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NEIL AGGETT LABOUR STUDIES UNIT (NALSU) Labour Studies Seminar Series, Rhodes University, South Africa.
WEBINAR: Wednesday, 6th October 2021, online via Zoom (details below), 4 pm
TOPIC & SPEAKER: Michael Rogan, Rhodes University "Same Storm, Different Boat: COVID-19, Precarity and the South African Labour Market"
Since the outset of the global pandemic, the ILO has warned of the disastrous impact of the crisis on informal workers (who make up roughly 60% of total employment globally). Unfortunately, these predictions have, to a large extent, been accurate. However, the impact of the crisis on different groups of informal workers has been uneven. The analysis in this webinar aims to outline some of the key theoretical understandings of the impacts of economic crises on informal employment and then presents a detailed analysis of the South African labour market over the past year and a half. Based on the Quarterly Labour Force Surveys, the analysis maps out the differentiated impacts of the 'pandemic recession' on informal and precarious employment by gender, status in employment and industry sector. The analysis concludes with a reflection on the key gaps in the state's response to the crisis from the perspective of the most marginalised workers in the labour market.
SPEAKER: Michael Rogan is an Associate Professor in Economics and Economic History, and an active member of the Neil Aggett Labour Studies Unit (NALSU) where he runs some of the largest projects. He is also a research associate in the global research-policy-action network Women in Informal Employment: Globalizing and Organizing (WIEGO). Prof Rogan's research focuses largely on informal employment, gender, poverty, inequality, food security, education and skills development, and survey design.
JOINING: register in advance for the seminar, which will use Zoom, by going to https://zoom.us/meeting/register/tJ0pcu-qpjwtGt2ZMxbYoaz-KW78d9hi0JG6
After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting.
HOSTS: The series is run by the Neil Aggett Labour Studies Unit (NALSU) in partnership with the Departments of Sociology & Industrial Sociology, and Economics & Economic History, Rhodes University and the Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung (FES).
NALSU, based in the Eastern Cape, South Africa, is engaged in policy, research and workers' education. Built around a vibrant team from disciplines including Economics, History and Sociology, it has active partnerships and relations with a range of advocacy, labour and research organisations. It draws strength from its location in a province where the legacy of apartheid and the cheap labour system, and the contradictions of the post-apartheid state, are keenly felt. We are named in honour of Dr Neil Hudson Aggett, a union organiser and medical doctor who died in 1982 in an apartheid jail after enduring brutality and torture.
MORE: https://www.ru.ac.za/nalsu