The Handbook for the Future of Work by MacLeavy, Julie, and Frederick Harry Pitts (eds). Taylor and Francis. 2024, 424 p.

Abstract

Few research topics are as contested as the “future of work.” What counts as work, whose futures matter, and which forces deserve emphasis remain open questions. The Handbook for the Future of Work assembles more than thirty specialists to map the terrain, offering panoramic coverage (or state-of-the-field cartography) of automation, platformisation, social difference and policy innovation.

Editors Julie MacLeavy and Frederick Harry Pitts position The Handbook as “a flexible guide” rather than a canonical gatekeeper, precisely because “there is no single conception of the future of work”. The book’s ten multi-chapter parts highlights that pluralism: histories (Part 2), automation debates (Part 3), platform labour (Part 4), identity and difference (Part 5), gender-care-reproduction (Part 6), sectoral case studies (Part 7), labour-market transitions (Part 8), geographies (Part 9) and policy futures (Part 10). The intention of the book is mainly in creating a reading material for university courses on Future-of-Work subject spread across a semester.