Injustices: L'expérience des inégalités au travail (review)

Initially involved in Alain Touraine's research program on social movements, Dubet later on developed a somewhat different approach. His "sociology of experience" promotes a pluralistic conception of human behavior which encompasses and integrates the respective contributions of functionalist/culturalist explanations, rational action theory and interpretative methodologies. Its distinctiveness lies in an attempt to show that "social experiences are subjective combinations of objective elements" (Dubet, 1994: 136), in the sense that individuals actively construct the meaning of things and situations through an ongoing process of innovative mixture between preexisting social logics and schemata. Although at times verging on eclecticism, Dubet's latest book proves the fruitfulness of such a departure from monistic catch-all models. Indeed, beyond collecting original data through varied methods (261 individual field interviews, 11 focus group meetings, and a 1144-respondent survey by questionnaire), Dubet has succeeded in providing an empirically grounded theoretical account of the prevailing stances with regard to inequalities at work in contemporary France.

Studying the lexicon and grammar of everyday moral reasoning, he shows that the critique of injustice can be parsed and summarized by means of three core principles: equality, merit and autonomy. In this view, critical capacity is no deceptive reflexivity, for judgments are constrained by unalterable syntactic frames and patterns whilst concretely implying combinatorial operations which prove the sagacious — though bounded — creativeness of ordinary people's "normative activity." Besides, the usual assumptions of sociological reductionism ("false consciousness," "rationalization," "mere ritual," etc.) are all the more disputable since the aforementioned principles are double-barreled weapons which may either legitimize or call into question any given social order. According to Dubet, the threefold meaning of work in advanced societies (status, exchange value, means of self-fulfillment) epitomizes the tensions between and within the instantiated forms of these contradictory principles, each of them being challenged or criticized in the name of the other two or for its own sake. Still, moral discrepancies are partly mitigated insofar as the denunciation of injustice has to do with intermediate concerns (disrespect of labor law, abuse of power, denial of recognition).

The claim for increased equality relates both to positions and opportunities (chapter 1). Be they blue-collar workers, call center employees, salesclerks, cashiers, caregivers or teachers, many interviewees get indignant with "castes" and emphasize hurtful social contempt. In their opinion, inequalities are legitimate inasmuch as they inhere to the social division of labor which allows for the furtherance of collective ideals (solidarity, culture, nation, etc.). Hence their disapproval with the abnormal gap between the over-privileged, the excluded, and those deprived of primary goods. Whereas their pleas for equal respect and honor derive from an organicist outlook on society, their own experience of unfair treatment (sexism, racism, etc.) lies behind their statements about unequal opportunities. Strikingly, when giving an overall assessment of their own situation, most interviewees relativize their miseries. Dubet puts forth that this balanced judgment not only stems from the existence of distinct "spheres" (work, consumption, etc.) and scales of inequality but also reveals an implicit satisfaction threshold, namely the effective freedom to pursue one's life goals. The protest against the infringements of merit-based standards (unwarranted advantages, favoritism, automatic career progression, etc.) reflects an attachment to fair exchange and incentive rewards (chapter 2). The very nature of the belief in merit varies with rank and occupation, but the underlying feeling — that of not being recompensed according to one's devotion to his tasks — remains the same and only gets acute when the word "exploitation" encapsulates one's perception of work. As to the longing for a stimulating job, it indicates the interviewees' expectation of being able to blossom out at work and therefore highlights how much autonomy is held to be a rightful need (chapter 3). In this respect, the semantics of authenticity (vocation, craft) echoes the various depictions of one's alienation in the workplace (exhaustion, harassment, stress).

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