Almost 250 years ago, ‘gang-masters’ – those who mediated between rural employers and roving bands of migrant workers - were vividly brought to life within the pages of Marx’s Capital. By contrast the modern-day phenomenon of how paid-for labour market intermediaries – temporary staffing agencies and their rural ‘gangmaster’ counterparts – construct transnational workforces remains remarkably undocumented, let alone theorised. Similarly, although a burgeoning literature sheds light on the increasing privatisation of international migration flows, the precise role of profit-seeking ‘recruiters’ within a broader migration industry remains underexposed. This thesis explores how - and why - agencies recruited migrant workers from his or her home countries and placed them in temporary employment in the UK. In response to the apparent growing significance of temporary staffing agencies in facilitating migration into the UK from the EU8 countries of Central and Eastern Europe, as well as from beyond the EU, the research was funded by an ESRC CASE studentship. Evidence was gathered from qualitative interviews conducted with representatives of agencies in the UK, in Poland, the Philippines, and Australia, as well as with a range of respondents from government departments, labour organisations, regulatory bodies, and journalists in all four countries. The multi-scale fieldwork sites were selected in order to offer a comparative analysis of variable institutional and regulatory settings. Within the following pages I argue that agencies in both the origin countries, as well as in the UK, made markets in the recruitment and supply of temporary migrant workers; selling migration to recruits, and migrant workers to client employers in the process. Activities of agencies were highly embedded within the precise institutional and regulatory regime that resulted from the interaction between that in place in the origin country as well as that in the UK. The thesis seeks to contribute empirically and conceptually to a growing literature which exposes the behaviour of temporary staffing agencies within national labour markets as well as the migration industry literature which looks at the behaviour of actors which transport workers between national labour markets.

Since the early 1990s the temporary staffing industry experienced rapid growth in many areas of Europe, although the extent and rate of this growth varied across the continent. The existing literature on labour market intermediaries and the temporary staffing industry fail to adequately address the importance of national institutional arrangements. This thesis addresses the research lacuna by providing a comparative study of temporary staffing industries in three different political-economic contexts: the United Kingdom, Germany and the Czech Republic. This contributes to a greater understanding of the role of the temporary staffing industry in each country, how it is structured, and the key institutions involved. These three case studies profile the size and characteristics of each temporary staffing industry but also discuss the key institutions present in each case, and the relationships which drive or restrict its change. This thesis includes analysis of both quantitative and qualitative data to provide a detailed picture of each national temporary staffing industry. The research reveals three nationally distinctive formations of the temporary staffing industry within the context of the European Union. While the UK has the largest temporary staffing industry in Europe, it remains highly fragmented. With an established presence in many sectors of the labour market the industry seeks to increase its presence in professional occupations, and its collaboration with public employment services. While the temporary staffing industry in Germany has experienced significant growth since 2003, resistance remains from the trade unions against the use of temporary agency work, and the state remains greatly involved in determining working conditions. The presence of collective bargaining between the trade unions and trade associations remains a key relationship in this system. The temporary staffing industry in the Czech Republic is still in the early stages of growth and as such regulations are still being formulated, and agencies are still establishing branch networks in an environment where a large number of informal agencies are already present. While temporary staffing agencies and trade associations remain active in pursuing growth for the temporary staffing industry, the extent to which these changes took place varied between countries. This thesis argues the form of each national temporary staffing industry is a reflection of the complex historical, and contemporary, national institutional arrangements, and as such, its form and role varies.

<p>At the time of writing, the business world is currently recovering from a recession that struck globally in the late 2008. The financial crisis brought many consequences, not least in the labor market. In meantime, media is reporting of the increasing trends of companies outsourcing their employment needs, by using staffing companies. Could it be that there is a correlation between the recession and the companies’ choices to do so?</p><p>By revising literature on the topic we have found that the companies need for flexibility seem to be their main reason for using staffing companies. We have also come to review the first reports on the current increase of staffing company use in the US claimed to be caused by the current recession. Regarding the recession, we have come to find that it does have a structural impact on the labor market according to literature. An impact, that many claims is not temporary, but is here to stay.</p><p>We have departed from retroduction with a touch of abduction when investigating our research problem. In practice, we have conducted a study based on surveys where we have asked 37 people in managerial positions at the top 100 largest employers in Sweden about their views on the recession and their attitudes towards the staffing industry. In addition, we have conducted an interview with a manager from a staffing company in Sweden to get another view on the use of staffing companies.</p><p>The findings of this study include; even though several references in this paper forecast rapid growth during times of expansion for the staffing companies, this is not reflected within the responses in our sample. The companies perceive the situation of temporary staff as being better than what some theory suggests. There is reason to suggest that large companies that use staffing companies are moving towards a permanent need of temporary labor, and the respondent of such companies generally perceive staffing companies as a good option for mitigating labor-associated risks.</p><p>It is difficult to draw definite conclusions based on our findings. We have opted to give the reader some insight as to how the companies perceive the staffing industry, and how a manager of a staffing company perceives its current state. We would like to encourage further research to use the questions and suggestions raised in our paper to conduct tests in the area of temporary staffing from a corporate perspective to nourish the debate in the society with a scientific point of view.</p>

At the time of writing, the business world is currently recovering from a recession that struck globally in the late 2008. The financial crisis brought many consequences, not least in the labor market. In meantime, media is reporting of the increasing trends of companies outsourcing their employment needs, by using staffing companies. Could it be that there is a correlation between the recession and the companies’ choices to do so? By revising literature on the topic we have found that the companies need for flexibility seem to be their main reason for using staffing companies. We have also come to review the first reports on the current increase of staffing company use in the US claimed to be caused by the current recession. Regarding the recession, we have come to find that it does have a structural impact on the labor market according to literature. An impact, that many claims is not temporary, but is here to stay. We have departed from retroduction with a touch of abduction when investigating our research problem. In practice, we have conducted a study based on surveys where we have asked 37 people in managerial positions at the top 100 largest employers in Sweden about their views on the recession and their attitudes towards the staffing industry. In addition, we have conducted an interview with a manager from a staffing company in Sweden to get another view on the use of staffing companies. The findings of this study include; even though several references in this paper forecast rapid growth during times of expansion for the staffing companies, this is not reflected within the responses in our sample. The companies perceive the situation of temporary staff as being better than what some theory suggests. There is reason to suggest that large companies that use staffing companies are moving towards a permanent need of temporary labor, and the respondent of such companies generally perceive staffing companies as a good option for mitigating labor-associated risks. It is difficult to draw definite conclusions based on our findings. We have opted to give the reader some insight as to how the companies perceive the staffing industry, and how a manager of a staffing company perceives its current state. We would like to encourage further research to use the questions and suggestions raised in our paper to conduct tests in the area of temporary staffing from a corporate perspective to nourish the debate in the society with a scientific point of view.

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This study examines the various forms of precarity within the temporary staffing industry and how the industry can be understood as a producer of precarity. From a worker’s perspective, we have with a hermeneutic approach and qualitative method conducted eight semistructured interviews with temporary staffing employees working in the industrial sector. The purpose of the interviews was to explore how workers in the staffing industry experience their employment conditions to compare the experiences with existing knowledge about the temporary staffing industry. Drawing on Guy Standing’s (2011) theory of the precariat and David Harvey's (1982, 2005) theories of capitalism and neoliberalism, we have interpreted the emergence and expansion of the temporary staffing industry and its precarious terms of employment. Our findings indicate that the forms of precarity within the temporary staffing industry shows through lack of integration, competence development, participation in the workplace, and the employment’s impact on the employees' decisions in their personal lives. The conclusion is that the temporary staffing industry, in its current form, will always produce precarity because the employees' job security is not prioritized. / Studien undersöker vilka former prekaritet kan ta inom bemanningsbranschen och hur bemanningsbranschen kan förstås som en producent av prekaritet. Utifrån ett arbetstagarperspektiv har vi genom kvalitativ metod och hermeneutisk ansats genomfört åtta semistrukturerade intervjuer med bemanningsanställda inom industrisektorn. Syftet med intervjuerna var att undersöka hur arbetstagare i bemanningsbranschen upplever sina anställningsvillkor för att vidare kunna jämföra upplevelserna med tidigare kunskap om bemanningsbranschen. Med utgångspunkt i Guy Standings (2011) teori om prekariatet och David Harveys (1982, 2005) teorier om kapitalism och nyliberalism har vi tolkat framväxten och expansionen av bemanningsbranschen samt dess otrygga anställningsvillkor. Vårt resultat visar att bemanningsbranschens former av prekaritet tar sig i uttryck i  brist på integrering, kompetensutveckling och delaktighet samt anställningens påverkan  på arbetstagares privatliv. Slutsatsen är att bemanningsbranschen i sin nuvarande form alltid kommer att producera prekaritet eftersom arbetstagarnas tryggheter inte prioriteras.