Internationalisation Trends, Investment and Labour; Issues and Policy Options

Abstract

This paper takes the position that changes and trends in labour, employment and work (LEW) in New Zealand are unavoidably entangled in developments whose origins lie, in the main, outside New Zealand. It is further argued that debate about these changes and trends remains largely grounded in conceptual and theoretical frameworks which give insufficient regard to global structural realities and what these realities might mean in particular countries. Rather than rehearse the scope and content of existing LEW frameworks, this paper conceptualises a general process of globalisation centred on developments in the world capitalist accumulation process.