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Traditional Occupations in a Modern World: Career Guidance, Livelihood Planning, and Crafts in the Context of Globalization

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Part of the book series: International and Cultural Psychology ((ICUP))

Abstract

Neoliberal capitalism has posed several new challenges for career guidance and livelihood planning and has raised questions about the goals, techniques, ethics, and conceptual frameworks that currently guide their practice. At the same time, globalization and the growth paradigm have drawn attention to new forms of social and economic exclusion, worker alienation and disorientation, the precarious livelihoods of marginalized groups, and the politics of knowledge itself. In this chapter, both these sets of issues are brought together to examine what crafts have to offer the career guidance and livelihood planning discourse, and to explore ways in which career guidance and livelihood planning can reach out to crafts.

The chapter begins with an examination of the threats and opportunities that globalization has brought to crafts and craftspeople. In the second section, the ways in which career guidance and livelihood planning can contribute towards the repositioning of crafts as a modern career option are outlined. The role that career guidance and livelihood planning can play in translating crafts into meaningful careers for individuals, into sustainable livelihood systems for communities, and into engines of inclusive and sustainable growth through creative and cultural industry for marginalized regions and peoples is also examined. This includes developing a critique of the current growth paradigm; recognizing the porosity between art and craft and between tradition and modernity; and acknowledging crafts as meaningful work. Also, career guidance and livelihood planning can play a vital role in validating traditional knowledge in crafts, and in leveraging the flexibility that crafts offer in the context of volatile job markets. In the last section, attention is drawn to the challenges in providing relevant career guidance and livelihood planning services to young people from craft communities. The need for critical engagement with disadvantaged young people’s aspirations, with work codes in crafts communities, and with identities of artisans is identified as key areas. Often perceived as legacies of the past, it is argued that traditional crafts can be repositioned as creative and cultural industries for the future, and as career or livelihood options that redress social exclusion, disorientation, and the insecurity of a volatile labor market.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Samvada, Bangalore, India

    Anita Ratnam

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  1. Anita Ratnam
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Correspondence to Anita Ratnam .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. The Promise Foundation, Bangalore, India

    Gideon Arulmani

  2. Department of Human Development, Nirmala Niketan College of Home Science, University of Mumbai, Mumbai, India

    Anuradha J. Bakshi

  3. Department of Psychology, Michigan State University, East Lansing, Michigan, USA

    Frederick T. L. Leong

  4. National Institute for Careers Education and Counselling, Cambridge, United Kingdom

    A. G. Watts

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Ratnam, A. (2014). Traditional Occupations in a Modern World: Career Guidance, Livelihood Planning, and Crafts in the Context of Globalization. In: Arulmani, G., Bakshi, A., Leong, F., Watts, A. (eds) Handbook of Career Development. International and Cultural Psychology. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-9460-7_22

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