a high proportion of “non-voluntary” part-time workers and that, in general terms,
part-time employment has remained stable over the last few years (Hespanha 1999;
Kovács 2004b)29. An interesting phenomenon emphasized in a recent study relates to
the fact that there is a higher incidence of flexible forms of employment among less
socially recognized socio-professional categories (e.g. call-centres and third sector employees)
and that stable forms of employment are predominant among high-level
socio-professional categories (e.g. highly-skilled specialists, enterprise executives)
(Kovács 2004b). Again, this is a symptom of the already mentioned dual image of the
Portuguese labour market, i.e., where there is a group of individuals with access to
stable, lifelong well paid jobs accompanied by training and promotion opportunities
and there is another group of workers with an unstable employment relationship,
whose jobs are, generally, poorly paid and linked to not very attractive professional
expectations. Nowadays, the gaps between the “privileged insiders” and the “precarious
outsiders”, to use Esping-Andersen’s terminology, are deepening (Esping-Andersen
2002) and there has been a considerable increase within the last group. Consequently,
although labour market flexibility is considered an important factor allowing markets,
organizations and individuals to adapt quickly to external and internal conditions and
thus inducing higher competitiveness and economic growth, the increase of non-stable
jobs generates new social risks: a) in terms of the quality of work itself (e.g. more precarious
and insecure forms of employment, with fewer access to training and promotional
opportunities) (Auer 2005; Rebelo 2003); b) in terms of individuals’ ability to negotiate
and to participate in collective activities (Kovács 2004b: 65); c) strengthening
the role of family and other social networks in the provision of welfare support, namely,
in compensating the absence of unemployment benefits (Gonzalez cit in Papadopoulos
2006); d) high risk of poverty and social exclusion due, namely, to the lack of social protection
(e.g. unemployment insurance) (Costa 2008; Perista and Nogueira 2006). As in
other countries, this has been a very critical issue of dispute between workers and employers
representatives. While the later “argue for the liberalization of the labour market