Trapped in contradiction: Precariousness and the ideological orientations of younger workers in hospitality-related occupations

Abstract

This article explores the ideological orientations of ‘younger workers’ in relation to their experience of precarious employment in Scotland and Greece. Based on 60 semi-structured interviews with workers in hospitality-related occupations in two national settings, it counterposes their actual material conditions to their ideational conceptions, values and worldviews. By interrogating stances on issues such as flexibility, future plans, collectivism and trade unionism, on the ideals of freedom and fairness and on their thoughts about what is possible in their field of work, it enquires about the impact of prevailing market-centred values and neoliberal axioms on younger workers. It identifies tensions, unease and contradictions in workers’ ‘subjective’ articulations and explains how these are not a product of ideology per se but have their causes in the ‘objective’ realm, the socio-economic conditions prevailing since the financial crisis.