Some years ago, during the height of the technology stock bubble, a book entitled Free Agent Nation made quite a splash
by glorifying the phenomenon of independent contracting. Less famously and far less optimistically, a number of economists and anthropologists pointed to this trend as a grave sign of the decay of workers’ position in American society. Stephen R. Barley and Gideon Kunda, the authors of this study, steer a careful, meticulously documented middle course. They examined the observable fact of independent contracting in the high technology industry from three viewpoints: the contractors, the headhunters and the client firms. They say that the contractor is a new, different kind of knowledge worker with a unique set of opportunities and constraints. The book is clearly written, based on apparently sound evidence and illustrated with carefully chosen anecdotes. getAbstract.com suggests that its primary appeal will be to academics and other students of labor market trends, but also recommends it to firms that hire contractors and to contractors themselves - both will benefit from the authors’ analysis of their market.