Toward Flexible Care and Secure Work in Intimate Labor

This chapter highlights the importance of deeply democratic alliances between domestic personal support workers and recipients that negotiate tensions at the intimate level of the labor process. Disabled people have long had support from their own advocacy organizations, like independent living centers (ILCs), on ways to be a fair employer and attain quality services. Yet, despite such support, informality can creep in to individual relationships due to the complexity of labor legislation in this sector and to the lack of enforcement. Alliances between recipient organizations and the labor movement could address these issues in creative ways. If the goal is security with flexibility, workers need critical education about how the locations of disability and age shape people's quest for ongoing input into their services, and they need training and support on how to negotiate this. What kinds of organizing models can engage deeply and continuously with workers and recipients to address tensions in the labor process? Community-based labor organizing provides inspiration.

Independent-Living Senior Communities in Disaster: Self-Efficacy and Trust in Responding Agencies

Human security and vulnerability theoretical frameworks are utilized to examine willingness of seniors living in independent living centers (ILCs) in two counties of southern New Jersey (United States) to follow voluntary and mandatory evacuation orders from a number of sources. The sample, mostly White (73.3%) and female (81.8%) indicated the most willingness to follow both categories of orders when delivered by military, law enforcement, and/or fire officials. The least level of willingness was noted with orders delivered by neighbors, church leaders, and media (TV and radio) outlets. No significant difference was found based on county residency, level of preparedness, or previous evacuation experience. Those with previous disaster experience, however, indicated a significantly increased willingness to follow voluntary evacuation orders from military or National Guard, fire department, and the state governor. No significant association was found between willingness to evacuate and self-reported generalized self-efficacy. A human security framework is suggested to be beneficial for analysis given the potential for increased community frustration, anger, or anxiety based on physical, social, and economic vulnerabilities identified for senior communities.