallels or discrepancies.

Flexibility and production

The passage from ‘fordism’ to the new, flexible production methods has become progres- sively visible in production structures. The production methods defining fordism - mass production, strict division of labour, the homogeneous market and stability - have now been replaced by unstable markets, rapid shifts in production coherence and new forms for the division of labour. Whereas fordism characterized earlier production forms, modern production forms are characterized by flexible structures which in all ways seek to live up to society’s need for prompt change.

It follows, therefore, that the production methods of fordism are found in traditional industrial production while the new flexible forms are utilized in new types, for instance ‘high-tech’, or the more advanced of the production and service industries. Taking this into consideration, the ‘flexible production structure’ is bound to the dynamic development of the most advanced section of the post-industrial production structure. Flexible production forms can be defined as: ‘Forms of production characterized by a well developed ability both to shift promptly from one process to another and to adjust quantities of output rapidly up or down over the short run without any strongly deleterious effects on level of efficiency’ (Scott and Storper, 1987). As a result, the determination of the concept is closely related to production’s adaptation to the market; the determination being qualitative as well as quantitative. In addition to this are the strategies which are adopted to attain flexibility. Confusion about the concept of flexibility often occurs when reasons for its requirement are interchanged with strategies used to achieve it.

Fordism’s attempts to make production flow more efficiently and at a minimal cost put an analytical focus on the internal relationships of individual businesses. This became important when analysing the division of labour and the utilization of technology in the production process itself, especially on the shopfloor. Meanwhile, the flexible structures are displaced by analytical interest towards linking the external and internal relationships of businesses, with emphasis on the first. Certain concepts are discontinued, such as ‘transaction costs’, which contend that one business can relate to another in terms of expenses (Williamson, 1975). Relationships can be with subcontractors, service firms and marketing agencies, while expenses define those costs which are tied up by the need to maintain these external relationships. They determine associations linking businesses together, particularly in product development and marketing.

44 Lise Drewes Nielsen

Whereas earlier theories focused on a minimizing of expenses in the production processes, modern economic theories state that besides this, and in fact even more important for modern production associations, there is a need to optimize the gain obtained from external relationships. Economizing with the necessary transaction costs is the key. This is achieved through various processes in the vertical and horizontal production structures, with most interest being directed towards the vertical. Vertical integration defines industry’s tendencies to internalize all production functions, frequently in one single location. Industry in this way fully controls the conditions of the relationships and thereby manages them and minimizes costs. This characterizes a large portion of the ‘Ford’ production methods by which the large, non-producing industries gathered all the salaried workers under one roof. In the meantime, vertical disintegration moves ahead. This results in the segregation of the production functions, economical as well as geographical, via the development of a diffused subcontractor’s net.

Economy, technology and work distribution are the reasons behind this development. With shrinking and rapidly changing markets, it becomes economically lucrative to place the economic responsibility on the subcontractors. By linking new technology and rational production methods, the subcontractor emerges as a result of a technical work distribution in which the manufacture of semi-finished components, available to several customers, becomes profitable. The setting up of production functions in areas with an abundance of cheap, stable labour is a well-known method of disintegration in which space is exploited in order to divide and geographically separate the planning and directing functions of a factory from the producing entities. All these forms of internal disintegration have regional consequences, as well as the implication that regional development enters in as an active connection in the overall process of accumulation.

Vertical disintegration can therefore be defined as a strategy for flexibility and adaptation. However, finding exactly what regional consequences it has and how technical development is involved is problematic. Because many analyses pinpoint vertical integration, on fordist lines, as being too inflexible and outdated, this old fordistic production stand-by is doomed. Also, geographic areas that have been localized, especially old industrial centres, will experience, and are experiencing, a pronounced loss of industry, which has a dramatic effect on the workforce and local society. New associations and agreements between the employer and employee will occur, destroying the traditional fordist agreements which up until now have dominated the organizational pattern of the labour market.

Flexibility and geography

In this way the new flexible structures set requirements and conditions for production structures and the labour force. Flexible production systems are especially prevalent within the area of high-tech, the most advanced of the industries (this is especially true of the small and medium-sized companies) and the service sector, particularly business services (Atkinson, 1986; Scott and Storper, 1987; Morris, 1988).

If the geographic development of these sectors is included, we can determine which areas will be most affected by these flexible systems. The flexibility of the technology- producing industries in the adaptation of production, and the subsequently altered qualifica- tion demands of the labour force, have resulted in the locating of these industries either in or around large towns or in a completely new location with no links with traditional production methods of fordism, including its capital labour force agreement systems. This withdrawal from the old industrial centres has been supported by the possibilities for the new centre to amass, use and create advantages for close associations between factories, research and development centres and the labour force (Hall and Markussen, 1985; Castells, 1985).

The flexible production structure of the service industries and their importance to


regional patterns include some of the same development features. Where the externalizing of services in local firms allows the development of local service industries, more advanced business services exist - for instance, concerning product development and new technology and the constant advantage of tight networks and personal contacts in and about the old centres (Sassen-Koob, 1984).

The development of the handicraft industries is a direct result of the extended subcontractor net, along with the factories that produce for their local communities. This is where the flexibility of these small workshops, their ability to convert and their highly qualified labour, create a position in the market defined and limited by the large mass- production centres, although they can easily be powerful in a new flexible production structure. Investigations point out that these handicraft industries (especially the small ones) are flexible; among other things, computer-based technology contributes to this. On the other hand, it has always been much more difficult for technology-based, flexible production systems to function in European industry’s big businesses; this is definitely so in Danish businesses, too (Morris, 1987).

The Danish industrial structure contains some special features. It is made up of an incredible number of small firms, some of which are based on local production. Others produce highly specialized products aimed at the world market. Danish industry has been subjected to a strong regional development. In the 1970s, the greater Copenhagen area experienced a loss of industry, while the surrounding areas, especially in West Jutland, experienced a dynamic growth in small and medium-sized firms. At the same time, other outlying areas, those with a unilateral industrial structure, were faced with severe loss of industry. This was the result of structure development within the iron and other metal industries and predominantly in the shipyards.

If we look at regional development from the angle of a flexible production structure, then West Jutland’s development is not just the residual result due to the transformation of the Danish capital’s area, even though political and scientific circles have used this explanation. On the contrary, a new regional structure is brought about by flexible production systems introduced into the most advanced production. In other words, a geographic division of labour is attained. Copenhagen becomes the centre for commerce, service and high- tech; part of the outlying areas for flexible industry and service firms; and the remaining outlying areas for the more difficult development problems concerning the conversion from fordism to the new methods. Copenhagen will suffer from stagnation and mistakes in adaptation, not to mention great problems with the conversion from fordism to a centre for high technology. This produces economic problems as well as difficulties for the job market, because high-tech and service development cannot compensate for the loss of industry. For instance, there is much evidence that Danish electronics cannot handle tough international competition. This will have a sharp impact on Copenhagen, since this is where the electronics industry is concentrated (Maskell, 1986). Some of the outlying areas, though, will dynamically generate industry if the small and medium-sized firms can continue to convert to flexible production methods and can find a suitable international network as subcontractors. Meanwhile, the other areas outside of Copenhagen, which have to undergo a conversion of the heavy, fordist-style industries, will have difficulties in the conversion process based locally.

I have attempted to establish what flexibility and conversion mean for development in Denmark, and how the map of Denmark is then redefined. Some earlier explanations for such development have seen the dynamic impulses of small firms as the reason for this evolution, while others have seized upon the role of the local environment in their accounts, in that the exploitation of the interplay between businesses and environment gave some firms in the outlying environs a competitive advantage and hence great potential for survival than others (Maskell, 1986). There are also theories which see the cause as being the flight of firms from Copenhagen to West Jutland; but this is hard to accept, because on the whole there has not been a transfer of companies from east to west.


Most of the attempts to explain the situation have been loosely connected to the individual firm or locality. Only recently, the new economic theories, neo-institutionalists and network, have made an impact on Danish and Norwegian regional science (NordREFO, 1987). We still lack, therefore, an empirical example concerning Danish industry’s subcontracting position. Several investigations have focused on the rapid spreading of subcontractor systems. It is documented in a Swedish analysis that two out of every three small firms in Sweden are subcontractors (Fredriksson and Lindmark, 1979). Similar reports are to be found in England, Italy and Japan (Atkinson, 1985; Bagnasco, 1981; Brusco and Sabel, 1981; Sheard, 1983). In the meantime, only a few analyses have tried to explain the generating power behind the subcontractor systems (Morris, 1987). Some reports, however, have looked into the use of subcontractors by large concerns, while very few have looked at the survival possibilities of small firms in this connection. Due to the structure of Danish industry, consisting of many small and few large firms, this last problematic situation becomes extremely relevant.

A fruitful concept?

Flexibility coupled with vertical disintegration seems clearly to have some analytical inside potential for the comprehension of the development of a firm. The following grounds especially give credence to this. First, the consequences of structural changes are described in relation to production methods in the individual firm. This allows many of the clarifica- tions which the micro-economy ’s dominance of location theories has repudiated or omitted. The individual firms are not isolated, statistical entities, but a part of a comprehensive development process that enables them to do business externally as well as internally (Malecki, 1986). Then, at the same time, the focus is placed on how production methods penetrate the individual firm’s production adaptation. Flexibility requirements can be transformed into requirements which are widely directed against the labour force. This clarifies the shortcomings which have characterized the economic theory and regional economy: that it has not been able to implicate the labour force and the division of labour in theory and explanations (Scott and Storper, 1987; Walker, 1985).

A flexibility and disintegration mentality could track down new connections in the regional economic structure. However, we should remember that the regional division of labour is steadily moving and that the capitalistic powers of accumulation constantly try to find new means of exploiting production. Flexibility requirements are also an attempt to break barriers by throwing off earlier attachments. (This can be seen clearly in relation to the labour force.) This is why flexibility analyses often seem chaotic, and why predicting what new structures might appear out of this chaos can be difficult to determine without doubt, not to mention other predictions . . .

Flexibility and organization of labour

The changed conditions for production after the 1970s means that the economic development which takes place under fordism changes character in step with the modifications to production. An understanding of these modifications should be sought in relation to production planning and the labour force. In the production process one can also find modifications as the result of the relationships of firms with the new flexibility requirements, whether it is caused by a crisis, marketing or new technology. Relationships between wage-work and capital must be rethought, focusing here, too, on the concept of flexibility.

A firm’s corresponding requirements for rapid conversion and adaptation is a development for a completely new flexible relationship between labour and capital. Relationships can be defined by the following traits (Atkinson and Meager, 1986):


(1) Functional flexibility describes how the labour force changes within various job functions, depending on the firm’s development. This is when technological advances come in and the application of different tools changes and influences job functions.

( 2 ) Numericalflexibility’s aim is to adapt the total work volume to the firm’s needs, that is to say, minimizing the number of working hours. Two forms are utilized: (1) An attempt to achieve the freedom to hire and fire according to needs. There are many variations regarding the division of labour, i.e. seasonal swings. In order to promote this form, more of the hard-won rights achieved through labour unions have to be abandoned in the name of flexibility. If this form wins wide acceptance, then more sectorial and individualistic types of contracts will follow. (2) Possibilities for worlung flexible hours. Tendencies to increase part-time work can be seen here in various countries. This is true in the job functions which require, sporadically, additional work performance or a continuous 24-hour production process. Flexibility is relevant here when it takes the form of distribution of strenuous work within various time structures.

( 3 ) Flexibility of a3nancial nature is a third form. Wage levels are used as a dividing factor between different wage-earners situated in various functional flexibility forms,

’ and furthermore, transfer payrolls from piecework and productivity-based work to more general assessments concerning the willingness of the labour force to be flexible and address their work performance to the existing work tasks.

Flexibility replaces the previous methods of internal rationalization in the work process, but can also determine segments in the labour market. The different variations of segment theories attempt to find relationships between the internal labour market in a firm and the external in the labour market. Flexibility strategies enter in as forms describing the dynamics of this development. The core workforce describes the permanent nucleus of the workforce which is coupled to functional flexibility. The periphery workforce, however, is coupled to the numerical flexibility. Companies try minimizing the amount of core workers and change them into a peripheral or marginal workforce as a movement towards greater flexibility. This is accomplished internally with the help of new technology and restructuring, but it is also done by externalizing functions. Some investigations indicate that educational and training functions in particular are externalized and made peripheral. Others assess externalizing as the formation of new independent firms in vertical disintegration, and show that these have an internal labour market as well, consisting of core and marginal workforces. Then it becomes clear that firms at the forefront of the development of flexibility, for example within high-tech or advanced service industries, have a work structure hierarchy too, both in the job function and in a stable or variable association.

Sectorizing in this way, linked to the new production methods, is involved in promoting an ever greater division of the labour force, with a part of the core workforce being placed highest in the hierarchy and a portion of the peripheral workforce swinging back and forth in the labour market.

Flexibility and the labour force

In order for the concept of flexibility to stipulate something else besides capital’s exploitation of the labour force, the developmental consequences from the labour force’s point of view must also be taken into consideration. To understand this, a look at the past is important. The production structure of the 1950s through to the middle of the 1970s (often referred to as ‘fordistic’) was characterized by vertical integration, mass production and a steadily growing market. For the labour force this meant full-time, steady employment, especially for men. For women, it meant division. Some were brought into industry, under conditions set by men; others were absorbed into part-time jobs in the public or service sector. Public


service jobs were stable, but to a high degree part-time; while jobs in the service sector were unstable and part-time, with unsocial hours. Women have thus had a more flexible relation to the labour market than men.

When looking at the movement from a core to a peripheral labour force from the perspective of the labour market, three effects can be named: (1) increased part-time work; (2) increased temporary work; and (3) increasing numbers of self-employed. There has been a dramatic development of part-time jobs in the United States and Britain recently. Women account for the largest share of these jobs, but men too have been forced to take part-time jobs. This has often been thought of as an ideal way to bring into the workforce workers who were otherwise occupied, e.g. women, but this was a problem belonging to the 1960s (Christophersen, 1987-8). Lack of workers is not the question today. Instead, part-time work is now a means for capital to liberate itself from an expensive workforce and to adjust wages to fluctuation and instability: in other words, a direct result of flexibility.

In Denmark, part-time employment has been widespread, especially for women in the service and public sectors. By the middle of the 1970s, approximately half of the women in the job market were employed part-time, as against 5 % of the men. A dramatic drop in part-time employment for women has occurred in the past few years, so the figures are now 33 % for women. The active fight of unions against part-time employment accounts for this decline, but the great difficulties in qualifying for full unemployment benefits from a part-time job has also played a role. High unemployment is associated with the next type of flexibility.

The increased share of temporary employment means that the workforce, at a certain period of time, has a variable relation to its place of employment. Temporary employment is on the increase in the United States in certain types of industry, but it is found in the local labour market in the public service sector as well, for instance in mail services. The solution used for this periodic need for labour is to lay off and re-hire. This form of flexibility is widespread in Denmark, too. Unemployment there is at an average of 8- 10%. Hidden in this figure is the large number of those who move in and out of the job market, those who go back and forth from job to unemployment. This accounts for 25 % of the workforce, a little higher for women than for men. The reasons for this are that there are no costs involved for the employer when firing employees, and supplementary benefits are available from the first day of unemployment.

The self-employed constitute the third group identified. One could call them independent contractors with their own offices. They can be well-educated professionals, such as architects and engineers (often men), but can also provide business services such as administration, translation and printing (often women). Besides this, a tendency can be seen for certain groups taken out of the labour market to establish small firms of their own within service and retailing. This is quite often the case with immigrants in large cities or women who start up a business in or in the proximity of the home. In the northern countries of Europe, as in so many others, there has been a concerted effort to get women to start something up for themselves. A ‘Start your Own’ campaign in Sweden was undertaken with an almost religious fervour. It is important, here, to separate the well- educated woman’s desire to take responsibility for her own firm from the less-educated woman’s last stab at finding a spot in the labour market. A study from the Netherlands has shown that 53% of female initiators were so-called ‘repeaters’ in the job market, i.e. middle-aged women now available for work after raising their families, who started their own businesses as a result of their failure to acquire salaried employment (Carlsen and Drewes Nielsen, 1988).

Other forms of flexibility requirements develop when the core labour force is addressed. It is important to ensure the flexibility of the core labour force in regard to conversion and new technology with, among other things, education and retraining. Functional flexibility is utilized here when shifting job functions. At the same time, economic flexibility takes the lead when the labour force is rewarded for its talent to increase working time


to meet the needs of the employer to a higher degree than daily, permanent working hours. Today, the labour force which finds itself in the core of that part of the labour market which has introduced flexible production systems, is the group at the highest level of the labour hierarchy, with high salaries but with stress, long working hours and frequent job shifts to further their careers and obtain promotions.

Women’s flexible time

Are there limits to flexibility? As documented earlier, there are strong powers, economic and technological, trying to push the various flexible forms ahead. So far, we have only analysed it from the point of view of demand and, from this angle, have reached an evaluation of the forms of flexibility and their influence and traits. Suppose we look now at it from the point of view of supply or of the labour force. I have already mentioned some of the consequences, but I will concentrate now on how the social relationships in and around the workplace also have an influence on the flexibility of the labour force. This is where I. propose to bring in the concept of time structure. Feminist scientific investigation has linked flexibility and time structure, as a result of women’s daily need to apportion time between home and work (Ipsen, 1984). Therefore, this part of the paper will also take into account the flexibility of women as regards the daily time structure, and the consequences when this flexibility confronts the requirements for flexibility in work organizing and the job market.

Just as the job market has gender division of labour, the utilization of time differs for the two sexes. In fact, there are two entirely different time structures. Therefore, it is absolutely necessary when we link flexibility and time structure to relate differently to the development for men and for women. Since women seem to have the greatest restrictions on time structure if they are to live up to flexibility requirements posed by the labour market, this is a good place to start analysing flexibility relationships and the daily time structure. When analysing flexibility, it is natural to use time perspectives, because the daily time structure sets limits to activities and priority demands on time in regard to these activities. In fact, the more activities you need to tit in to your daily time structure, the bigger is the demand for priorities (Simonsen, 1985).

Time as regards the family unit has taken a dramatic turn over the past 30 years. Earlier, it was the man’s place to adapt himself to the home and labour market, with the family often coordinating itself to the demands of his job. With the arrival of women in the labour market, this picture changed completely - not only because there were now two wage-earner structures to coordinate, but because the family needed to learn to juggle production and reproduction. The attention women gave to reproductive functions was not. however, equally shared by men; this was the beginning of the pattern in which men still adapt themselves to the labour market while women must adapt to both home and work.

Women between home and work

Especially in spatial analyses, the relationships between home and work also become time- concerned relations between residence and workplace. The analysis, therefore, is not just about the structure of the place of employment, the flexible developmental requirements for the labour force and how local labour is divided on the job. It is also a question of urban development, separation of workplace and residence and, last but not least, the pattern of locating workplaces and housing in segregated structures. Towns are developed under the influence of family norms which assume a working male head of household (Mackenzie and Rose, 1983). Suburban areas are the ghettos of reproduction. I t is the women who


have the responsibility for solving the division of everyday life which the obsolete town structure forces on families.

Towns, transportation, social and educational institutions, not to mention the labour market, are programmed to the old concept of family. As a result, women must perform with a great degree of flexibility. So must supportive men, who slowly but surely are brought into the reproduction functions of the family. In this way, barriers are created with regard to the labour market’s requirements for flexibility which are determined by economic development. In the end, the discussion is actually about two widely different concepts, ‘flexibility in relation to the family’ and ‘flexibility in relation to the labour market’.

Historically, whenever women were brought in as wage-earners, the labour market was divided by sex in such a way that male and female labour markets were different vertically, horizontally and temporally. Some analyses work on the basis of contemplating two labour markets to start with and then seeing what points of contact they have.

Even though certain needs in the labour market and home have departed from gender division of labour, absurd as it is, one can conclude, in relation to flexibility, that women’s relationship with the labour market has shown a high degree of flexibility. Meanwhile, this flexibility has taken into consideration social renewal functions regarding children, family and men, with the daily time structure as a base. Women have actively used time and space as a starting point for their flexibility. Naturally, their geographic and social mobility have thus been greatly limited, and the necessary flexibility between home and work limits the flexibility of the labour market. Therefore, from the labour market’s viewpoint, women can be misjudged as inflexible because of their limited mobility. This shows a misunderstanding of women’s flexibility between home and work which has actually been their singular solution to remedy the situation in which society (and men) have put them. This situation arose because no one else took over the reproduction functions at the same pace at which women became involved as wage-earners.

An account of a family’s time consumption outside the home shows that in the 1950s a family used 50 hours for work and transport per week; in the 1980s this amount increased to 80 hours. It has also been documented that even with all the technological, time-saving equipment in the home, there has not been a corresponding reduction of work in the home. Currently, we have a long time to wait before work in the home is shared equally. The conclusion here is that there is more work and that women, especially, are involved in this phase of’historical development and taking the largest role (Haslebo, 1982).

The women’s labour market

Are women employed in those areas where flexibility forms are widespread? Yes and no. Women have entered the public sector. In regard to the system for the division of labour, women have taken some of those functions removed from the home. From an employment angle, women have been absorbed by the public sector in the municipality because its expansion came about during those years in which a large number of women entered the labour market. Looking at it from the perspective of time structure, local employment in municipalities became very attractive. Women attended to many of the local service functions within administration, culture, education and care.

However, the public sector is the administration centre for the central areas. So, even though a woman’s share is less than in the municipalities, many women are employed in the public sector in or around the large towns. In the private sector, women are employed in offices and administration, private services and in retail. The women’s labour market is smaller as regards time and space; therefore, it is limited in time and space. Yet, women in the outlying areas who are frequently stressed by the lack of employment possibilities have had to accept long commuting journeys to regional and public working places, for


instance in hospitals and administration. To compensate for this, women often take part- time jobs and those with unsocial hours. Other women in less developed parts of the country have had to settle for what the local labour market has to offer, for example in industry, private service or in the retail branch. In periods of high unemployment, others have had to rotate between work and unemployment, especially unskilled women who account for a high percentage of the unemployed.

Are women core or periphery? The ongoing error many labour market researchers make is to place women almost automatically in the peripheral labour market. This has been pointed out by feminist scientific researchers, but without much success in being heard. The women’s labour market has, of course, a core and periphery labour force. The core is found especially in those areas where women dominate: the public sector, service sector and in ‘female’ industries (textilesklothing and food). It is true, though, that in the male-dominated sector women are often employed as peripheral workers; and on this premise, these studies are accurate in regarding women as a periphery labour force. However, this part of the female labour market is dwindling; therefore, the studies are inaccurate when these male-dominated areas are taken as the general labour market.

When we look at the whole of the labour market, flexibility requirements within industry will not mean all that much to women - although geographic areas which are distinguished by a one-sided female industrial sector cannot be disregarded, as they could be strongly affected. There will be an attempt slowly to introduce these requirements to the public sector. They are already proposed for discussion on the political agenda in Denmark, but strong opposition is expected from the unions. Therefore, salaried women in the public sector are still threatened by the traditional austerity drives, downgrading salaries of civil servants and cessation of hiring, and not (yet) by flexibility. Requirements for flexibility are found in the service sector where women are employed in business services, clerical work, private service and retail. In business services, there is a tendency to hire out labour as needed, resulting in a pronounced increase of employees-for-hire agencies (Vedel, 1986). In addition, an increasing number of women have become self-employed within business services, such as typing, printing, translating, etc. (Carlsen et al . , 1988). This increase in self-employment is also seen in private service and retail shops such as beauty salons, health food shops and health and exercise centres. There are strong regional variations in this pattern. Women in the central areas have a far greater portion of these forms of employment than women in less developed areas which are tightly linked to the area’s business structure and are possibly more tied to the traditional family patterns.

We can therefore conclude that the requirements for flexibility when the periphery labour force is situated in a weaker position, economic and time-wise, in the labour market, will affect the women’s labour force to various extents. From the local community’s perspective, the flexibility forms which by its economic development give women a looser connection to the labour market are, from a woman’s point of view, full of contradictions. Even though it creates a looser foundation in the labour market’s association, the establish- ment of businesses will, for instance, solve flexibility considerations for women between work and home because their businesses are usually in close proximity to their homes (Carlsen and Drewes Nielsen, 1988).

Flexibility and polarization

The vertical structure of the gender-divided society puts the majority of women in lower- bracket jobs. Whereas men have worked their way up the ‘pyramid’ over the past twenty years, women’s ‘submarine’ has not changed its appearances. On the one hand, blame can be laid on the horizontal structure in which women and men are partially separated by sectors. On the other hand, blame must also be put on the lack of opportunities for women in the work situation for advance and job-changing (Boje, 1987). I will not go


further into the reasons for this, but instead will look at the results in relation to flexibility. This is where the relevance of the polarization concept comes in.

Many regional economic studies have indicated the polarization that occurs in society and in the labour market. Regional division of labour as well as labour division inside individual regions are the reasons for polarization. It is the polarization of central areas which is most often analysed (Weiss, 1985). At the top is the new ‘upper class’, closely connected to economic and managerial transactions, national and international. Vertical disintegration demands leadership, control and coordination. Besides this, the advanced and development-oriented business service is still, in relation to localization, dependent upon the advantages of agglomeration and, moreover, on the most advanced data-processing industries. These sectors offer jobs that require maximum flexibility. The work is directed towards assignments and entails a great deal of work, but career possibilities are open and salaries high.

These requirements can only be accepted by specific groups: the young and highly educated who are willing to focus everything on a career. The conditions for participation are that relationships with family, friends, etc. are given lower priorities or are even written off (Jlirrgensen and Drewes Nielsen, 1988). It is easy to comprehend why women (and men too) who are responsible for caring for their families in this period of their lives are prevented from participating in this development. All in all, the dominance of men in these sectors is great.

Women are the lowest in the hierarchy of employment and are in the majority. A consequence of growth of the upper classes in the inner cities and their desire to save time is a succession of private service functions which are carried out by women and immigrants. It is a mistake exclusively to look at these groups as periphery labour forces with their subsequent flexibility forms and casual connection to the labour market. Nor is it correct to consider them as stagnating in this periphery status in relation to economic development. Growth for these low-income groups is a result of growth for high-income groups at the other end of the polarizing structure and can be looked upon as a prerequisite (Sassen-Koob, 1984). Simultaneously, requirements for conversion and rapidly altered economic conditions will influence the employment of these groups quickly, e.g. within private service.

Summary

Requirements for flexibility determine new relationships in the development of the economy. This word often hides the fact that the abolition of existing ties is desirable if they break down barriers for broad economic development. In this way, flexibility can be seen not only as an adaptation but as an active attempt to abolish and re-create relationships between wage-earners and capital and between the labour force and time/space.

Flexibility is not simply a question of an individual alone adapting better to a production structure, as so many politicians and employers have argued. Requirements for flexibility must be seen as a process in which the development of the production structure assumes that the existing ties for the labour force are eliminated. The barriers, therefore, are broken through along with the development of new forms. In this article I have attempted to shed light on the flexibility requirements’ effects in these areas. A firm’s flexible relationships in the vertical disintegration process opens the door to new interpretations of regional structural development. At the same time, new requirements for flexibility in the labour force follow.

Opposition between the economic structures’ compulsion and the labour force’s adaptation becomes evident at the local level. Women are a vulnerable group in relation to the new demands for flexibility, not as a consequence of being part of a periphery labour force, but because they are at the lowest level of the work hierarchy and their geographic


and social mobility and adaptation are limited due to the social renewal functions. Women have shown a high degree of flexibility between space and time, at home and at work. The problem lies in the fact that this flexibility apparently does not suit the flexibility which sets new requirements in economic development.

I have analysed a ‘top-down’ determination of the flexibility concept (in accordance with existing literature). Therefore, I have suggested structural economic development results for the local community’s development of those requirements for flexibility with regard to the local labour force. In another type of analysis, the starting point would be the labour forces’ relationships between home and work in time and space and the resulting qualitative, as well as quantitative, requirements for flexibility in local, regional and national development. A so-called ‘bottom-up’ analysis would to a great degree focus on the opposing relations found regarding capital and work and in which politically ideal requirements are needed so that these two forms of flexibility ‘between wage-earners and capital’ and ‘between production and reproduction’ can meet.

Lise Drewes Nielsen, Copenhagen Business School, Blaagaardsgade 23B, Postbox 539, DK-2200, Copenhagen, Denmark

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