"Workers" in the West German "society of jobholders". On the transformation of a pivotal category of societal knowledge "after the boom".

• Applicant: Professor Dr. Anselm Doering-Manteuffel
• Subject Area: Modern and Contemporary History
• Term: from 2016 to 2022
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 290312494

For more than one hundred years, the category "worker" has been an important part of societal knowledge. In spite of being context-dependent, it has proved sufficiently abstract to enable protagonists to reflect on "society". Now, "after the boom", "worker" has lost this significance. Concerning the Federal Republic of Germany, the decisive transition seems to have taken place between the late 1960s and the mid-1980s. Even though there were efforts to update the concept of "worker", the notion of a "society of jobholders" appeared as an alternative instrument of analysis. Hence, the purpose of the project at hand is to examine concrete negotiations and conflicting interpretations regarding "worker" by scrutinizing which protagonist - under which circumstances - opted for "worker" or "jobholder", and what could be gained or lost by the respective decision.The project consists of five case studies. First, three working-class movies, co-produced by the WDR, allow for disclosing if and how the concept of a "society of jobholders" was a necessary condition for "worker" to be turned into a cultural ressource. Conversely, the second case study shows how "worker" became a problem for the "jobholder" unions of the Deutsche Gewerkschaftsbund at a time when the West German labour market and economy underwent structural changes. Two studies will analyze how "worker" could be legally transformed into "jobholder" by industrial agreements and federal law respectively. Finally, one case study will be dedicated to the "Research Institute on Worker Education". It will discuss the ontological problem if education could be instrumental in promoting "workers" to the status of "non-workers".The project takes the social constructedness as well as the complexity of the "end of the worker" seriously. It seeks to contribute both to the methodological renewal of labour history and to the political and cultural history of the Federal Republic. Finally, it aims at scrutinizing central premises of the "after the boom" approach.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants