Why We Need Meaningful Work, Not Jobs

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The Dictatorship of the Workplace 

Good work involves not only the character and values of work, but also the power relationships in the workplace. Economists and politicians never mention it, but under the job system, virtually every workplace is a dictatorship. Let's face it: Most of us spend the majority of our adult lives as passive subjects in managerial tyrannies. Workers—whatever the color of their collars—have little say in forming workplace policies or conditions.

Even many of the advances for workers, hard-won through decades of labor-movement struggles, have been rolled back in recent years. While this is largely the result of corporate pressure, unions bear some responsibility for their own decline by choosing to focus almost exclusively on wage issues; they seldom explore other ways to improve workers' lives. Pay is important to anyone with a job, but a sense of purpose and accomplishment, an outlet for creativity, an opportunity for flexibility, and co-worker relationships matter, too. As the American labor movement pushes to revitalize itself by reaching out to women, youth, minorities, and the public at large, there's hope that helping workers achieve other elements of good work will find a more prominent place on union agendas.

Over the past 20 years, a variety of employee ownership strategies and more ambitious efforts toward workplace democracy have brought greater equity to many thousands of workers. A new generation of socially responsible businesses have broadened employees' role in decision making—a trend that is now spreading to some mainstream firms. Many people have found that leaving the dictatorship of the workplace and pursuing partnership or self-employment options, while fraught with risks, can be a way to more fulfilling work and lives. For some it simply means repackaging current job skills as a consulting business in order to spend more time with family or favorite pursuits; others, inspired by writers like Wendell Berry and Paul Hawken, have created independent livelihoods that make a contribution to society and the planet. Each of these efforts is a potentially important step in the re-creation of work.

A Nation of Strangers 

For years we have heard urgent pleas to "preserve family values" and to "restore a sense of community" in our lives. Yet we rarely hear the advocates of these causes mention that our current job system is one of the chief culprits in destroying traditional bonds of family and community life. For generations workers have been forced to move to wherever jobs could be found, uprooting their spouses and children from family, friends, and community connections. Downsizing, corporate restructuring, shifting production to low-wage areas, and other favorite tools of the globalized economy keep almost all of us anxious and scouting for the next job. Always anticipating the next move to Seattle, Sarasota, or Singapore, we invest little energy in maintaining strong bonds to our extended family, our community, or any particular place. We have become, in investigative journalist Vance Packard's memorable phrase, "a nation of strangers." Witness the throngs at airports each Thanksgiving as millions return "home" to find a 48-hour semblance of family and community.

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