This paper explores the lived experiences and aspirational social constructions of call centre work and employment in India’s high profile IT Enabled Services-Business Process Outsourcing (ITES-BPO) industry; the ways in which they differ from those previously documented amongst call centre workers in the Global North (specifically the UK); and the consequences of that geographical reconfiguration of offshored call centre work for the replicability in India of workplace collective bargaining strategies successfully developed in some UK call centres. These issues are analysed using new empirical evidence from a regional survey of 511 non-unionised ITES-BPO workers and 42 in-depth interviews in India’s National Capital Region. Based on this analysis, the paper then discusses the operation, outcomes and ongoing challenges faced by the newly formed ‘Union for ITES Professionals’ (UNITES Pro) in developing an alternative occupational organising model better suited to the particular needs, motivations and preferences of India’s young, mobile, call centre workers. The empirical analysis presented in the paper is located, therefore, within wider debates on the role of geographical context in shaping possibilities for organising white-collar service workers at different ends of global service chains in the new economy. 相似文献
The effects of wind-driven rain (WDR) on sand detachment were studied under various raindrop obliquities. Results suggested a significant reduction in compressive stress on sand surfaces for a two-dimensional experimental set-up in a wind tunnel. During experiments, sand particles in splash cups were exposed to both wind-free rain (WFR) and WDR driven by horizontal winds of 6.4, 8.9 and 12.8 m s−1 and rainfall intensities of 50, 60, 75 and 90-mm h−1 to assess the sand detachment rate (D, in g m−2 s−1). The effects of sand moisture state (dry and wet) on the detachment of different-sized particles (0.20–0.50 and 0.50–2.00 mm, respectively) were also tested. Factorial analysis of variance showed that shear and compressive stress components evaluated by horizontal and vertical kinetic energy flux terms (KEx and KEy, respectively, in J m−2 s−1) along with their vector sum (KEr, in J m−2 s−1) explained the variation in D. Neither sand size nor sand moisture was statistically significant alone although binary interactions of KEr, KEx and KEy with the sand size and three-way interaction of KEx, sand size and moisture were statistically significant. These results can be explained by size-dependent variation in sand compressibility and surface friction related to the total stress field developed by a given partition of shear and compressive stresses of wind-driven oblique raindrops (KEx/KEy). Further analysis of the variation of the unit sand detachment rate (Du = D/KEr = g J−1) with rain inclination (α, in degrees) better revealed the effect of WDR obliquity on Du that further changed with sand size class and moisture state. Finally, the difference in the resulting stress field differentiable by the oblique raindrop trajectories of the experiment over sand surface significantly affected the non-cohesive particle detachment rates, to some extent interacted with size-dependent compressibility and interface shear strength of sand grains. 相似文献