This book reflects the enormous interest in work-life balance and current pressing concerns about the impacts of austerity more broadly. It draws on contemporary research and practitioner experiences to explore how work-life balance and related workplace and social policy fare in turbulent economic times and the implications for employees, employers and wider societies. Authors consider workplace trends, practices and employment relations and the impacts on work, care and well-being of diverse workers. A guiding theme throughout the book is a triple agenda of supporting employee work-life balance, workplace effectiveness and social justice. The final chapters present case studies of innovative processes and organizational practices for addressing the triple agenda, note the important role of social policy context and discuss the challenge of extending debates on work-life balance to include a social justice dimension.

This book will be of interest to academics and postgraduate students of organisational psychology, sociology, human resource management, management and business studies, law and social policy, as well as employers, managers, HR managers, trade unions, and policy makers.

"Overall this book clearly presents the many reservations from diverse stakeholders regarding WLB and challenges us to reconsider and reconcile the implied gender neutrality, fairness and social justice footings of the WLB discourse during austerity. I highly recommend this volume in its ability to query issues of autonomy, negotiated working times and workplaces, whose agenda WLB truly is, and how its approaches, mantras and practices have been hijacked in ways that perpetuate the neoliberal agenda fostering austerity." Judie M Gannon, Oxford Brookes University, UK, Work employment and society