News published by the University of Klagenfurt concerning the Department of Sociology

Migrant (family) businesses: Diaspora money flow and interaction between family and business?

“Family businesses are the backbone of the economy,” as Valdet Hadri, who is pursuing his doctorate at the University of Klagenfurt under the supervision of Dieter Bögenhold (Department of Sociology), explains. Valdet Hadri is interested in the unique specificities associated with migrant (family) businesses.

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“ There is a desire to ‘improve’ something in the interest of others, without actually knowing what those interests are.”

In the Western world we are very quick to demand specific ethical criteria relating to working conditions. However, the Pakistani sociologist Farah Naz, who earned her doctorate at the University of Klagenfurt and now researches and teaches at the University of Sargodha, raises the following issue: Before judging child labour and home-based work, we should understand the living and working conditions of the families concerned. Together with sociology professor Dieter Bögenhold, she has published a book with the title “Unheard Voices”. The publication forges links between the work of Pakistani football stitchers and the great global inequalities. The two authors discuss the main ideas of their book in this interview.

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The flip side of self-employment

The sociologist Dieter Bögenhold is advocating a critical discourse on the functions and effects of self-employment on national economies. After all, not all that glistens is gold when it comes to labour market statistics.

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The ball is out of play

In Madrid, Barcelona or Munich, millionaires attempt to kick balls into goals. The same balls are produced for just a few cents in China, India, Pakistan and Thailand. Global markets insist on ethical standards for the countries of production, and yet these very same standards threaten existences in the affected countries. For her doctoral thesis, Farah Naz examined football production in Pakistan. In this interview, she tells us why it is important to think in shades of grey, rather than in black and white.

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