ABSTRACT
The hunch being proposed and tested in this book is that small scale carries implications for labour relations which in turn have a bearing even when confronted by global management strategies. It argues for a methodology which explicitly operationalizes smallness in order to gain a better understanding of the predicament of the world of work, and which opts for small island developing states as exemplaries of small-scale environments. The validity and contribution of this methodology is intended as a novel perspective towards the exploration of labour policy and labour relations issues. The context for such an application is provided primarily by small island developing states, but interesting application potential extends to small-scale, ‘social island’ sites elsewhere. This widens the context of applicability enormously, placing (for a change) large, global- and continental-based producers in a position to learn from the next-to-forgotten island outposts of the modern world. Put differently, the argument is that small scale matters – not deterministically but in a variety of ways which intervene and therefore colour, in unique but comparable strokes, the behaviour entered into by small-scale producers in the process of managing, and being managed by, their working environment.
