Illegal Yet Licit
Justifing Informal Purchases of Work in Contemporary Sweden
By Lotta Bjorklund Larsen
April 2010
Stockholm University
Distributed by
ISBN: 9789186071325
240 pages
$89.50 Paper original
This study is based on ethnographic interviews with a group of middle-aged people in all walks of life, who have their roots in a small town in southern Sweden. In the midst of life and work, they address situations where living in accordance with moral standards becomes difficult. This study aims to illuminate multifaceted reasonings about the illegal but licit purchases made and how people make sense and meaning of them in retrospect and in the larger context of societal economy. The ways in which these purchases of svart arbete are justified illustrate inherent tensions in contemporary welfare society.