Work and the Mental Health Crisis in Britain

Carl Walker is a Senior Lecturer in the School of Applied Social Sciences, University of Brighton. His research and teaching interests include social inequality and mental distress, cultural representations of mental health, and critical community approaches to psychology. He is course leader for the MA in Community Psychology and is currently engaged in work around employment, personal debt and mental distress. His previous publications include Depression and Globalisation (2007). Ben Fincham is a Lecturer in Sociology at the University of Sussex. He has been involved with developing projects on 'mobilities' and qualitative approaches to studying work in unstable employment environments, and his current research focuses on the complex relationship between work and mental health. He is co-author of Mobile Methodologies (2010).

About the Contributors ix Acknowledgements xi Chapter 1 Introduction: Mental Health, Emotional Well-Being and 21st Century Work 1 Chapter 2 Getting Britain Back to Work: A Policy Perspective 11 Chapter 3 Mental Health and Work-Experiences of Work Ben Fincham, Carl Walker with Holly Easlick 39 Chapter 4 Techniques of Identity Governance and Resistance: Formulating the Neoliberal Worker Carl Walker, Ben Fincham with Josh Cameron 67 Chapter 5 Managing Mental Health in Organizations 97 Chapter 6 Work/Life Balance and the Individualized Responsibility of the Neoliberal Worker 133 Chapter 7 Concluding Thoughts: Neoliberalism and the Shrine of Work 147 References 163 Index 179