The Image of Precarious Employment in Statistical Sources: the Italian Case

The precariousness of labour is a characteristic of the labour market that is becoming increasingly widespread in the more highly developed capitalist societies. (e chapter studies how this phenomenon has been represented in Italian statistical sources in the last thirty years. The aim is to reconstruct a picture of the precariousness of work as it emerges from this particular type of source. For this reason we will be specifying the type of quantitative and qualitative analysis of the phenomenon, the criteria of classification and the terminology. These are all elements that together constitute the language of the sources examined and thus represent the medium and mode of presentation of the phenomenon in these sources. Italy in the last thirty years is referred to because here, as in other industrially very advanced countries, the phenomenon of precarious work contracts has reached increasingly significant levels. The historical point of view adopted in the chapter enables us to make three clear points. First, the precariousness of labour as studied is not a new occurrence in the history of industrial capitalism. Second, the reasons why this phenomenon has reached an unprecedented level in more recent times have been examined. Third, historical analysis is particularly useful in the critical examination of statistical sources, both in order to question how far they can be trusted to reflect the true extent of the phenomenon and in order to reconstruct the kind of representation they afford of job precariousness. Gender specifics are also considered and a comparison is made between the trend in Italy and that in other European countries.