Working in and against to overcome precariousness in higher education
In Portugal, academic staff suffers from structural precarity as most of workers in higher education institutions are under scholarship programmes or other precarious employment terms in which they can be trapped for decades. To support this category of workers and to leverage their right to organise and join a union, FENPROF has been working on different levels. By participating to governmental committees, it has contributed to the analysis relating to the conditions of higher education workers. It has further engaged to provide precarious academic staff with information, legal advice and support and, finally, it has supported public demonstrations to raise public awareness on this matter. To overcome difficulties to reach out and to represent precarious workers in higher education and research, FENPROF has been working with allies such as the researchers’ association and it has been stressing the key democratic role unions carry with them.
