Precarious Work Versus Decent Work: The Precariousness From The Perspectives Of Service Sector Employees In Turkey:The Case Of Bursa

The most direct consequence of the expansion of non-standard employment contracts in labour market becomes “precarious work”, which is characterized by job insecurity, job instability and involuntariness for nonpermanent jobs. Non-standard employment forms which are implemented increasingly in service sector as a result of attempts to make Turkish labour market more flexible, make it compulsory to problematize the precarious experience of employees. This qualitative study aims to explore how those, who are employed under fixed-term contracts, experience job insecurity and job instability and whether the experience of precariousness differentiates according to the age, gender and educational level.hdam giderek sonuçlarınaygınlaşması ile birlikte ortaya çıkan ize edilen eğreti çalışma durumlarına According to the findings of the semi-structured in-depth interviews made with 21 employees working in cleaning and security sectors operating in Bursa, phenomenon of job insecurity is experienced as the increase of unemployment risk, the danger of not finding a job again in the labour market after falling out of the job, and loss of foresight pertaining to the future in the working life. As for the job instability, it arises as both the gradual loss of employees’ abilities to build their careers and postponement of short term and long term decisions in their everyday lives. On the other hand, all participants’ accepting their jobs compulsorily completes the precariousness characteristics of their jobs. Furthermore, it was found that those who were influenced by job insecurity and job instability utmost are women and young people who have high level of education. These findings point out that precariousness peculiar to service sector jobs in Turkey causes multi-dimensional problems for temporary employees.

Keywords:

Precarious employment, fixed-term employment contracts, job insecurity job instability, service sector,

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