Project time line: 2018 – 2020

Against the background of advancements in fields such as digitisation, artificial intelligence and robotics that are changing vocations, this project will explore emerging literature on the qualitative transformations in the forces of production, with specific focus on labour. It will also contribute to the international Millennium Project’s ‘Future of Work Tech Scenarios 2050’ by constituting the South African chapter of that review.

In addition, this project will reconcile South African empirical data with the literatures on long-waves of capitalist expansion, techno-economic paradigms and socio-technical transitions, and the fourth industrial revolution framings of the World Economic Forum. A sub-project will look at PhD recruitment by the public sector in South Africa and the use of their cognate domains of expertise in their vocational placements. A further aspect covers the changing role of organised labour within the context of rapidly mutating national and global ecosystems.

Research team

Collaborating organisations

  • South African Federation of Trade Unions
  • National Council of Trade Unions
  • Federation of Unions of South Africa

Science and technology and innovation studies

Research area