Productive Reorganization, Outsourcing, and Work Relations in the Offshore Oil Industry in the Campos Basin, Rio de Janeiro

• Published in: New solutions Vol. 18; no. 4; pp. 459 - 480
• Main Authors: Figueiredo, Marcelo, Alvarez, Denise, Athayde, Milton, Suarez, José Diego, Pereira, Renata, Soares, Leonardo
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Los Angeles, CA SAGE Publications 01.02.2009; SAGE PUBLICATIONS, INC
• Subjects: Accidents, Occupational; Brazil; Collectives; Ergonomics; Extraction and Processing Industry - methods; Humans; Interpersonal Relations; Labor movements; Labor Unions; Occupational Health; Occupational safety; Offshore oil wells; Oil and gas industry; Organizational Innovation; Outsourced Services - standards; Outsourcing; Petroleum; Petroleum industry; Program Evaluation; Reliability; Reorganization; Work; Brazil; Rio de Janeiro Brazil; Campos Basin
• ISSN: 1048-2911; 1541-3772
• DOI: 10.2190/NS.18.4.d

This article analyzes the relationship between the intensive use of outsourcing and labor organizations on offshore oil platforms in the Campos Basin, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. The theoretical and methodological framework applied in our research is based on Ergonomics of Activity and the Psychodynamics of Work, from an ergological perspective. In addition to the more general trend of increasing precariousness, we highlight the potential loss of formal and informal knowledge resulting from the fragmentation of work collectives, as we consider the cohesion of these collectives to be a crucial element contributing to reliability in process operations. Increasing precariousness of work contributes to this fragmentation and one of its main causes is the uncontrolled increase in outsourcing of work. This situation has had nefarious consequences for workers' health and safety, suggesting that those who have adopted outsourcing as a labor management tool have failed to consider these harmful consequences as rigorously as necessary.