Social reconquest as a new policy paradigm. Changing urban policies in the city of Rotterdam

The repressive turn taken in urban policies has been pointed out by many urban sociologists, particularly in the UK and US. Cities no longer form a tolerant microcosmos, where the deviant behaviour of marginal social categories – delinquent youngsters, petty criminals, drug users and drug traffickers, homeless people, prostitutes, etc. – is tolerated to a certain extent as ‘part and parcel of the urban lifestyle’. Public opinion, newspapers, policymakers and social scientists now focus on urban problems – the spatial concentration of poverty, unemployment, multi-problem families, nuisance, violence and other criminal behaviour in deprived urban areas – and generally agree that this multifaceted crisis in our cities necessitates a tougher approach to urban policy. More generally, a shift in attention seems to have occurred in urban policies. Previously primarily focused on fighting social deprivation in disadvantaged neighbourhoods and disadvantaged segments of the urban population (cf. the American ‘war on poverty’ of the 1960s and 1970s), urban policy’s central issue nowadays is ‘managing disorderly places’ (Cochrane, 2007)

Better Work

This Open Access book provides a thorough analysis of the quality of work in the Netherlands, and suggests policy proposals to promote and facilitate good work for more people. New technology, flexibilization and the intensification of work will have significant consequences for all those who will still have jobs in the future, and – much less studied so far – for the quality of their work. Good work is essential for general well-being: for the individual’s quality of life, for the economy and for society. Good work for everyone should therefore be seen as an important aspiration for companies, institutions, social partners and governments. An essential read for an international audience of academics in the field of the sociology of work, labor economics and social policy, as well as for policymakers and researchers of trade unions, and representatives of other social movements

Better Work

This Open Access book provides a thorough analysis of the quality of work in the Netherlands, and suggests policy proposals to promote and facilitate good work for more people. New technology, flexibilization and the intensification of work will have significant consequences for all those who will still have jobs in the future, and – much less studied so far – for the quality of their work. Good work is essential for general well-being: for the individual’s quality of life, for the economy and for society. Good work for everyone should therefore be seen as an important aspiration for companies, institutions, social partners and governments. An essential read for an international audience of academics in the field of the sociology of work, labor economics and social policy, as well as for policymakers and researchers of trade unions, and representatives of other social movements