Smelter Jobs? Societal changes and employment opportunities for women in East Iceland

• Published in: Stjórnmál og stjórnsýsla
• Main Authors: Halldórsdóttir, Tinna Kristbjörg, Rafnsdóttir, Guðbjörg Linda
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: Icelandic
• Published: Stofnun stjórnmála og stjórnsýslu 2025
• Subjects: Job Market; Women; Rural Society; Aluminium Smelters; Vinnumarkaður; álver; konur; landsbyggð; samfélag; Kvenna; Kárahnjúkar; Iceland
• Online Access: https://ojs.hi.is/index.php/irpa/article/view/a.2012.8.2.13; https://doi.org/10.13177/irpa.a.2012.8.2.13

The period from 2003-2008 was one of upheaval and change in East Iceland with the single largest construction project in Iceland to date; the building of Kárahnjúkar dam and the Fjarðaál Alcoa aluminium smelter. These gave way to various societal changes in the area, such as population increase, new jobs and rise in housing prices, in addition to a range of side effects on the service factor. The aim of this article is to explore if women in the area describe new employment opportunities accompanying these changes. The results are derived from in-depth interviews with 34 women in East Iceland. The interviews unfold the view that a certain ‘modernization’ of the east Icelandic society can be attributed to the smelter construction. However, the women interviewed have difficulty defining whether and how they themselves had profited from the constructions and none of those interviewed in this research named working in the smelter as one of their employment opportunities. Among the reasons discussed were the twelve-hour shifts, lack of flexibilities, long distances and the binding to the workplace during work-hours. Results indicate that an unequal gender balance still remainsin the area. Um miðjan síðasta áratug átti sér stað umrót og breytingar á Austurlandi með stærstu einstöku framkvæmdum Íslandssögunnar; byggingu Kárahnjúkastíflu og álvers Alcoa Fjarðaáls. Framkvæmdunum fylgdu ýmsar samfélagsbreytingar; fjölgun íbúa á svæðinu, fjölgun starfa, hækkun húsnæðisverðs, auk þess sem framkvæmdirnar höfðu margskonar hliðaráhrif á þá þjónustu sem íbúunum stóð til boða. Meginmarkmið þessarar greinar er svara spurningunni; að hvaða marki hafa álversframkvæmdirnar bætt vinnumarkaðsstöðu kvenna á Austurlandi? Auk greiningar lýðfræðilegra gagna og annarra heimilda, byggir greinin á viðtölum við 34 konur búsettar á svæðinu. Engin þeirra vann í álverinu. Helstu niðurstöður sýna að álversframkvæmdir hafa haft margt gott í för hvað varðar aukna þjónustu í samfélaginu. Þær hafa skapað ný störf, þó í meira mæli fyrir karla en ...