Labour Beyond the Labour Market: Interrogating Marginality

In the twentieth century, social security systems were largely tied to labour market outcomes. In current times, radical proposals like “universal basic income” are premised on a new understanding of labour beyond the labour market—i.e. in a context where wage-employment is no longer the “normal” condition of labour. Radical restructuring of capital–labour relations throughout the world since the last quarter of the twentieth century have resulted in forced self-employment in developing economies and precarious employment in developed economies. The new locations of labour are a product of processes which have rendered large segments of the labour force redundant or substitutable, rendering labourers’ access to social wealth a matter of moral claims rather than legitimate economic rights. The chapter argues that this transformation requires us to rethink the notion of marginality of labour in the contemporary context.