ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the fundamental transformations characterising work and family life during late modernity period. It focuses on the new conditions for family life under flexible capitalism and the instable foundations on which individuals are expected to create and maintain a consistent, meaningful life narrative in a volatile work sphere structured around temporary goals and relationships. The chapter briefly discusses how the social practices and activities we associate with work can be analysed sociologically. It introduces Richard Sennett's analysis of life under flexible capitalism and his famous diagnosis of the personal consequences of work life in a society that orients its activities towards short-term objectives and encounters. The chapter discusses Arlie Hochschild's detailed and eye-opening interactionist study of everyday life in the large US company "Amerco", which, despite a declared mission to be a family-friendly workplace puts its employees under increasing time pressure and promotes a cultural reversal of the norms and values that we usually associate with work and family.
