The Perfecting of Productivity - free time does not actually exist

After Work: A History of the Home and the Fight for Free Time review

Isabela Restrepo

The first two hours of most weekdays in November started the same for me. The productivity of the routine of making my bed, sweeping, doing laundry, and making breakfast was maximized and perfected by listening to Helen Hester and Nick Srnicek’s book examining postwork ambitions and free time, or the lack thereof, applied to unpaid reproductive labor. Please note the irony in this. For those in similar situations as mine, where the concept of sitting down to read a book with undivided attention is considered a luxury, After Work: A History of the Home and the Fight for Free Time encapsulates this shared frustration and funnels it towards an analysis of the evolution and subsequent effects of four main topics (technology, standards, family structures, and space) on care.

This analysis is successful in its context and structure, which allows for a digestible and concise critique. It sets itself apart from many social commentary pieces by instead of providing over simplified idealistic solutions or structuring its entire argument on griping over the recurring faults in society’s functioning, it creates a set of values to use as a foundation to implement the ideas previously talked about. The book is supported through an impressive range of case study types in differing scales and specificities from looking at the impacts of Campbell’s soup cans on the structure of the home to tackling daunting social and moral ambiguities of family abolition, or as they describe, communal care. This openness allows for these ideas to be applied to various disciplines. The roundness in their approach, at times, comes at the consequence of the occasional conflict in detail, but that is understood simply as these complex scenarios cannot be prescribed catchall solutions. The theme examining social systems in need of reform automatically lends itself to critique through a sustainability understanding. Additionally, observing changes within space and its impacts lends itself to being viewed not only as a dweller of these familiar spaces but also through an architectural perspective.

The authors–a married couple with three children of their own, composed of a professor of media and communication with a focus in social reproduction and sexuality, and a lecturer involved in studies surrounding post scarcity economy and anti-work politics–combine their disciplines to develop the elements needed in order to achieve the post-work ideal while acknowledging a major part of the issue with the lack of free time that is typically disregarded. Capitalist economy cannot exist without the support of reproductive labor, yet this type of work is not recognized as deserving of a wage. It is unsurprising that the analysis is automatically done largely through a feminist lens after considering that the significant majority of at-home labor is done by women. One of the main dilemmas that the book aims to solve, though, is that of time. They persistently ask the question ‘how does one obtain free time,’ which is then followed by the daunting ‘what does one do with said free time’ question. The authors dwell mainly on the former question, leaving the latter up to those who somehow manage to obtain it. This compels the reader to understand not just the point that is being made, but the cause that it fights for–a possible world where self actualization might be possible and where the idea of free time isn’t plagued by obligation.

The book is broken down into four subsections which result in a rhythm of providing a combination of utopian theory, which is then balanced with historical examples with context and critique, and analysis of current problematic scenarios, with which they develop a series of proposed tools, simplified or adjusted for pragmatic future application. This is evident, for example, in the Technologies chapter where the author observes the ways that the development of new technologies, which are advertised as time saving revolutions, are actually a form of labor displacement. This is bluntly pointed out in the statement, “an increase in technology alone does not decrease labor” (Hester, Srnicek 34). The scenario of the evolution of the process of shopping, going from counter service, to self service, to self checkout, claims to be a reduction of labor, is actually a shifting, which is entirely different. Over time, every single part of the shopping experience is moved from the employee to the unpaid consumer. This can be considered as an analysis of the history of an object within its context, which bleeds into present day. It acknowledges the current state of the proposed solutions and why exactly it isn’t enough. The chapter is concluded with a series of priorities that must be set in order to close the gap between waged and unwaged labor, which includes smaller scale solutions made to fit niche scenarios such as the focus of technology development onto the kitchen, and broader examples of the call to reconsider the structure of the family as the core issue rather than the technologies themselves.

The text is extremely thorough within its realm. It meticulously dissects what it aims to do, which is the dilemma of free time for domestic workers. It is understandable for the focus to exist mainly on the woman, as domestic labor statistically tends to lay heavily on this population, but it feels necessary to pay slightly more attention to other demographics and the ways in which they may or may not be supported in these scenarios. Granted, the author does acknowledge at times certain historical implications on women of color but it mostly focuses on how racism is often a factor in the failure of previous attempts towards social support to enable free time. When examining the pendulum movement of laundry washing from the home to the market and back into the home, the author explains, “the mixture of factors contributed to the eventual downfall of laundrettes. Technological improvements to home washer-dryers, the power of large appliance manufacturers with substantial advertising budgets, versus smaller typically locally owned laundrettes, rising wages for laundrette workers, and often classist and racist anxieties about one’s washing mixing with that of other households all played a role” but it evidently exists almost as an afterthought (Hester, Srnicek, 43). The focus on the woman is again shifted, though, when arguing against the structure of the nuclear family. The stronger point to be made here is homelessness and abuse amongst LGBT youth and how “a significant percentage of LGBT people don’t have families full stop” (Malatino 2020). Although this is one of very few examples relating to a wider range of demographics, it is understandable as the main focus is distinctly on women and their role in the household.

Reading through a sustainable perspective, the author dissects the different scales of the dilemma, and it quickly becomes apparent that no part of the system is sustainable as is. Applying the values of sustainability beyond ecological instances and instead towards family systems, societal ideals, and entire market economies, it becomes understood that not only will these systems eventually collapse, but they have often not been functioning in the first place. After scathing remark after remark, it is adamantly clear that the structure of the family is a prescribed one, rather than a natural one. It is a system that is so deeply ingrained into society that it is rarely questioned, yet Hester and Srnicek are very much not afraid to do so. They rationally and carefully tread on the concept of communal care, acknowledging its much more contentious title, family abolition, as a proposed solution not as a means of isolation, but more as one of chosen relationships for larger networks of support (Hester, Srnicek 2023).

A particularly interesting argument of their main four is the concept of space and its power to dictate the activity within the household. This is broken down into studying the house commune type, its successes and failures. Most interestingly, it examines the city’s part in the development of the city into the home. After communal projects were deemed unsuccessful because of lack of adequate resources and interests, the city became the place for communal recreation, which was enabled using the garden, parks, and boulevards (Hester, Srnicek 2023). A contrasting example functioning at a much smaller scale may be one of the Frankfurt Kitchen, by Margarete Schutte-Lihotzky. While Hester and Srnicek’s case study focuses on the leisure component of space enabled by the government, Frankfurt Kitchen is a much more explicit example of what has been previously studied in the pursuit of free time for women. “The Frankfurt Kitchen was designed like a laboratory or factory and based on contemporary theories about efficiency, hygiene, and workflow. In planning the design, Schutte-Lihotzsky conducted detailed time-motion studies and interviews with housewives and women’s groups” (Moma | counter space: Design and the modern kitchen 2011). This project, to me, encapsulates the theme of the text perfectly, as it is a historical example of a design evolution of a domestic space in order to empower women with the possibility of free time. This also, unfortunately, further solidifies their point that there is truly no such thing as free time considering it was then in turn used as an excuse for women to have more time… to be better mothers and carers for the home.

After Hester and Srnicek’s extensive analysis and case study observation, they finally curate a list of three main principles necessary to successfully implement or at least begin to work towards achieving post-work. Although seemingly ambitious, the selection of studies leading up to this ultimate decision makes a shift towards the adoption of ideas a possibility. Although the moral implications of what happens to a society without the structure of capitalist obligation remain uncertain, the resulting conversations from this text may be able to unpack this. The search for freedom from the droll of labor obligations takes a major step forward as the conversation turns toward the type of labor that hides itself within the time that is technically considered “free” since it is unpaid. It points out the horrifying reality that none of our time is truly free, but it also recognizes that it could be obtained. And once it is, we get to ask the next question of what now?

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