Subaltern Workers in Contemporary France

Olivier Masclet is a Professor of Sociology at the Université de Limoges and co-director of the GRESCO Research Centre, France.Thomas Amossé is a researcher at the Conservatoire National des Arts et Métiers, Lise-CEET Research Centre, Paris, France.Lise Bernard is a researcher at CNRS and a member of the Centre Maurice Halbwachs, Paris, France.Marie Cartier is a Professor of Sociology at Nantes University, France.Marie-Hélène Lechien is a Lecturer in the Department of Sociology at the Université de Limoges, France.Olivier Schwartz is a Professor of Sociology at the Université Paris Cité, France.Yasmine Siblot is a Professor of Sociology at the Université Paris 8, CRESPPA-CSU Research Centre, France.

• List of figures; List of tables; List of contributors; 1 Introduction: Subalterns in a ‘society of the similar’: A study of the lifestyles of the stable-modest fractions of the contemporary working classes; 2 An exploration of the working classes starting from their middle fractions: A two-pronged approach, through statistics and case studies; Part 1: Stories of stabilisation; 3 Introduction to Part 1: Stories of stabilisation; 4 ‘We aimed too high’: A household destabilised by its residential and professional aspirations – Élodie Paillé and Clément Jacquet; 5 Planning life: A strong investment in activities other than work – Laurent Douillard and Thomas Guillet; 6 ‘A mellow job’ and living with a friend: A young, single male worker’s adjustment to a subaltern condition – Romain Boyer; 7 Holding on: Sparing no effort to stabilise an unstable position – Véronique Delage; 8 ‘Getting it right this time’: Aspiring to join the world of intellectuals – Yamina and Souleymane Diallo; 9 ‘You’ve got to fight’: Work as a resource for a fragile success – Mina and Michel Carry; 10 Making a virtue of simplicity: The hedonistic choices of labouring couple – Yvon and Michou Ratelier; 11 A story of social reclassification: A couple from rural backgrounds gone to the city – Mireille and Roger Monteil; Part II: Gender relations and domestic space; 12 Introduction to Part 2: Gender relations and domestic space; 13 Being a mother and unemployed: Resisting being stuck at home – Laeticia and Valentin Dufour; 14 The power of two femininities – Régine and Hervé Leblanc; 15 A business that works: Breaking away from the family model, relying on family help – Cécile and Jean-Marc Pilier; 16 An interlude of equality: ‘Stéphanie is there with the children, she can manage the homework’ – Nicolas and Stéphanie Fontaine; 17 Keeping the conjugal peace: A compensatory domestic equality – Cécilia and Éric Dufar; 18 Being a housewife: Between permanence and evolution of a traditional role – Nadège and Patrick Lancel; Part III: Triangular social consciousness and institutional ‘goodwill’ – the reconfiguration of relations with other social groups; 19 Introduction to Part 3: Triangular social consciousness and institutional ‘goodwill’: the reconfiguration of relations with other social groups; 20 Being a respectable woman: Between the stigma of housing estates and the union in-group – Chantal Monlouis; 21 ‘Simple people’? A local labour family, between social reproduction and openness – Nathalie and Alain Rigaux; 22 ‘It’s really important to be able to grow’: Social ambitions and political disappointments in a working-class household – Vanessa Le Coz and Samuel Bidaud; 23 Always between two worlds: One couple’s split local social life – Manou and Jean Audouin; 24 The cleaning woman and the school parents’ association: Multipositionality in the working classes – Myriam and Nicolino Sanatanazefi; 25 Getting back to a ‘normal life’: Biographical disruptions and ‘institutional goodwill’ – Sylvie Barderon and Enzo; 26 ‘I’ve had two lives’: Self-improvement work and the infiltration of psychological culture into working-class worlds – Philippe and Marianne Chapalain; 27 Conclusion: Goodwill as necessity: Aspirations of the middle fraction of the working classes and how they relate to norms; Appendix A: Socio-professional categories; Appendix B: Equivalency chart of the primary and secondary educational systems in France, the UK, and the US; Appendix C: Educational qualifications; Index

'Olivier Masclet and his team of expert researchers have produced an exemplary account of those in the middle tier of the working class today: those who are not so poor and insecure as to be the subject of moral panic and political censure but not so affluent and privileged as to be on the edge of the middle class. They are getting by, struggling on, trying to be "like everyone else", with hopes, dreams, struggles, failures and fears for the future. Embedding rich, detailed case studies of individuals and couples within rigorous reviews of the changes sweeping France as much as any other Western social order, the team skilfully manage to unpick the effects of declining working class solidarity, precarisation and feminisation of employment, changing gender relations and the race for credentials on the everyday experiences, biographies, self-perceptions and self-evaluations of workers and families in the 21st century. This is a must-read for anyone interested in working-class life in contemporary Europe'. Will Atkinson, Professor of Sociology, University of Bristol, author of The Class Structure of Capitalist Societies and Beyond Bourdieu