"It is absolutely true that the threat of relocation and/or casualization has become an important ideological weapon for employers to use against their workforce, but the feeling of precarity is something real—something with material roots.
[...] And while the recommodification of the public sector doesn’t entail the end of work, it does have a real effect on working conditions as we witness the stripping away of union protection for teachers and public employees, and the rise of nonunion, private competitors. The claims of a new capitalism (one in which the working class no longer plays a central role) may be overblown, but many of us do feel more precarious than ever before.
The reason the concept of the precariat has caught on, despite its empirical and theoretical weaknesses, is because it reflects something real: the feelings of insecurity, instability, and vulnerability that have accompanied the neoliberal assault on the working class. While Marxists should remain critical of some of the more far-reaching claims about the precariat representing a new revolutionary class, we should also seek to assist and strengthen attempts to organize among any section of the working class. Because [...] feelings of precariousness can quickly lead to their opposite: a feeling of common oppression and the desire to fight."
Geoff Bailey
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