Pandemic as a Biographical Experience: The Case of Essential Workers in Poland

Essential work, which is crucial for social reproduction and the provision of basic services, has become even more important during the COVID-19 pandemic and related lockdowns. Based on an analysis of biographical interviews with essential workers in Poland, the chapter reconstructs the consequences of the pandemic for essential workers’ biographical experiences. The outbreak of COVID-19 was expected to be a biographically significant event for the narrators, necessitating the development of new ways of coping. The analysis of interviews with workers in primary education, health care, social care and logistics however, reveals a more complex, nuanced picture. Firstly, there is a tendency to fade out the pandemic in life stories, which may reflect both the gradual “normalisation” of the crisis and the difficulty of working it out biographically. Secondly, the meanings attributed to the pandemic depend on the depth of the biographical crisis experienced in and out of the workplace. Thirdly, in at least some cases, the pandemic led to changes in life strategies, usually by reinforcing pre-pandemic tendencies and resources. In the main parts of the chapter, the results of thematic analysis and two biographical case studies, that of a social care home worker and a bicycle courier, are discussed in detail.