Reflections on Embeddedness in an Applied Sociology Project in Ontario

Abstract

The growth of precarious employment across Canada prompted sociologists and community researchers to understand the causes and consequences of insecure work. However, structural context often leads research organizations’ goals to conflict with those of its members. According to organizational theory, external pressures influence organizational goals and their approaches to problem solving. Thus, the purpose of this article is to illuminate some of the concrete ways that such pressures, known as embeddedness, help to shape research output. We draw on written reflective analyses of our experiences with embeddedness while working in the research organization Poverty and Employment Precarity in Niagara (PEPiN) to highlight the external factors which constrained our data analysis and our final report’s legislative and workplace policy recommendations for relieving the economic and family stresses associated with precarious work. We argue that embeddedness under neoliberal conditions limits the extent of structural critique that research organizations make of working conditions.