Absenteeism, or resistance of last resort: workers’ defence strategies to work intensification and managerial responses in the automotive industry

This article analyzes absenteeism in the automotive industry as a form of worker resistance against the intensification of production rhythms. Through a qualitative case study of an automotive plant in central Italy, based on semi-structured interviews with workers and union representatives, the research challenges managerialist perspectives that frame absenteeism as social and labour deviance requiring correction. Using Labour Process Theory, the study contends that against the backdrop of individualization in the workplace and trade union power erosion, workers retreat to absenteeism – an individual, unorganized response – as resistance of last resort in order to physically and mentally recover from the intensity of assembly-line work. While literature has usually portrayed resistance as a one-way process, the article suggests that absenteeism triggers a response by management, shedding light on dynamics affecting the night shift to illustrate how management leverages coercion to suppress resistance. Ultimately, the article advances an understanding of absenteeism as emerging from the interplay between the social relations of production, management practices, and mechanisms of coercion and consent.