Flexibilization through Work from Home? History of Telework in (West) Germany and France, 1960–present
With the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic in March 2020, many office workers suddenly found themselves working from home on a daily basis. What may have seemed like a new development to most people, however, had a much longer history. The so-called “home office” (then known as “telework”) originated as an idea in the postwar decades and gained traction with the growing importance of information technologies in the 1970s.
This project analyzes the history of telework in France and West-Germany within the broader context of the flexibilization of labor regimes in the second half of the twentieth century. It examines the knowledge and technologies that shaped, produced, and constructed human labor as a resource. The project brings together studies of labor and intersectionality with recent insights from digital and computing history to explore how digitalization shaped global and local labor regimes in the late twentieth century.
Tjark Nentwig holds an BA in Social and Cultural Anthropology and an MA in the History of Science, Technology and the Environment from the Technische Universität Berlin. His MA thesis explored the political and software history of West-German Artificial Intelligence in the 1980s.
Publications & Presentations
Selected Bibliography
Nentwig, Tjark. “Computerlandschaften – Literaturessay zur Geschichte computergestützter Umweltbeziehungen.” In Umwelt – Technik – Wissen: Verflechtungen vom 18. Jahrhundert bis heute, edited by F. Zimmer et al. Umwelt- und Klimageschichte. Transcript, 2025. >link
Nentwig, Tjark. “Revolution als Werbegag: Es kam doch anders als man dachte,” Kultur & Technik 32, no. 3 (2025): 34–38.
Nentwig, Tjark and Kathrin Tschida. “Ausgebügelt? Leichtigkeit als Fortschrittsversprechen,” Mensch! Technik. Das Magazin des Deutschen Technikmuseums und seiner Freunde und Förderer, vol. 1/24. Museen Bauen. Deutsches Technikmuseum, 2024. >link
Selected Presentations
July 2026: “Quo vadis, Computer? (Geschlechter-)Politik und Informatik an der TU Berlin 1970–1990.” Ringvorlesung, Wissenschaft in bewegten Zeiten – 80 Jahre TU Berlin. TU Berlin.
July 2025: “Computing Landscapes – Sketching an Information History of the Environment.” Workshop Historical and Sociological Perspectives on the Digital Transformation, Deutsches Museum München.
Image 1: Mother, laptop and child function as one central unit of early 21st century telework futures. Cover of: Kleemann, Frank. Die Wirklichkeit der Teleheimarbeit: eine arbeitssoziologische Untersuchung, 2005. Courtesy of Nomos Verlagsgesellschaft.
Image 2: During the Covid pandemic, offices remained empty as telework became a mass phenomenon. Wikimedia Commons.
Image 3: “I don’t know where your socks are, and if you keep coming in here with that cigar, I’m going to call OSHA”. A 2000 Herb Block Cartoon, © The Herb Block Foundation.