Most French people do not want to work on Sundays, but many would like to benefit from more services on that day. Taking Sunday Battles On the contrary, P. Askenazy wonders whether Sunday opening of shops would not help to preserve family ties.
The so-called Macron Law of 2015 gave rise to lively, often muddled, debates on the relevance of extending the exemptions to Sunday opening of shops. It was only a legislative step in a movement born with the appearance of large stores in the 1970s. The previous major law, the Maillé law, only dated back to 2009. It is therefore a safe bet that the current five-year term will not end without a new law. Already, a new front is opening with the report that Erik Orsenna has just submitted recommending that libraries open on Sundays.
However, a calm debate on the singularity of Sunday requires a depth of analysis, both historical and of current social conditions. Sunday Battles fall within this ambition. This is not the first work dealing specifically with Sunday, particularly in France; we can cite theHistory of Sunday from 1700 to the present daypublished by Robert Beck 20 years ago. But Jean-Yves Boulin and Laurent Lesnard are the first to combine a long history up to today, and a sociological analysis of Sunday work as well as the expectations of consumers and users. It is certainly a book to read… on Sunday, at least if you don’t work that day!
The Lord’s Day Through the Ages
For the non-specialist reader, the “brief history of Sunday” that makes up the first part of the book is an entertaining and erudite tale. It begins in antiquity with the dual astrological and religious origin of Sunday. Step by step, the authors – sociologists transformed here into convincing historians – shed light on a history that is far from linear, where, from the Middle Ages, three logics were already clashing: economic logic, religious logic, and leisure logic. In the Western world, until the XIXe century, Sunday activities were essentially the result of the degree of domination of the Church and the Merchants. At the end of the Middle Ages, the imposed respect for the Lord’s Day served both to affirm the Christian religion and to control social times. But, in the central Middle Ages, the development of commercial exchanges gradually led to the emergence, across Europe, in addition to seasonal agricultural work, of Sunday markets. After offices and markets, leisure activities were then practiced, often collective, on a day not worked for the greatest number. The following centuries saw the continuation of the confrontation of economic imperatives, brandished not only by merchants and artisans, but also now by factory owners, and shifting religious requirements between the Reformation and the Counter-Reformation. This confrontation resulted in a more or less strict application of Sunday prohibitions across the continent.
The two authors accompany the reader through the turning points represented by the XVIIIe And XIXe centuries. The revolutionary 10-day week forms a short parenthesis. If there is a Sunday revolution, it is that of the hold of the capitalist bourgeoisie on Sunday. In the wake of the development of transport and the industrial revolution, the first half of the XIXe century saw the extension of Sunday work from commerce to manufacturing.
Sunday put to the test by the workers’ movement
This movement reversed in the second half of the century, particularly under the effect of workers’ demands and the emergence of socialist ideas. The hesitation between weekly rest and Sunday rest, between English week and Holy Monday, crossed the Western world. Sunday work clearly declined in factories. In France, it was necessary to wait for the law of July 1906 for Sunday to be imposed as a non-working day, in a secular conception of a day dedicated to rest, family and leisure. For the authors, an “involuntary” coalition between the Church and utopian or libertarian socialists had thus formed in favor of Sunday rest.
Perhaps it would have been necessary to dwell more on the determinants of this conquest in a period of flourishing capitalism. While the authors cite the reports of hygienists, they do not highlight the fact that two types of actors also had an interest, at a minimum, in a reduction in working hours, and certainly in a weekly rest. The capitalists inquired about the consequences on the productivity of workers; the weekly rest can then be interpreted as being part of a productivist and paternalistic logic in the same way as the development of workers’ cities. And the army, particularly in a revanchist France, was concerned about the state of health of the troops in the event of conflict. In a mirror image, one could ask whether the current questioning of Sunday rest is not linked to both the better general health of the population, the reduction in the weekly working hours, and the disappearance of the usefulness of a conscript army.
Sunday in the time of consumer society
Similarly, the authors quickly move on to the period from 1906 to the 1970s and 1980s. They describe a secularization of non-working Sundays, but also an extension of non-working time to Saturday afternoons, effectively making Sunday the day of rest, family and leisure. Focusing on industry and commerce, their analysis then ignores another social fact. The development of the continuity of public services – transport, hospitals, etc. – and Sunday leisure activities called for a growing number of workers to work at least occasionally on Sundays. Thus, the statistic cited by the authors from the 1974 employment survey is striking: more than 6% of workers had worked on the Sunday of the survey’s reference week.
The commercial prism also dominates in the authors’ long but useful presentation of deregulation at work in industry and then commerce since the 1980s. The lobbying work of big business is described in detail. Above all, it is recalled that, from furniture, with IKEA On the front line, from the food trade to the cultural sector, traders have bet on the fait accompli by defying the laws. And these are in fine laws that have been adapted, creating a multitude of exceptions and new acronyms (CHIP, ZTIetc.), but also maintaining the “illusion of volunteering” and limiting compensation for Sunday work.
The French changes are ultimately part of a fairly generalized dynamic of deregulation of the opening of shops. The authors could have noted that this dynamic is independent of the state of the labor market in each country; if France had full employment, the proponents of Sunday openings would have found other arguments than the hope of significant job creation. This point would have spared the reader the technical discussion, in the third part, of the economists’ arguments on the impact that the deregulation of Sunday work has or does not have on employment.
What do the French do on Sundays?
Jean-Yves Boulin and Laurent Lesnard become sociologists again in the rest of the book. The second part is based on their intensive use of the French “time use” survey of 2010 (the next one is planned for 2020) which offers a detailed description of the activities, during a day or a week, of a representative sample of French people. First result: Sunday work, if it is mainly done outside the home, is also common at home for certain professions, such as teachers. Although a study by gender is lacking, the portrait of Sunday workers that the authors paint is very instructive.
Contrary to popular belief that private sector executives see their work encroaching on their personal lives, they continued not to work on Sundays in 2010 (only 5% reported working at their workplace or at home). In the non-agricultural private sector, excluding health, Sunday work primarily concerns employees and workers. Furthermore, taking up their econometric work published in 2016 in the journal of theINSEE Economics and Statisticsthe authors point out that Sunday workers are in fact in a situation of cumulation, being more exposed to atypical hours on other days of the week.
The exploration of the social costs of Sunday work comes next. In 2010, working on Sunday is clearly associated with a loss of family and friendly sociability and a reduction in leisure time that cannot be corrected by possible compensatory rest.
Between rest and consumption, contradictory preferences
While they do denounce these social costs, the authors do not condemn Sunday work per se. Using various opinion surveys, they report on the contradictions of a society where people do not want to work on Sundays, but where they would like to have various services available on that day. The great originality of this part lies in the use of a qualitative survey conducted in the city of Brive by the authors. Indeed, the debates on Sunday work are often very Parisian or confined to large cities. On the contrary, the work relays the point of view of a large part of the French population, that of medium-sized cities. Their preferences are ultimately not very surprising and probably in line with those of the inhabitants of large urban areas: on Sundays, they focus on convivial activities with family or friends, sports and cultural activities, and shopping. The inhabitants would therefore like more cafés and restaurants to be open and, above all, are demanding that the media library be opened. Precisely, the opening of libraries and media libraries on Sundays seems to the authors to be a legitimate demand. Their analyses are therefore entirely in line with the Orsenna report.
At this point, the reader may be bothered by an analysis that can be described as “class-based”. The lack of reflexivity on the categories that the authors use is flagrant when they include errands and shopping in the category of “domestic work”. Errands and shopping are therefore in fact classified outside of leisure activities. However, the authors clearly show that these activities provide much more satisfaction than ironing and that they are often collective, carried out with children or spouses. In practice, does errands not constitute any further a time for sociability than the hours spent in the library?
More fundamentally, the quantitative and qualitative surveys used in the book all date from the beginning of the 2010s. Since then, the use of the Internet and social networks has accelerated; however, it offers new opportunities for accessing cultural goods while absorbing an increasing share of the time spent at home, including on Sundays! Being at home on that day is no guarantee of escaping the act of purchasing or sharing with family or friends. However, despite the very strong growth in online commerce, the vast majority of purchases are still made, even in the United States, mainly in stores. In this context, is the opening on Sundays of the temples of consumption – beyond the social cost for retail employees – not the ultimate salvation for maintaining shared time within families? It would therefore be exciting if the authors republished their sociological work in 2020.