Methodology
The ACToR_UU project providew territory- and sector-specific accounts of diversified unemployment and underemployment patterns. To accomplish these tasks the project analyzes regional specialization employing a (newly introduced) shift-share analysis for both the pre- and post-crisis periods in Greece, in order to estimate the differentiated industry- or region-specific factors defining un/underemployment trends across regions and localities (i.e. as described in WP1 and WP2). The spatial dimension of the conceptual and analytical framework constitutes an advance over the current line of research relating production structures to labour markets. The locality is considered as an endogenous factor of development, embedding institutional, socio-economic and cultural assets and relations; therefore, it is here recognized as defining production specialisation and restructuring on the basis of local competitive advantages.
The proposed research integrates both quantitative (statistical data and indices) and qualitative (questionnaires to un/underemployed, interviews with local stakeholders) input, applying a methodological approach which has not been implemented in any of the recent accounts on crisis and unemployment in Greece and Southern Europe. In this way, the research advances existing knowledge on how inherited and evolving production and institutional structures in different spatial/regional settings are affected by EU and national employment policies, in terms of their differentiated impact on unemployment and underemployment.
Moreover, research on regional specialisation has mainly addressed local competitive advantages from the aspect of specific industries and local economies developed over time (Watson and Cooke, 2012). But as existing growth patterns are challenged by globalisation and the current crisis, the project pursues to identify new potential competitive advantages based on local human capital. To this purpose, the ACT_oR_UU contributes to the current state-of-the-art in Labour Geography by focusing on worker collective action in a context of both success and defeat, and in a country of the European South. Labour agency are examined as a relational phenomenon, strongly shaped by the interests of the entrepreneurs and the economic specificities of the firms’ sector. The project also explores the effects of multi-scalar levels of workers’ efforts to involve other local actors, or to upscale their efforts through translocal actions. The identification of the impact of sectoral specificities, temporality and timing on the agency of group of workers is one among the major weaknesses of contemporary Labour Geography contributions that is being systematically explored through the project.
The innovative element of this research project is the combination of conventional quantitative and qualitative research methodologies with Participatory Action Research (PAR). The results of the WP1 and WP2 will be utilised in WP3, based on the PAR methodology which aims to help the un/underemployed themselves and other key community stakeholders in the selected localities, to acquire a better understanding of the causes of underutilization of the local labour surplus and co-create a plan for taking advantage of human capital in economic recovery and sustainable development. Action researchers, unemployed and local stakeholders themselves produce knowledge through this process thus, the PAR component of the project promotes knowledge production beyond the gate-keeping of professional knowledge makers, who eventually merge theory and action. Epistemologically PAR belongs to the critical-dialectical paradigm. Its aims are technical, practical and emancipating. This particular methodology has been used in research on sustainable local development in many countries worldwide as it presents three particular attributes which distinguish it from conventional research: shared ownership of research outcomes, community-based analysis of social problems, and an orientation toward community action (Huang, 2010, Barnsley, Jan & Diana Ellis, 1992, Bergold, 2007; Bergold & Thomas, 2010, Selener, 2010, Lewis, H., 2001). PAR has not been so far applied in planning sustainable local development in Greece; nevertheless there are some inspiring examples from the field of education (Fragkaki 2008, Fragkaki & Lionarakis, 2011).