Socialmente utili. Antropologia del lavoro e non lavoro in una città del Mezzogiorno

The Socially Useful Jobs (LSU) were the first important Italian experiment in active labor policies. This article examines the categories of work and non-work through the ethnographic analysis of the trajectories of socially useful workers in Brindisi. The analysis shows how their trajectory has been characterized by the interaction of processes of regulation and informalization. The LSUs were an important experiment in differentiating work within a regulatory framework defined by the notion of public utility. Often assessed as an assistentialist measure, the LSUs have recently been evoked in the discussion of new workfare measures such as the Reddito di Cittadinanza. The article suggests that the analysis of LSU in their actual implementation can provide important critical insights to approach current conditional income measures and, more broadly, the social implications of the relationships between unemployment and public utility in relation to the work-income nexus.

Keywords: Work; Income; Unemployment; Public utility.