Telework and the spatio-temporal reorganization of work: insights from post-pandemic France and Italy

Journal title STUDI ORGANIZZATIVI
Author/s Emiliana Armano, Patrick Cingolani, Domenica Farinella, Corinne Siino
Publishing Year 2025 Issue 2025/2
Language English Pages 19 P. 120-138 File size 214 KB
DOI 10.3280/SO2025-002005
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Remote work as telework (salaried employment performed outside company premises via digital technologies), became central during the COVID-19 pandemic. This paper presents an interpretative analysis based on Le télétravail, la COVID et la numérisation, a study conducted in France (2023-2024). Examining remote work’s organizational transformations in post-pandemic France and Italy through a critical socio-organizational lens, it draws on qualitative field research with interviews in Paris, Toulouse, Milan, and Messina. The study explores three key dimensions: the reorganization of workplaces, as remote work reshapes the relationship between living and working spaces; the transformation of temporal dynamics, where increased flexibility disrupts traditional work-life rhythms; the emotional economy between new pluralities and the desire for autonomy, revealing the practices workers adopt to carve out autonomy, highlighting shifting organizational boundaries. Research findings show that remote work embodies the ambivalence of contemporary capitalism, balancing neoliberal constraints and emancipatory potentials. Its future depends on how individuals, organizations, and institutions negotiate autonomy, control, and social justice. The challenge is to transform it from an isolating mechanism into a tool for resilient communities. As Lefebvre suggests, we must “reinvent everyday space” to create a future where work and life coexist as allies, not adversaries.

Keywords: telework work; smart work; time and space; organizational transformations; pandemic inequalities; work flexibility; autonomy.

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Emiliana Armano, Patrick Cingolani, Domenica Farinella, Corinne Siino, Telework and the spatio-temporal reorganization of work: insights from post-pandemic France and Italy in "STUDI ORGANIZZATIVI " 2/2025, pp 120-138, DOI: 10.3280/SO2025-002005