The Future of Work(ers) Programme is an interdisciplinary research group of the Southern Centre for Inequality Studies. The project aims to conduct cutting-edge research on the changing nature of work and its implications for inequality in the global South; promote research collaborations amongst Southern scholars; and shape national, regional and global policy agendas at the national through public engagement. The project's thematic streams include:
The research group adopts an intersectional approach that explores how categories of difference – race, gender, class, age, citizenship – shape power relations and inequality.
Future Works: Eastern and Southern Africa is a global research network committed to a more sustainable and inclusive world of work, with a focus on women and youth. The hub for Eastern and Southern Africa (ESA) is coordinated by the Southern Centre for Inequality Studies, in collaboration with the Centre for Researching Education and Labour and the International Labour Organization. The objective of the network is to generate original, rigorous, comparative research on the relationship between labour trajectories and skills formation systems, that can contribute to more effective skills policies and programmes in the ESA region. With support from the IDRC-CRDI, the hub will offer grants to interdisciplinary research teams in the ESA region to conduct research along the following themes: the dynamics of accumulation and constraints to structural transformation; the implications of the “double transition” towards decarbonization and digitalization for the labour market, conditions of work and worker power; the scope, objectives and outcomes of skills formation systems; the economic, social and political factors which underlie the design and implementation of skills formation system; and the policy levers which can contribute to a more inclusive and sustainable world of work. The first round of research will run from September 2024 to March 2026.
This research stream is coordinated by Dr Ruth Castel-Branco