Inimkond: Eeva Kesküla

03/16/2017 - 08:15 - 09:30

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The next event from the Inimkond seminar series will be hosted by social anthropologist Eeva Kesküla and she will speak on the subject of "Family in the company, family and the company: corporate ethics and family relations in Estonian and Kazakhstani mining communities".

This presentation looks at corporate ethics and moral obligations relating to families in two Postsoviet mining towns. In the Soviet industrial workplaces, there was a strong tradition and pride of families working in the same workplace, manifested in the discourse of labour dynasties, especially among miners. Postsoviet mining towns in Estonia and Kazakhstan present two radically different corporate visions of family members working together in the situation of corporate reorganisation of labour and limited recruitment. In Estonia, family members working together came to be seen as unethical nepotism while in Kazakhstan, the company deems moral was to recruit workers’ children, preferably to the same unit where the parent was already working. This paper compares the implications of two corporate policies, to reproduction of the working class. In comparing the two cases, I argue that the deep moral commitments and beliefs of the middle management play out in damaging worker families and profiting the companies in different ways in both cases. Furthermore, in bringing the cases side- by-side, I aim to highlight the tradition of anthropology as a comparative discipline and what doing fieldwork in two places and engaging in ‘disjunctive comparisons’ means for analysis and building anthropological theories.

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All are welcome to attend the seminar on Thursday, 16 March at 18.15 in room A325.