The wild factories: transformations of work in the Industrial Pole of the Manaus Free Trade Zone

The objective of this article is to identify the main transformations of the work that took place in the productive space of the Manaus Free Trade Zone. With this purpose, it is made a historical and theoretical recovery of the researches carried out in the Industrial Pole of Manaus (PIM) in order to point out, first, the characteristics of the work from the beginning of the 1970s until the first decade of the 20th century. Second, we seek to indicate the conceptual responses elaborated by the researchers for the understanding of changes and continuities in the world of work in Manaus. Third, within a context of metamorphoses of the world economy, national political dilemmas and the dispute of the local working class, the article outlines the organizational patterns of the four decades of the PIM and addresses the type of work seen in recent research. In addition, the arrival of new productive actors at the beginning of the millennium, like the Chinese, raises new theoretical questions, besides sheltering a world of the fertile work for the sociological exploration. A research agenda involving this theme composes the final part of the article.