The Rise of Meritocratic Morality and the Failure of Institutions: A Study of Unemployed Autoworkers in the United States and Canada

• In Event: 221 - ASA-NSF Postdoctoral Fellowship Program Research Session. Issues in Economic Sociology: Comparative International Perspectives

Abstract

This talk is based on a crossnational comparative study of similar sets of unemployed autoworkers right across the US-Canadian border, in the metro areas of Detroit, Michigan, and Windsor, Ontario, during the economic crisis years of 2009 and 2010. The overall goal of my ethnographic study was to isolate the effects of social policies and national cultures. In the part of my work highlighted in this talk, I argue that, contrary to past scholarship, today's unemployed blue-collar workers in the US and Canada express self-reliant views of the labor market that have converged with white-collar views and converged across nations. Second, I identify two proximate causal mechanisms. Personal experiences with failed institutions lead workers in both countries to a realistic approach of self-reliance. In turn, what I call meritocratic morality--an ideology of critical judgment prevalent among jobless workers from both countries--reinforces and extends this view, worsening their doubts about unions and government, excusing corporations, and, ultimately, leading to a poisonous self-blame.

Author

• Victor Tan Chen, University of California-Berkeley