Employment conditions, conflicts, and new challenges along the transport-logistics chain

Journal title SOCIOLOGIA DEL LAVORO
Author/s Andrea Bottalico, Jörg Nowak
Publishing Year 2024 Issue 2024/169
Language English Pages 15 P. 9-23 File size 188 KB
DOI 10.3280/SL2024-169001
DOI is like a bar code for intellectual property: to have more infomation click here

Below, you can see the article first page

If you want to buy this article in PDF format, you can do it, following the instructions to buy download credits

Article preview

FrancoAngeli is member of Publishers International Linking Association, Inc (PILA), a not-for-profit association which run the CrossRef service enabling links to and from online scholarly content.

Logistics, understood as a management tool for the flow of goods and transport, has emerged as a strategic aspect of the economy. The complexity of a logistics transport chain is correlated with the increasing structuring of firms into networks and the fragmentation of global value chains. While the modern economy demands greater synchronization, the Covid-19 pandemic highlighted that a disruption to any link in the chain can have systemic impacts. The pandemic has placed significant pressure on global supply chains, affecting employment conditions, particularly on ships, in warehouses, and in last-mile logistics. Labor market distortions are offset by intense competition along the logistics chain, encompassing maritime activities, cargo handling in ports, and transport services in the hinterland, where distribution centers are located. In this introduction, we define logistics as a complex and diverse field, elucidating key aspects not yet fully addressed in the scientific literature. This Special Issue aims to enrich the scientific debate on logistics by exploring the evolving dynamics along the logistics chain with a focus on labor issues. We examine logistics and transport infrastructures by posing questions aimed at facilitating comprehensive empirical descriptions and broad theoretical reflections on contemporary forms of labor.

Keywords: Logistics chains; Globalization; Labour relations; Unions

  1. Marx K. (1978). Capital. A Critique to Political Economy, Vol. II, London: Penguin.
  2. Allen W.B. (1997). The Logistics Revolution and Transportation, Annals, AAPSS, 533: 106-116. DOI: 10.1177/0002716297553001010
  3. Andrijasevic R., Yujie Chen J, Gregg M., Steinberg M. (2021). Media and Management. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.
  4. Autorità di Regolazione dei Trasporti (ART), Indagine conoscitiva sui settori dell’autotrasporto e della logistica, 27th September 2023, Executive Summary. -- Testo disponibile al sito https://www.autorita-trasporti.it/relazioni-su-indagini-conoscitive/indagine-conoscitiva-sui-settori-dellautotrasporto-e-della-logistica/ accessed 16th november 2024.
  5. Baldwin R., Weder De Mauro B. (2020). Economics in the time of Covid-19, London, CEPR Press.
  6. Benvegnù C., Cuppini N. (2017). Spettri del lavoro. Note sulle lotte logistiche nella megalopoli padana, Napolimonitor, 17th October 2017.
  7. Bologna S. (2022). Il lavoro ai tempi di Amazon. In: Perulli P., a cura di, Economia della velocità. Mendrisio: Mendrisio Academy Press, 47-56.
  8. Bologna S., Curi S. (2019). Relazioni industriali e servizi di logistica: Uno studio preliminare. Giornale di diritto del lavoro e di relazioni industriali, 161/2019: 125-156.
  9. Bonacich E., Wilson J.B. (2008). Getting the Goods: Ports, Labor, and the Logistics Revolution, Ithaca: Cornell University Press.
  10. Bottalico A. (2024). Catena logistica del trasporto merci e pratiche di sindacalizzazione dal basso, Meridiana, 109.
  11. Cowen D. (2010). A geography of logistics: market authority and the security of supply chains. Annals of the association of american geographers, 100(3), 600-620. DOI: 10.1080/00045601003794908
  12. Cowen D. (2014). The Deadly Life of Logistics. Mapping Violence in Global Trade, Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.
  13. Curcio A., Roggero G. (2018). La logistica è la logica del capitale. Primo Maggio, numero speciale, supplemento a Altronovecento, Marzo 2028: 30-38.
  14. Easterling K. (2014). Extrastatecraft: The Power of Infrastructure Space. New York: Verso books.
  15. Engels B. (2018). Strike Movements and Popular Class Struggles in Burkina Faso. In:
  16. Grappi G. (2016). Logistica. Roma: Ediesse.
  17. Gregson N., Crang M., Antonopoulos C.N. (2017). Holding together logistical worlds: Friction, seams and circulation in the emerging ´global warehouse´. Environment and Planning D: Society and Space, 35 (3): 381-398.
  18. Into the Black Box (2022). Le frontiere del Capitale, Roma: Red Star Press.
  19. Jameson F. (2009). Valences of dialectic. New York: Verso Books.
  20. Mann M. (1984). The autonomous power of the state: its origins, mechanisms and results. European Journal of Sociology / Archives Européennes de Sociologie / Europäisches Archiv Für Soziologie, 25(2), 185–213. -- http://www.jstor.org/stable/23999270.
  21. Massimo F. S. (2020). Des coopératives au syndicalisme de base: la citoyenneté industrielle dans le secteur de la logistique en Italie (1990-2015), Critique internationale, 87: 57-78.
  22. Mentzer T.J., Kahn K.B. (1995). A framework of logistics research. Journal of business logistics, 16(1): 231-250. DOI: 10.1108/0957409101107190
  23. Neilson B. (2012). Five theses on understanding logistics as power. Distinktion: Scandinavian Journal of Social Theory, 13 (3): 322-339. DOI: 10.1080/1600910X.2012.72853
  24. Ness I., Alimahomed-Wilson J., a cura di (2018). Choke points: Logistics workers disrupting the global supply chain, London: Pluto Press.
  25. Nowak J., Dutta M., Birke P., a cura di (2018). Workers´ Movements and Strikes in the Twenty-First Century, London: Rowman and Littlefield, 169-184.
  26. Nowak J. (2021). Do choke points provide workers in logistics with power? A critique of the power resources approach in light of the 2018 truckers’ strike in Brazil, Review of International Political Economy. 29(5):1675–1697, DOI: 10.1080/09692290.2021.193194
  27. Osservatorio Contract Logistics “Gino Marchet” (2023). Logistica: strategia e attrattività fa(ra)nno la differenza, Milano, 15th November 2023.
  28. Rodrigue J.P. (2006). Challenging the derived transport-demand thesis: geographical issues in freight distribution. Environment and Planning A 38: 1449-1462.
  29. Rossi G. (2023). Piattaforme digitali, nuove configurazioni del potere. Il Manifesto, 25th June 2023.
  30. Rossomando L. (2024). “La corda si è tirata troppo assai”. Lo sciopero dei corrieri Gls di Napoli e provincia, Napolimonitor, 14th March 2024 -- https://www.monitor-italia.it/la-corda-si-e-tirata-troppo-assai-lo-sciopero-dei-corrieri-gls-di-napoli-e-provincia/ , accessed 17th march 2024.
  31. UNCTAD, United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (2015). Key Statistics and Trends in International Trade 2014, New York/Geneva.
  32. UNCTAD, United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (2019). Review of Maritime Transport 2019, New York/Geneva.
  33. Veltz P. (2017) La société hyper-industrielle. Le nouveau capitalisme productif. Paris: Seuil.
  34. Wei W., Nowak J., Rolf S. (2023). Leapfrog logistics: digital trucking platforms, infrastructure, and labor in Brazil and China. Review of International Political Economy, 31(3): 930–954. DOI: 10.1080/09692290.2023.2267074

Andrea Bottalico, Jörg Nowak, Employment conditions, conflicts, and new challenges along the transport-logistics chain in "SOCIOLOGIA DEL LAVORO " 169/2024, pp 9-23, DOI: 10.3280/SL2024-169001