In Working at Leisure (originally published in 1986), Barrie Sherman envisages a world where homeworking will be the norm, the cities will be deserted, the suburbs the new centres of work and leisure. And what of unemployment? We must recognise that never again can we expect to be in full-time employment for the whole of our working lives. But, depending on the action we take now, this could lead us in one of two waysto widespread unemployment and misery, or to a Brave New World where, for the first time in history, men and women will be able to find fulfilment by balancing their lives equally between work and leisure.
In this brilliant and perceptive analysis, Barrie Sherman stresses that we must allow ourselves the luxury of optimism when confronting the future. It is people who will determine what happens to usnot technology.
1. The working go-round
2. Not enough to go round
3. The new
technologies
4. Conventional theories in unconventional times
5. The
political dimension
6. Who does and who will do what
7. The changing faces of
work
8. The need for change
9. Learning to live
10. Meeting peoples needs
11. For the unemployed, leisure is a waste of time
12. The leisure
revolution
13. Thinking the unthinkable
14. Political action and inaction
15. Facing the future: the new industrial revolution
16. The hardest
revolution of all
Barrie Sherman was a journalist, broadcaster and writer. He served as the Director of Research at the Association of Scientific, Technical and Managerial Staffs. He was the co-author, with Clive Jenkins, of The Collapse of Work and The Leisure Shock.
