Increasingly high unemployment has brought with it a multitude of consequences affecting those without jobs and, beyond them, their families, friends and communities. This book reports findings from original research. It explores, often in the words of the unemployed and others involved, what life without a job is like. It challenges many widely held beliefs about the unemployed - that they are workshy, price themselves out of jobs or earn money illegally on the side - and explores where such misconceptions come from. It reveals the inherent contradictions involved in trying to search for work whilst coping with the experience of unemployment.

Autorentext

SHEILA ALLEN is Research Professor of Sociology at the University of Bradford. She has published extensively in the areas of ethnic relations, gender and work.

ALAN WATON is Pro-Vice Chancellor and Lecturer in Sociology at the University of Bradford. He is particularly interested in problems of analysing power in industrial societies and is currently engaged in research on ethnic minority use of the media.

KATE PURCELL is a Research Fellow at the Institute for Employment Research, University of Warwick. She has carried out research on manual workers' employment expleriences and attitudes to work, with a particular interest in the sexual division of labour and the relationship between class and gender.

STEPHEN WOOD is Lecturer in Industrial Relations at the London School of Economics and Associate Fellow at Harvard University. He has written and edited several studies of work and employment.