ABSTRACT
The introductory chapter sets the scene by outlining the broad social changes that have transformed contemporary work, including casualization, the fragmentation of careers and work insecurity. It then poses key questions about the accuracy of theoretical accounts of contemporary work, focusing particularly on arguments by Zygmunt Bauman and Richard Sennett regarding the meaning of work and self-identity. This chapter also introduces the problem of disenchantment in contemporary Western culture—with reference to Max Weber and Friedrich Nietzsche—which informs the study of the significance of work in the lives of contemporary individuals. The key questions this book sets out to answer are then outlined: Do workers today continue to be haunted by the work ethic? Is it possible to devote oneself to a calling when the companies of the new capitalism demand not loyalty but flexibility from their employees? What is the fate of the work ethic in a world increasingly shaped by neoliberalism and globalization? Finally, the chapter zooms in on Melbourne, Australia, and explains how the city will be used in the book as a laboratory for studying the complexity of the meanings of work in the liquid-modern world.
