Retrainers as Labor Market Brokers: Constructing Networks and Narratives in the Detroit Area

For nearly two decades retraining has been touted as a means of responding to economic change. The rationale, derived from human capital theory, is that retrainers will pass on new skills that increase the bargaining power of job seekers. But researchers have not examined the roles that retrainers take when internal labor markets are in decline. Network theorists observe that in such a situation employment programs will need to connect clusters of job seekers to new sets of firms. I argue that this brokering role shapes retraining regimes and outcomes. The article presents a case study of a suburban Detroit program that was cast as a national model. The program became a business service, constructing new employment networks and narratives that reinforced firm leverage. The training itself was modest and many clients only received resocialization. The program's brokering stance reflected conditions favoring firms, its own middle class orientation, and the "frames" it used to establish credibility and leverage with business customers and working class clients. These findings indicate that policy-makers should not assume that retrainers will necessarily match workers with good jobs or even good training. What retrainers do, and with what consequences, depends on the social and cultural roles they construct in particular economic and institutional circumstances.