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Purpose – Chapter 3 analyses if Russia's current problems in agriculture, particularly the slow growth of labour productivity are due primarily to the weak property rights of shareholders stemming from the privatisation and therefore attributed to Russia's failure to implement the family farm project as supposed by the World Bank and many other international institution.

Methodology – To compare the development of labour productivity and farm structure in Russia and the Baltic countries after decollectivisation.

Findings – The comparisons show that the outcomes in Latvia and Lithuania are not in fact any better than in Russia, even though large-scale farms here have largely been replaced by individual farms. They also show that the most likely explanation for the extremely poor results in Lithuania lies in the overly strong property rights of shareholders. Estonia's success compared to Russia's failure cannot be explained away by stronger property rights or family farming, but the reasons lie in the country's more successful application of Soviet farming traditions, the capability of the middle class of former Soviet farms to maintain and modernise large-scale production in capitalist conditions.

Originality/value of chapter – It calls into question one of the basic interpretations presented by World Bank, IMF, OECD and EBRD.

The ‘Decollectivisation of Industrial Relations’ is now a significant theme in the policy of the Conservative Government and that of a growing, if still small number, of companies and state agencies. Its theoretical justification is a ‘neo‐ classical’ economic perspective in which the contract of employment is conceived as a market relationship between symmetrical parties and organisations of capital and labour are differently evaluated. The collective nature of the former is subsumed under its legal individual personality and only certain monopolies and monopoly practices are considered illegitimate. Unions, however, are viewed as coercive organisations which intrude upon the contract of employment to distort the labour market through the imposition of a ‘rent’ upon the hire of labour by capital; as a result, either labour costs are raised and profits reduced or the wages of non‐union labour are suppressed. The neo‐classical perspective is thus hostile to collective power of unions as such rather than ‘excesses’ of that power which could be redressed by ‘shifting the balance’ to employers as was the stated objective of the Employment Act 1980 (Wedderburn 1989).

Since the end of the 1970s, the restructuring of the economic landscape and the drive by governments throughout Europe to deregulate markets, reduce institutional rigidities, and flexibilise the movement of capital and labour, have confronted trade unions with the most serious challenges they have faced for more than half a century. According to many commentators, a process of decollectivisation and decentralisation of industrial relations is now firmly established. For example, Baglioni (1990) describes decentralisation as one of the dominant trends in contemporary European industrial relations. In his view ‘Decentralisation, all in all, is part of the general retreat of the labour movement. It is often a manifestation of the alteration of the power balance in favour of management, and it has created complicated problems for union strategy.’

This chapter focuses on the case of migrant Filipina live-in domestic workers in Greece and how the frame of their work and employment in precarious, low-status/low-wage jobs and race discrimination at work, that is, the employers’ residences, affect their participation in secondary groups of solidarity and workers and their representation in them, that is, community, migrant labour associations and trade unions, during the economic crisis in Greece. According to the results of in-depth interviews Filipina migrants are entrapped in a frame of isolative and exploitative working conditions and racial discrimination at work, that is, personal services, care and domestic work. In this working context, most of the interviewed migrant Filipina live-in domestic workers appear to have developed individualistic perceptions, they act in an atomistic manner, form materialistic beliefs, are indifferent to collectivity and solidarity and are isolated from their compatriots and other workers. They have low self-perceptions and expectations for social advancement and deal with their social and labour-related problems individually, or completely resign from claiming them.

The purpose of this paper is to focus on the repercussions of work and employment in low-status jobs upon the collective organisation and representation of Egyptian immigrant workers.

Focusing on results from 117 in-depth interviews, the qualitative research (2010-2013) and analysis examines the case of Egyptians in Athens, Greece and on how the frame of their work and their employment affects participation in the immigrant work association Union of Egyptian Workers in Greece/EL-RAPTA and in Greek trade unions as well.

Evidence from in-depth interviews proves that Egyptians are supported by friendly and relative relations in search for solidarity; they develop individualistic behaviours and find alternative solutions for survival and protection.

Through the research, what is analysed is how immigration has affected social welfare and collective forms of representation but also how the immigrants themselves view and act within the collective frameworks. The results are of great concern to immigration policymakers to facilitate integration, combat undeclared work and identify weaknesses in worker rights and organisations.

The research, the first in Greece specifically for Egyptians immigrant workers and their work association, contributes to the broader body of sociological literature on the study of labour migration and immigrant voluntary associations and it is original as it is based on primary research on the experiences of Egyptian immigrants.

This paper explores the emerging articulations between microfinance and livestock production cycles among Mongolian pastoralists in contexts plagued by disaster and commodity market fluctuations. Ethnographic investigations of household production and vulnerability in two rural districts of eastern and western Mongolia demonstrates that both poor and wealthy households have become ensnared in a cashmere-debt cycle but that the bifurcation of livestock asset trajectories between large and small herds has also fostered diverse financial and herd management strategies that further exacerbate existing inequalities.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the cases of Bangladeshi, Filipina, Nigerian, Palestinian and Pakistani migrant workers and how the frame of their work and employment in precarious, low-status/low-wage jobs affects their perceptions and practices regarding health and access to healthcare services.

Using qualitative research methodology, the analysis via in-depth interviews focuses on male Bangladeshi, Nigerian, Pakistani and Palestinian unskilled manual and textile laborers as well as street vendors, and female Filipina live-in domestic workers.

Migrants are entrapped in a context of isolative and exploitative working conditions, i.e., in unskilled labor, textile work, street-vending, personal services, care and domestic work, which lead them to adopt a self-perception in which healthcare and social protection are not a priority.

Throughout the paper it has become clear that these precarious low-status/low-wage jobs have an important underside effect on migrants’ lives, intensifying labor and health instability and exposing migrants to employment-generating activities that do not guarantee health safety. In Greek society, the impact of migration on public health is characterized by many as a “time bomb ready to explode,” especially in urban centers. Meanwhile, the economy and particularly the informal sector of the labor market is benefiting from migrant workers. More research is needed as this mode of exploitative labor and precarious employment needs to be adequately addressed to mitigate barriers in the access of labor and healthcare rights.

Via its contribution to the sociology of migration with particular emphasis on labor healthcare, the paper provides evidence that due to their concentration in precarious, low-status/low-wage jobs migrant workers have very limited access to healthcare services. The removal of inequalities and discrimination against migrant workers in accessing healthcare services and medical care is a challenge for South European Union countries and particularly for Greece. However, in spite of this, there is no uniform policy in the management of migrants with respect to their access to health services. The paper will aid debates between policy makers and academics working on migration and inequalities due to the division of labor and health disparities, will contribute to the understanding of the perils attached to precarious, low-status/low-wage jobs and in addressing health inequalities effectively.

This paper analyzes changes in property rights, land uses, and culturally based notions of ownership that have emerged following privatization of communal land in a Samburu pastoralist community in Northern Kenya. The research challenges the strict dichotomy between private and collective rights often found in property rights literature, which does not match empirical findings of overlapping and contested rights.

Part of a long-term ethnographic project investigating the process of land privatization and its outcomes, this paper draws on in-depth interviews and participant observation conducted by the author in Samburu County in 2008, 2009, and 2010. Interviews focused on how land is being used post-privatization as well as emerging social norms regulating its use.

Privatization privileges male household heads with powers including rental, sale, and bequeathal of land. However, informal rights to land extend to women and other household members. Exercise of legal rights is frequently limited due to knowledge and resource gaps. New rules regulating land use have emerged, some represent sharp divergences from past practice while others support shared access to land. These changes challenge Samburu cultural notions of individuality, reciprocity, and shared responsibility.

This research illuminates complex changes following legal shifts in property rights and demonstrates the interactions between formal laws and informal social norms and cultural beliefs about land. The result is that privatization does not have easily predictable outcomes as some theories of property would suggest.

Empirical investigation of the effects of legal changes enables fuller understanding of the implications of policy changes that many governments are pursuing privatization with limited understanding of the likely effects.

The rate of urbanization and its implications in post‐Mao China have been underestimated in most recent studies on China’s urbanization as they have excluded the rising urban floating population. Making use of recently available floating population survey data assesses the significance of China’s urban floating population and its socio‐economic consequences and suggests remedial measures to control its flow. Finds that the floating population caused China to experience one of the highest urban population growths among the developing countries. The floating population has increased rural‐urban labour mobility and helped to eliminate the dualistic nature of Chinese society. But it has also caused oveer‐urbanization and environmental pollution and created certain social problems. To control the flow of the urban floating population, argues that the government should increasingly rely on indirect market‐based control mechanisms.

Analyses the features, strategies and characteristics of health‐care reforms in the People’s Republic of China. Since the fourteenth Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party held in 1992, an emphasis has been placed on reform strategies such as cost recovery, profit making, diversification of services, and development of alternative financing strategies in respect of health‐care services provided in the public sector. Argues that the reform strategies employed have created new problems before solving the old ones. Inflation of medical cost has been elevated very rapidly. The de‐linkage of state finance bureau and health service providers has also contributed to the transfer of tension from the state to the enterprises. There is no sign that quasi‐public health‐care insurance is able to resolve these problems. Finally, co‐operative medicine in the rural areas has been largely dismantled, though this direction is going against the will of the state. Argues that a new balance of responsibility has to be developed as a top social priority between the state, enterprises and service users in China in order to meet the health‐care needs of the people.