Joyce Jiang
Senior Lecturer in Human Resource Management

Profile

Biography

Joyce Jiang joined the School for Business and Society as a lecturer in Human Resources Management in September 2016, before which she held a lectureship at Roehampton Business School in London. Joyce earned her PhD from Loughborough University with her dissertation focusing on the collective mobilisation of migrant workers in the UK, and a MA in Industrial Relations and Personnel Management (with Distinction) from the University of Warwick. In Warwick, she won the Trade Union Congress Prize for Outstanding Attainment in Employment Rights for her master dissertation on the topic of migrant workers’ union propensities.

Joyce is on the editorial board of the journal Work, Employment and Society. She also holds membership of many professional and academic organisations such as graduate membership of the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development, Fellowship of the Higher Education Academy and membership of European Association of Sociology and British Universities Industrial Relations Association.

Her first research area is the collective mobilisation of migrant workers and new forms of labour organising. Her PhD dissertation probes the alternative and new forms of organising among migrant workers when trade union is absent in their workplaces in the UK. Built upon that basis, her current research engages the debate on community unionism, new social movement and a variety of intersections between class, gender and ethnicity in collective mobilisation of workers. She argues for the utilisation of a social movement approach in studying the creative forms of organising.

Joyce is also interested in art, labour and activism. She’s also developed research projects that explore the role of participatory art in labour organising. Joyce is particularly interested in how participatory art can construct organic solidarity in collective mobilisation of workers. Her new project concerns the way art functions as a nimble form of collective action of workers in China, and she’s received funding for this project from the Arts and Humanities Research Council. Joyce’s research has developed enduring attention to art-based research methods, such as photography and videos, to be applied as an enabling methodology to the study of marginalised populations. She has produced a participatory film on migrant domestic workers and organised the exhibitions on domestic work ( https://myhomeisnotmyhome.wordpress.com) in different galleries including L’etrangere, Stephen Lawrence gallery and Cubitt gallery in London, and Norman Rea Gallery in York (forthcoming).

Joyce welcomes PhD interest in the following areas:

• Art, labour and activism
• Trade unionism in Britain
• Collective action of workers
• Migrant workers and their work rights
• Social movement and new forms of organising
• The use of ethnography, particularly art-based research methods, in the study of work and employment
• Emotional labour

Subject Group

Work Management and Organisation

Research

Overview

Joyce’s main research areas include migrant labour, trade unionism, social movement and art, labour and activism. She specialises in ethnography with a particular focus on the use of art-based methods, such as photography and film, in the study of the marginalised communities. She has published papers in leading management journals, such as Human Relations. She’s also on the editorial board of the journal Work, Employment and Society.

Joyce has been actively reporting her research findings to a wider practitioner audience including third sector organisations, arts organisations and the Houses of Parliament. She is on the trustee board of the charity organisation -The Voice of Domestic Workers in London. She has also produced a number of exhibitions on migrant domestic workers in different galleries in London and York (https://myhomeisnotmyhome.wordpress.com). Her research has been covered by national mainstream media, such as The Guardian. 

Research funding and awards

International placement fellowship in Shanghai Theatre Academy, granted by Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC), for her research project ‘Art as an Empowerment tool of Marginalised Workers in Shanghai’.

Loughborough University PhD funding for her project: ‘Collective Mobilisation among Migrant Workers: A study of Community Organising of Migrant Workers in Low-skilled Sectors in the UK’.

Research fellowship granted by social science project ‘Domestic Work’, International Centre for Development and Decent Work, University of Kassel, Germany, for her project ‘Collective Mobilisation among Migrant Domestic Workers in London’.

Trade Union Congress Prize for Outstanding Attainments in Employment Rights for her master dissertation: ‘How do Migrant Workers View Trade Unions in the UK? Social Identities of Migrant Workers and Their Union Propensities.’

Publications

Selected publications

Journal articles

Jiang Z and Korczynski M (2023) ‘The role of community organisations in collective mobilisation of migrant workers: The importance of a “community’-oriented perspective’. Work,Employment and Society 38(2): https://doi.org/10.1177/09500170221138008. 

Jiang Z and Korczynski M (2022) ‘The role of community organisations in collective mobilisation of migrant workers: The importance of a “community’-oriented perspective’. Work,Employment and Society. Forthcoming. 

Jiang Z and Korczynski M (2021) The art of labour organising: Participatory art and migrant domestic workers’ self-organising in London. Human Relations 74(6): 842-868. 

Jiang Z, Kobylinska T and VoDW (2020) Art with marginalised communities: Participatory video as a tool of empowerment and resistance for migrant domestic workers in London. City. DOI: 10.1080/13604813.2020.1739460 . 

Jiang, J (2018) Book Review Gurgles, I, A very short, fairly interesting and reasonably cheap book about human resource management, Management Learning, https://doi.org/10.1177/1350507618772126.

Jiang Z and Korczynski M (2016) When the ‘unorganisable’ organise: Collective mobilisation of migrant domestic workers in London. Human Relations, 69(3): 813–838.(The paper was shortlisted as the best Human Relations paper in 2016. The vodcast is available here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wvJ3EgnctnE)

Book chapters 

Jiang J (2023) Abuses Against Female Migrant Domestic Workers in the UK: An Intersectional Approach. In Parveen A and Michaela R (eds) Gender-Based Violence: A Comprehensive Guide. Springer.353-365.

Jiang Z (2020) Migrant Domestic Workers in the UK: Struggle and Resistance. In: Leal Filho W., Azul A., Brandli L., Lange Salvia A., Wall T. (eds) Decent Work and Economic Growth. Encyclopaedia of the UN Sustainable Development Goals. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-71058-7_100-1

Jiang, J (2018) ‘Organising Immigrant Workers Through “Communities of Coping": An Analysis of Migrant Domestic Workers’ Journey from an Individual Labour of Love to a Collective Labour with Rights', In Atzeni. M and Ness, I (eds), Global Perspectives on Workers' and Labour Organisations, Springer.

Report

Co-authored report (2024) UK agriculture and care visas: worker exploitation and obstacles to redress. https://modernslaverypec.org/resources/uk-agriculture-care-visas-vulnerability-exploitation. 

Co-authored report (2023) Outcomes for survivors of trafficking who return to the Philippines as their country of origin. https://www.kcl.ac.uk/artshums/assets/7214-4pp-report-survivors-of-trafficking-digital.pdf.

Jiang Z (2019) A Special Vulnerability: Migrant Domestic Workers Enslaved by the Non-renewable Six-month Overseas Domestic Worker Visa in the UK. Policy report for The Voice of Domestic Workers, London. https://16fae8ab-6f0a-412c-b753-4986ecc84967.filesusr.com/ugd/6608f3_39dcbbd4f03245

Web publication

Jiang Z (co-editor, 2022) Tools to transform: A workbook for Asian Diasporic organising in Europe. https://toolstotransform.net/. 

Jiang Z (2021) A manual for organising migrant domestic workers: The lessons from The Voice of Domestic Workers in London. Tools to transform: A workbook for Asian Diasporic organising in Europe.https://toolstotransform.net/portfolio/joyce-jiang-20210521-a-manual-for-organising-migrant-domestic-workers-lessons-from-the-voice-of-domestic-workers-in-london/

Jiang Z (2020) Migrant Domestic workers and Covid-19: Risks facing front-line care workers https://haringeywelcome.org/2020/07/08/migrant-domestic-workers-and-covid-19-risks-facing-front-line-care-workers/

Jiang, Z (2016), ‘ Organising the Unorganisable: The Rise of Flat, Associational Organising’, Work in Progress (public blog of American Association of Sociology), https://workinprogress.oowsection.org/2016/06/23/organizing-the-unorganisable-the-rise-of-flat-associational-organising/.

Creative output (exhibitions)

2021, ‘My Home Is Not My Home’ exhibition, People’s History Museum, Manchester, 10 May - 11July. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xVHJgTLnvQM

2019, ‘My Home Is Not My Home’ exhibition, Norman Rea gallery, York, 5-12 November.

2019, ‘Domestic Work is Work’ exhibition, Cubitt Gallery, London, 7-11 August, https://www.cubittartists.org.uk/domestic-work-is-work.

2019 ‘Keep the Door of My Lips: Understanding the Unspoken Cost of Work in Victoria/Austerity Britain’ exhibition, Stephen Lawrence Gallery, London, 11 July - 14 August, http://www.greenwichunigalleries.co.uk/keep-the-door-of-my-lips/.

2019, ‘My Home Is Not My Home’ exhibition, L’etrangere Gallery, London, 15-26 January, (http://letrangere.net/exhibitions-past/tassia-kobylinska-and-the-voice-of-domestic-workers/).

The detailed information of our film project and exhibitions is available here: https://myhomeisnotmyhome.wordpress.com.

Media coverage

Guest speaker for BBC radio 4 Thinking Allowed (2023): https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m001rq6n