The Subjective Experience of Joblessness in Poland

1. Front Matter

   Pages i-x

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2. Introduction: The Experience of Joblessness in Poland

   • Irina Tomescu-Dubrow, Joshua Kjerulf Dubrow, Anna Kiersztyn, Katarzyna Andrejuk, Marta Kołczyńska, Kazimierz M. Slomczynski

   Pages 1-9

3. Background of the Study

   1. Front Matter

      Pages 11-11

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   2. Economic Context, Labor Market Situation, and Employment Policies

      • Irina Tomescu-Dubrow, Joshua Kjerulf Dubrow, Anna Kiersztyn, Katarzyna Andrejuk, Marta Kołczyńska, Kazimierz M. Slomczynski

      Pages 13-40

   3. Joblessness Studies Since the 1930s in Poland and Abroad

      • Irina Tomescu-Dubrow, Joshua Kjerulf Dubrow, Anna Kiersztyn, Katarzyna Andrejuk, Marta Kołczyńska, Kazimierz M. Slomczynski

      Pages 41-55

   4. The Respondents, the Interviewers, and the Interview Situation

      • Irina Tomescu-Dubrow, Joshua Kjerulf Dubrow, Anna Kiersztyn, Katarzyna Andrejuk, Marta Kołczyńska, Kazimierz M. Slomczynski

      Pages 57-64

4. Routes into and Out of Joblessness

   1. Front Matter

      Pages 65-65

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   2. How I Lost My Job

      • Irina Tomescu-Dubrow, Joshua Kjerulf Dubrow, Anna Kiersztyn, Katarzyna Andrejuk, Marta Kołczyńska, Kazimierz M. Slomczynski

      Pages 67-80

   3. Becoming a Housewife

      • Irina Tomescu-Dubrow, Joshua Kjerulf Dubrow, Anna Kiersztyn, Katarzyna Andrejuk, Marta Kołczyńska, Kazimierz M. Slomczynski

      Pages 81-92

   4. Looking for and Finding a Job

      • Irina Tomescu-Dubrow, Joshua Kjerulf Dubrow, Anna Kiersztyn, Katarzyna Andrejuk, Marta Kołczyńska, Kazimierz M. Slomczynski

      Pages 93-104

   5. Labor Market Destinations of the Jobless

      • Irina Tomescu-Dubrow, Joshua Kjerulf Dubrow, Anna Kiersztyn, Katarzyna Andrejuk, Marta Kołczyńska, Kazimierz M. Slomczynski

      Pages 105-123

5. Daily Life of the Jobless

   1. Front Matter

      Pages 125-125

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   2. Irregular Jobs and Housework

      • Irina Tomescu-Dubrow, Joshua Kjerulf Dubrow, Anna Kiersztyn, Katarzyna Andrejuk, Marta Kołczyńska, Kazimierz M. Slomczynski

      Pages 127-143

   3. Social and Political Activities of Housewives

      • Irina Tomescu-Dubrow, Joshua Kjerulf Dubrow, Anna Kiersztyn, Katarzyna Andrejuk, Marta Kołczyńska, Kazimierz M. Slomczynski

      Pages 145-156

   4. Social and Political Activities of the Unemployed

      • Irina Tomescu-Dubrow, Joshua Kjerulf Dubrow, Anna Kiersztyn, Katarzyna Andrejuk, Marta Kołczyńska, Kazimierz M. Slomczynski

      Pages 157-170

6. Back Matter

   Pages 171-179

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This book describes the experience of joblessness and unemployment in contemporary Poland. It does so by combining qualitative and quantitative data from a special project conducted in Poland after the Great Recession and the long-term Polish Panel Survey (POLPAN) to describe the lives of the jobless: women and men currently out of work, the recently re-employed, and housewives. The book uses a class and inequality perspective to investigate how these women and men became jobless, how they look for and find employment, their household and social activities, and their political participation. It contextualizes these experiences with a description of Poland’s economy, labor market and employment policies after the fall of Communism and builds on the active interviewing and social constructionist approaches to explore the complex interviewer-respondent relationship.

• Joblessness in Contemporary Poland
• Unemployment from a Sociological Perspective
• Polish Panel Survey POLPAN
• Joblessness in Poland, Central and Eastern Europe
• Unemployment and Social Welfare Policies
• Becoming Unemployed in Poland
• Housewives Experiences
• Routes Out of Joblessness in Poland
• Routes into Joblessness in Poland
• Informal Jobs and Life at Home
• Social and Political Activities of the Jobless

• Institute of Philosophy and Sociology, Polish Academy of Sciences, Warsaw, Poland

  Irina Tomescu-Dubrow, Joshua Kjerulf Dubrow, Katarzyna Andrejuk, Marta Kołczyńska

• Institute of Sociology, Warsaw University, Warsaw, Poland

  Anna Kiersztyn

• Institute of Philosophy and Sociology, Polish Academy of Sciences, Warsaw, Poland, Department of Sociology, The Ohio State University, Columbus, USA

  Kazimierz M. Slomczynski

Irina Tomescu-Dubrow received her PhD from The Ohio State University and is an Associate Professor at the Institute of Philosophy and Sociology of the Polish Academy of Sciences. She is also the program manager for the Cross-National Studies: Interdisciplinary Research and Training Program of The Ohio State University and the Polish Academy of Sciences. Irina is co-Principal Investigator of a (US) National Science Foundation grant on cross-national survey data harmonization, and of a (Polish) National Science Centre grant on POLPAN. She is the lead author of the book Dynamics of Class and Stratification in Poland (CEU Press, 2018).

Joshua Kjerulf Dubrow received his PhD from The Ohio State University and is a Professor of Sociology at the Institute of Philosophy and Sociology of the Polish Academy of Sciences. He is also program coordinator for the Cross-National Studies: Interdisciplinary Research and Training Program of The Ohio State University and the Polish Academy of Sciences. He is co-author of Dynamics of Class and Stratification in Poland (CEU Press, 2018). His research on inequality has appeared in Social Forces, Party Politics, and Current Sociology, among others.

Katarzyna Andrejuk is a sociologist and a lawyer, and is an Associate Professor at the Institute of Philosophy and Sociology, Polish Academy of Sciences. She also worked as a visiting scholar at the European University Institute in Florence and Herder Institut in Marburg. Academic focus: qualitative research, migration studies, foreigners in the labour market and educational institutions, and Europeanisation. Her PhD dissertation concerned educational migrations from Poland to the UK after 2004, and her habilitation examined Ukrainian migrant entrepreneurs in Poland. She published two monographs and multiple journal articles, i.a. in the Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies and Asian and Pacific Migration Journal.

Anna Kiersztyn is an Assistant Professor of Sociology at the Institute of Sociology, University of Warsaw. Her current research concerns the distribution, dynamics and social consequences of non-standard employment, and the relationship between alternative work arrangements and the quality of jobs. She is the author of several research articles analyzing the incidence and correlates of overeducation, low paid and unstable employment in the Polish economy. Her more recent work analyses the consequences of labor market precariousness with respect to economic and social security and political participation, with a focus on conditional relationships. Since 2005, Kiersztyn has also collaborated with the Team for Comparative Analysis of Social Inequalities (CASIN) at the Institute of Philosophy and Sociology, Polish Academy of Sciences. She has been involved in the Polish Panel Survey POLPAN project, analyzing long-term changes in the social and occupational structure of the Polish Society,as well as individual labor market trajectories.

Marta Kołczyńska is a post-doctoral researcher at the Institute of Philosophy and Sociology, Polish Academy of Sciences. She received her Ph.D. in sociology from The Ohio State University in 2017. Her research interests include comparative analyses of political attitudes and behavior across nations and over time, as well as the methodology of comparative research, in particular cross-national surveys. Email: kolczynska.1@osu.edu

Kazimierz M. Slomczynski is professor emeritus of the Departments of Sociology and Political Science at The Ohio State University (OSU), and professor of sociology at the Institute of Philosophy and Sociology, Polish Academy of Sciences (PAN). He is director of the Cross-National Studies: Interdisciplinary Research and Training Program of OSU and PAN, and co-PI of a (US) National Science Foundation grant on cross-national survey data harmonization. Maciek is co-author of Dynamics of Class andStratification in Poland (CEU Press, 2018). He serves as director of the Polish Panel Survey (POLPAN) since 1988, and is co-PI of the 2017-2020 (Polish) National Science Centre grant on POLPAN.

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