@charlesumney
Industrial relations, technology, sociology of work. Currently focused on technological change in warehousing work among other things. Co-author "Marketization" (Bloomsbury, 2022). https://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/marketization-9781913441463/
Are you interested in pursuing a funded PhD at the ESRC Centre for Digital Futures at Work, at the University of Leeds, supervised by Mark Stuart & Charles Umney? You will contribute to a study titled, ‘Building employment inclusion within the West Yorkshire regional digital skills ecosystem.'
Probably not a by-election that needs over-analysing in the end.
Since the 2024 GE, Labour has, in effect, been telling its core voters to vote for someone else. So they did.
hahhaaha
Disgraceful way to treat staff, please consider supporting Sheffield ucu
Labour councillor thinks that the murder of a woman - with plans that political parties in the UK are specifically looking to emulate - shouldn't be political.
Labour have no intention in every challenging the far right - which is why they'll be next to follow unless we stand up to them.
I am horrified by the murder of a woman in Minneapolis by an ICE agent.
This is what fascism looks like in real time, where a far-right government emboldens a violent death squad to terrorise communities with impunity.
Trump just said "all" of Venezuela's oil must be made accessible to US oil companies. Trump wants to emulate Putin's model: Authoritarian, expansionist rulers carving up their regions and distributing the spoils of conquest to friendly oligarchs. 1/
(new piece)
newrepublic.com/article/2049...
Colombian President Petro commenting on the US;
“A clan of pedophiles wants to destroy our democracy. To keep Epstein's list from coming out, they send warships to kill fishermen & threaten our neighbor with invasion for their oil."
In the past week, the Trump-Vance admin:
–Bombed Nigeria
–Bombed Venezuela, abducted its leader
–Bombed more ships in the middle of the ocean
–Threatened military action in Iran, Colombia, and Cuba
–Accepted the “Israel Prize” & hosted Netanyahu in Mar-a-Lago (despite his soldiers killing Americans)
We are deeply concerned for the health of Qesser Zuhrah, who has been on hunger strike for 46 days, and we join those calling on the government to act now, and address the serious concerns raised by lawyers acting for the prisoners.
We are deeply concerned for the health of Qesser Zuhrah, who has been on hunger strike for 46 days.
We join those calling on the government to act now, and address the serious concerns raised by lawyers acting for the prisoners.
PRO: Raises total number of countries Americans can name to respectable nine CON: May have to come up with a reason for doing so
Pros And Cons Of War With Venezuela https://theonion.com/pros-and-cons-of-war-with-venezuela/
When will this crisis get any attention whatsoever!? A THOUSAND ACADEMIC STAFF AT ONE INSTITUTION SERVED REDUNDANCY RISK NOTICES! And that's not counting what's surely being visited on professional services staff too. This is an economic catastrophe, to say nothing of the intellectual catastrophe!
Am X post from Suella Braverman that reads: "The SAS has the support of the whole country against this shameless government of cowards and Sinn Fein sympathisers." She is quote tweeting a post from the telegraph that says, "New laws could see former soldiers hounded through courts over alleged crimes, say veterans."
Once again, we are way too relaxed about the fact that "shooting Irish people is good actually" is a mainstream political position on the neighbouring island.
The way all of these people convinced themselves that Mamdani is antisemitic is a subject far more worthy of media examination than any of the ‘groupthink on campuses!’ thinkpieces we’ve been subjected to
What is human augmentation and why does it matter for the sociology of work? A conceptualization of worker-centred augmentation ‘Human augmentation’ commonly refers to ‘smart’ technologies that integrate with the human body, like exoskeletons, wearables, or modifications like retinal implants, increasing its cognitive or physical capacity. Many definitions of it are problematically broad or questionable. Nevertheless, the idea has gained traction in journalistic and policy debates. Evangelists for augmentation may posit a near-superhuman synthesis between humans and machines, supposedly resulting in upskilling and empowerment at work. These claims have attracted sceptical analysis from scholars of work and employment, yet there remains a need for further development of a critical research agenda around human augmentation. This article catalyzes this agenda by proposing a new conceptualization of ‘worker-centred’ human augmentation that can be usefully applied in the field. Such a conceptualization requires mediating between giving due weight to the intractable material characteristics of individual ‘augmenting’ technologies, and exploring the channels through which human agency shapes their design and use. We also argue that engaging with human augmentation necessitates critical reflection on ‘human-versus-machine’ framings that remain influential in sociological literature on technology and work.
Doing some proofreading on our forthcoming paper: "What is human augmentation and why does it matter for the sociology of work? A conceptualization of worker-centred augmentation". Forthcoming in Work in the Global Economy. Email me if interested and wanting to discuss.
My first book, *Unpaid: the Past, Present and Future of Wage Theft*, will be published by @versobooks.bsky.social in May, 2026!
This book is born from experience. It is written for anyone who is dissatisfied with the capitalist wage system.
UK pre-order: www.waterstones.com/book/unpaid/...
How does the local state mediate the relationship between technological change and work? Evidence from warehousing in England Abbie Winton, Charles Umney, Gabriella Alberti Abstract The debate on technology and the future of work has so far engaged little with the local state. This is surprising, since the local state’s role as a potentially progressive actor in employment relations systems is attracting renewed interest in sociological scholarship. Through a study of warehousing in northern England, we examine how local state actors can mediate the relationship between technological change and work. We show that they often questioned the policy orthodoxy that private employer-led technological innovation always benefits local working populations, and we develop a typology of three strategies through which they sought to engage with technological trajectories in warehousing workplaces: engagement and advocacy, activation, and conditionality. Our study also shows how their regulatory capacity was limited by the opacity of technological innovation in warehousing, confining them to “soft” strategies which enshrined employer discretion and market imperatives. It concludes by reflecting on alternative visions whereby the local state may become more empowered to shape the future of work.
"How does the local state mediate the relationship between technological change and work?": Forthcoming in Work & Occupations. Offers a typology for how devolved govt can intervene to shape technology's impact on local workers, esp in low wage jobs. @digitcentre.bsky.social @ceric-lubs.bsky.social
It would be good if the only political pushback against Nigel Farage's plans to mass deport hundreds of thousands of our neighbours, friends, family and colleagues didn't just come from a handful of backbench MPs and one regional mayor
It's been a long time coming, but I'm delighted to announce that my PhD paper "Sociotechnical Change in British Supermarkets: Examining the Role of Labour" has finally been published in New Technology, Work and Employment 🎉
onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...
"In contrast to futurist predictions of the proliferation of labour-replacing technologies, the analysis shows how food retailers continued to prioritise short-term solutions contingent on human labour rather than investments in longer-term automation programme."
Sociotechnical Change in British Supermarkets: Examining the Role of Labour Lead author Abbie Winton When predicting the future of retail work, commentators tend to focus on automation and labour replacement and neglect the continued role played by labour, particularly in food retail. To understand this role, this article draws on both interview and newspaper data to show how change unfolded in the sector from before to just after the Coronavirus pandemic. Specifically, it shows how increased technology adoption and use in food retail occurred alongside an increased reliance on labour. The availability of a flexible labour pool that was easy to scale and later disband enabled employers to respond to increased consumer demand rapidly. In contrast to futurist predictions of the proliferation of labour-replacing technologies, the analysis shows how food retailers continued to prioritise short-term solutions contingent on human labour rather than investments in longer-term automation programmes, reflecting historical patterns of sociotechnical change within the sector.
Many congratulations to @abbiewinton.bsky.social for this outstanding new paper in @ntwejournal.bsky.social! Essential reading for understanding technological adoption in retail workplaces, with a lot of additional insight into the implications of covid 🚨🚨👇👇 onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...
The destruction of the Gaza city mosque is a devastating loss to humanity as a whole. A part of our global medieval heritage destroyed in furtherance to a genocide. I despair.
Radical right accommodation really does not work.
New paper out with this exceptionally talented team
@katharinalawall.bsky.social @robjohns75.bsky.social @drjennings.bsky.social @sarahobolt.bsky.social @zachdickson.bsky.social @danjdevine.bsky.social & @jack-bailey.co.uk
doi.org/10.31235/osf...
The BBC is not going to allow us to not elect reform, they have decided.
'"You can’t have hobbyist research that’s unfunded going on in institutions. We can’t afford it.”'
Such a badly formulated phrasing of the issues, so open to so many misinterpretations. If this is the level of thinking about research among sector leaders and policy-makers, be very afraid.
"Understanding international waves of platform labour unrest"- our new piece in @britsoci.bsky.social's Everyday Society. es.britsoc.co.uk/understandin... Discusses our recent @wesjnl.bsky.social paper "Platform labour unrest in a global perspective: How, where and why do platform workers protest?"
Don’t ignore that the bbc asked a racist question here
Picture is of the paper abstract which reads: This article examines how understandings of passion shape people’s agency at work, through interviews with UK publicans. It addresses calls to rethink how “passion” is conceptualised in the sociology of work. While discourses around passion are often thought to legitimise individualised working practices, the article explores more collective interpretations. It analyses how publicans exercised agency in negotiating externally-imposed problems including the pandemic and exploitative relationships with leading industry actors. It identifies a collective understanding of passion centralising notions of community, which shaped participants’ agency in responding to these problems in three ways: providing motivation to persist in the industry; a frame for critiquing perceived injustice and (occasionally) mobilising against it; and a resource for reinvention in pursuing business sustainability. The main contribution is thus new concepts for analysing how “collectively-oriented passion” shapes individuals’ agency at work.
Recently accepted at @wesjnl.bsky.social: "What does it mean to be passionate about your job? Three meanings of 'collectively oriented passion' in UK pubs". Pre-print OA here: eprints.whiterose.ac.uk/id/eprint/22...
