To Be Free Full-Time: The Challenge of Work

Argues that there is a taboo surrounding the human experience of work and the work place, with a corresponding silence in poetry and fiction. Asserts that this is not because work is boring, but because people are in a state of unfreedom at work, which also impacts on their effective participation as citizens. Discusses the problems with work place democracy, while arguing that freedom should nevertheless be considered a full-time, not a part-time matter. The paper, which was originally given at the 1994 Sitka Symposium on the spirit of human work, is punctuated with quotations from the author's writings.