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Work-to-rule
Work-to-rule, also known as an Italian strike or a slowdown in United States usage, and sciopero bianco ('white strike') in Italy, is a job action in which employees do no more than the minimum required by the rules of their contract or job, and strictly follow time-consuming rules normally not enforced. It is a passive-aggressive form of labor opposition. This may cause a slowdown or decrease in productivity if the employer does not hire enough employees or pay the appropriate salary and consequently does not have the requirements needed to run normally.
It is a form of protest against low pay and poor working conditions, and is considered less disruptive than a strike; obeying the rules is not susceptible to disciplinary action or loss of pay. It can also highlight rules that are technically in place but impractical and thus hamper the organization, if they were to be followed as written. In practice, there may be ambiguous conditions – for example, a contract that requires working additional hours when necessary, or a requirement to work to operational requirements. In such cases, workers have been recommended to ask for a written direction to carry out the work, which can be used as evidence if necessary.
Work-to-rule may be employed formally or informally by workers and organizers as an alternative to traditional strike action in contexts where strikes are prohibited, either by law or due to lack of workforce union participation or political will. Work-to-rule has been employed in sectors where striking is prohibited, including education, policing, and healthcare, as well as in authoritarian societies like Russia, which prohibit strikes generally. In this respect, work-to-rule tactics can resemble other forms of industrial action such as an overtime ban or blue flu.
Quiet quitting is a specific, often spontaneous or grassroots application of work-to-rule tactics. Despite the name, the philosophy of quiet quitting is not connected to quitting a job outright, but rather, employees avoid going above and beyond the call of duty by doing the bare minimum required and engage in work-related activities solely within defined work hours. Proponents of quiet quitting also refer to it as "acting your wage", or "calibrated contributing", and say that the goal of quiet quitting is not primarily to disrupt the workplace as part of an organized movement, but to avoid occupational burnout and to reassert autonomy and work-life balance on an individual level.
There are no verifiable sources as to who coined the phrase. It was also thought to be inspired by the tang ping ('lying flat') movement that began in April 2021 on Chinese social media and became a buzzword on Sina Weibo. Later that year, Chinese Internet users combined tang ping with involution, a process researched by American anthropologist Clifford Geertz in his 1963 book Agricultural Involution. The book gained attention in the late 1980s from social sciences research about China which led to the term "involution" gaining great attention in China. In 2020, "involution" became one of the most commonly used words on Chinese-language media, where it is used to describe the feeling of exhaustion in an overly competitive society.
After tang ping became a buzzword and inspired numerous Internet memes, business magazine ABC Money claimed it resonated with a growing silent majority of youth disillusioned by the officially endorsed "Chinese Dream" that encourages a life of hard work and sacrifice with no actual life satisfaction to show for it.[citation needed] An editorial published in the journal of the American Institute of Chemical Engineers defined quiet quitting as a rejection of "hustle culture" and the belief that value of work is intrinsically tied to number of hours.
Though the term is recent, the ideas behind quiet quitting are not and go back decades. The phrase "quiet quitting" became popular during 2022 in the United States, mostly through the social video platform TikTok. In 2022, quiet quitting experienced a surge in popularity in numerous publications following a viral TikTok video, which was inspired by a Business Insider article. That same year, Gallup found that roughly half of the American workforce were quiet quitters.
Industry observers argue the COVID-19 pandemic accelerated the social movement of quiet quitting, with a resurgence in labor sentiments among Generation Z as a result of the economic fallout. A 2021 survey conducted by the American Psychological Association revealed that forty percent of American workers surveyed intend to change jobs, which the report attributed to lack of compensation for the amount of stress and burnout endured. In 2023, a trend called quiet cutting was seen where employers would reassign rather than lay off employees, suggesting a possible shift in workplace power. It is possible that conscious quitting might follow quiet quitting.
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Work-to-rule
Work-to-rule, also known as an Italian strike or a slowdown in United States usage, and sciopero bianco ('white strike') in Italy, is a job action in which employees do no more than the minimum required by the rules of their contract or job, and strictly follow time-consuming rules normally not enforced. It is a passive-aggressive form of labor opposition. This may cause a slowdown or decrease in productivity if the employer does not hire enough employees or pay the appropriate salary and consequently does not have the requirements needed to run normally.
It is a form of protest against low pay and poor working conditions, and is considered less disruptive than a strike; obeying the rules is not susceptible to disciplinary action or loss of pay. It can also highlight rules that are technically in place but impractical and thus hamper the organization, if they were to be followed as written. In practice, there may be ambiguous conditions – for example, a contract that requires working additional hours when necessary, or a requirement to work to operational requirements. In such cases, workers have been recommended to ask for a written direction to carry out the work, which can be used as evidence if necessary.
Work-to-rule may be employed formally or informally by workers and organizers as an alternative to traditional strike action in contexts where strikes are prohibited, either by law or due to lack of workforce union participation or political will. Work-to-rule has been employed in sectors where striking is prohibited, including education, policing, and healthcare, as well as in authoritarian societies like Russia, which prohibit strikes generally. In this respect, work-to-rule tactics can resemble other forms of industrial action such as an overtime ban or blue flu.
Quiet quitting is a specific, often spontaneous or grassroots application of work-to-rule tactics. Despite the name, the philosophy of quiet quitting is not connected to quitting a job outright, but rather, employees avoid going above and beyond the call of duty by doing the bare minimum required and engage in work-related activities solely within defined work hours. Proponents of quiet quitting also refer to it as "acting your wage", or "calibrated contributing", and say that the goal of quiet quitting is not primarily to disrupt the workplace as part of an organized movement, but to avoid occupational burnout and to reassert autonomy and work-life balance on an individual level.
There are no verifiable sources as to who coined the phrase. It was also thought to be inspired by the tang ping ('lying flat') movement that began in April 2021 on Chinese social media and became a buzzword on Sina Weibo. Later that year, Chinese Internet users combined tang ping with involution, a process researched by American anthropologist Clifford Geertz in his 1963 book Agricultural Involution. The book gained attention in the late 1980s from social sciences research about China which led to the term "involution" gaining great attention in China. In 2020, "involution" became one of the most commonly used words on Chinese-language media, where it is used to describe the feeling of exhaustion in an overly competitive society.
After tang ping became a buzzword and inspired numerous Internet memes, business magazine ABC Money claimed it resonated with a growing silent majority of youth disillusioned by the officially endorsed "Chinese Dream" that encourages a life of hard work and sacrifice with no actual life satisfaction to show for it.[citation needed] An editorial published in the journal of the American Institute of Chemical Engineers defined quiet quitting as a rejection of "hustle culture" and the belief that value of work is intrinsically tied to number of hours.
Though the term is recent, the ideas behind quiet quitting are not and go back decades. The phrase "quiet quitting" became popular during 2022 in the United States, mostly through the social video platform TikTok. In 2022, quiet quitting experienced a surge in popularity in numerous publications following a viral TikTok video, which was inspired by a Business Insider article. That same year, Gallup found that roughly half of the American workforce were quiet quitters.
Industry observers argue the COVID-19 pandemic accelerated the social movement of quiet quitting, with a resurgence in labor sentiments among Generation Z as a result of the economic fallout. A 2021 survey conducted by the American Psychological Association revealed that forty percent of American workers surveyed intend to change jobs, which the report attributed to lack of compensation for the amount of stress and burnout endured. In 2023, a trend called quiet cutting was seen where employers would reassign rather than lay off employees, suggesting a possible shift in workplace power. It is possible that conscious quitting might follow quiet quitting.