Filed under: ideas, news articles | Tags: article, economics, ideas, lifestyle, retirement, rights, society, time, vacation, work, working
There is nothing enlightened about this proposal and the ulterior motive is remarkably transparent.
Why on earth should people be enticed to continue generating profit for others through their labour? Indeed, wages continue to fall despite profits in a number of sectors (mainly banks). Much work is also related to continuing the ecologically destructive cycle of consumption.
People should have the chance to pursue their own range of interests without external pressures such as bosses, sales quotas, meetings, deadlines, or overtaxing workloads due to reduced staffing. Furthemrore, people should be bal eto pursue their own interests withou being a slave to economic interest as defined by others.
Reposted from: euro|topics 09/09/2010
Le Monde – France
Vijay Monany on fascinating work instead of retirement
If the French have recently striked and demonstrated en masse against the government’s plan to raise the retirement age to 62, it’s because their working environment doesn’t offer them all it should, writes Vijay Monany from the management consulting firm Khampus in the daily Le Monde: “The reason why the French prefer retirement to work is exactly the same as why they prefer holidays to work. … They are bored by their work, and they develop their interests outside of work. The real paradox is that it’s only when they retire that people feel their life is starting, that they can take control of their destiny and read, travel, follow their interests, or spend time with their friends. … One day we’ll understand that social progress does not consist in stringing together weeks of holiday, reducing the number of working hours or lowering the retirement age. One day we will understand that true progress consists in making work so interesting that there will be no difference between it and leisure time. One day we’ll see that the solution to pension reform consists in rendering work so fascinating that no one wants to retire.” (08/09/2010)
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Filed under: ideas, publication | Tags: art, article, books, contemporary art, economics, ideas, publication, society, time, work
This issue of “Texte zur Kunst” bears the programmatic title “Life at Work”. Admittedly, this means to take up quite a bit, for at issue is nothing less than revaluating a theoretical and historical relation that has determined the history of modern and contemporary art like almost no other: Since “around 1800”, the forms of art have been ascribed a quasi-organic life of their own. An important trend in modern aesthetics sought to evoke liveliness, with the aim of offering resistance to the commodified world of capitalism itself. But how does this problematic pose itself today? Is a critical reference to “life” in art and beyond at all possible after theories of biopolitics have insistently argued that capitalism has permeated all areas of life?
Plus reviews from Berlin, Madrid, Zurich, Basel, Tel Aviv, Vienna, Barcelona, Munich, Cologne, Frankfurt am Main, Leverkusen, and Kraichtal
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Louise Lawler, Thomas Scheibitz
ENGLISH CONTENT
SVEN LÜTTICKEN
ACTS IN THE AGE OF VIRTUOSO PERFORMANCE
BRANDEN W. JOSEPH
LEE LOZANO’S DREAM OF LIFE
ERIC C. H. DE BRUYN
INTERMITTENT CONVERSATIONS ON LEAVING THE FACTORY
PATENTED IDEALISM
A Conversation between Sven Lütticken and Hito Steyerl
SABETH BUCHMANN
LIFE AS ALLEGORY
On Joseph Beuys’s “La revoluzione siamo Noi”
RACHEL HAIDU
PERFORMANCE LIFE
PAUL CHAN
MIRACLES, FORCES, ATTRACTIONS, RECONSIDERED
REVIEWS
ALEXANDER ALBERRO
THE SILVER LINING OF GLOBALIZATION
On “The Potosí Principle” at the Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofia, Madrid
MICHAEL SANCHEZ
A DOSE OF FEELING
On Michael Krebber at Galerie Daniel Buchholz, Berlin
ARTISTS’ EDITIONS
LOUISE LAWLER
“DISCERNIBLE DIFFERENCE”, 2010
THOMAS SCHEIBITZ
“MASTERPLAN”, 2010
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