“Switzerland doesn’t want me” Work, precarity and emotions for mobile professionals’ partners

A wide range of professions demands mobility as a requisite for “excellence”, success and “good performance”. At the same time, more precarious and flexible conditions, ranging from unemployment, to temporary, free-lance and self-employed occupations, now characterize the mobile trajectories of a large number of professionals and their partners. What is the emotional cost of these conditions in mobility? How do mobile professionals’ partners feel and deal with feeling rules regarding unemployment and job search when moving? The article examines the case of Switzerland, by exploring the experience of mobile professionals’ partners.