Part-Time in Skilled Jobs: The Case of Teachers in the UK, Spain and the Netherlands

Abstract

Time is central to work-life balance debates. Studies consistently confirm that the longer the working time, the more people experience difficulties with balancing work and family/private life. Following authors such as Elias (1984), Nowotny (1989) and Adam (2004), the need to find a compromise between the social requirements and individual interests that characterize the social division of labour, could also be understood as compromises between, on the one hand, the individual’s needs and preferences on how to spend their own time, and, on the other, the time demands of society. From this perspective, assessments and evaluations concerning individuals’ quality of life may be expressed in terms of different combinations of number of hours and tempos required for engaging in different activities to satisfy their needs. Various time-use combinations may be more or less appropriate depending on a wide range of factors such as the relative talents and interests of individuals, their life-cycle stages, or their social contexts. In this sense, several authors from different approaches (Doyal and Gough, 1991; Sen and Nussbaum, 1993; Nussbaum, 2000; Glucksmann, 2000; Crompton, 2006) have explored how the principles of hierarchy and specialization that characterize the social division of labour may enter into conflict with other social functions, such as the sphere of care and reproduction.