Identity Politics at Work: Resisting Gender, Gendering Resistance (Management, Organizations and Society)

Identity Politics at Work This book represents the coming together of two key debates within organization studies: theorizing on gender and ways of understanding resistance. These debates have been given renewed vigour with the ‘postmodern turn’ in organization studies and feminist theory. By fusing these two literatures, this book offers new theoretical and empirical insights on issues of power, subjectivity and agency. The book contributes to the development of a more sophisticated conceptualizing of gender and the micro-politics of resistance in two ways. First, by focusing on the experiences of women and men in a range of organizations and presenting empirically grounded understandings of the nature of resistance, it offers a highly nuanced and complex analysis of identity politics. Second, in theorizing the micro-politics of resistance, the authors present a more detailed and varied understanding of resistance that accounts for different ways in which individuals and groups struggle to appropriate and transform norms. With these two unique strands, this is a fascinating addition to the field. Robyn Thomas is Senior Lecturer in Organizational Behaviour at Cardiff Business School, Cardiff University, UK. Professor Albert J.Mills is Director of the PhD Management Programme at Saint Mary’s University, Nova Scotia, Canada. Jean Helms Mills is Associate Professor of Management at the Sobey School of Business, Saint Mary’s University, Nova Scotia, Canada.

Management, organizations and society

Edited by Professor Barbara Czarniawska, Göteborg University, Sweden, and Professor Martha Feldman, University of Michigan, USA

Management, Organizations and Society presents innovative work grounded in new realities, addressing issues crucial to an understanding of the contemporary world. This is the world of organized societies, where boundaries between formal and informal, public and private, local and global organizations have been displaced or have vanished, along with other nineteenth-century dichotomies and oppositions. Management, apart from becoming a specialized profession for a growing number of people, is an everyday activity for most members of modern societies. Similarly, at the level of enquiry, culture and technology, and literature and economics, can no longer be conceived as isolated intellectual fields; conventional canons and established mainstreams are contested. Management, Organizations and Society will address these contemporary dynamics of transformation in a manner that transcends disciplinary boundaries, with work which will appeal to researchers, students and practitioners alike. Contrasting Involvements A study of management accounting practices in Britain and Germany Thomas Ahrens Turning Words, Spinning Worlds Chapters in organizational ethnography Michael Rosen Breaking Through the Glass Ceiling Women, power and leadership in agricultural organizations Margaret Alston The Poetic Logic of Administration Styles and changes of style in the art of organizing Kaj Sköldberg

Casting the Other Maintaining gender inequalities in the workplace Edited by Barbara Czarniawska and Heather Höpfl Gender, Identity and the Culture of Organizations Edited by Iiris Aaltio and Albert J.Mills Text/Work Representing organization and organizing representation Edited by Stephen Linstead The Social Construction of Management Texts and identities Nancy Harding Management Theory A critical and reflexive reading Nanette Monin Identity Politics at Work Resisting gender, gendering resistance Edited by Robyn Thomas, Albert J.Mills and Jean Helms Mills

Identity Politics at Work Resisting gender, gendering resistance

Edited by Robyn Thomas, Albert J.Mills and Jean Helms Mills

LONDON AND NEW YORK

First published 2004 by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxfordshire, OX14 4RN Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada by Routledge 29 West 35th Street, New York, NY 10001 Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2005. “To purchase your own copy of this or any of Taylor & Francis or Routledge’s collection of thousands of eBooks please go to http://www.ebookstore.tandf.co.uk/.” © 2004 editorial matter and selection Robyn Thomas, Albert J.Mills and Jean Helms Mills; individual chapters, the contributors All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilized in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Thomas, Robyn. Identity politics at work: resisting gender, gendering resistance/ Robyn Thomas, Albert J.Mills, Jean Helms Mills. p. cm.— (Management, organizations and society; 10) Includes bibliographical references and index. 1. Sex role in the work environment. 2. Industrial relations. 3. Labor disputes. 4. Organizational behavior. 5. Feminist theory. I. Mills, Albert J., 1945– II. Helms Mills, Jean. III. Title. IV. Series: Management, organizations and society (London, England); 10. HD6060.6.T48 2004 331.4'01– dc22 2004001202 ISBN 0-203-35826-0 Master e-book ISBN

ISBN 0-203-67077-9 (Adobe e-Reader Format) ISBN 0-415-32540-4 (hardback)

Dedicated with love to Stuart and to prove that there’s more to resistance than volts divided by amps

Robyn Thomas

For Sasha and Harvey-Lois in the hope that they resist and resist well

Albert J.Mills

In memory of Ann Black and Nora Helms, pioneering women workers

Jean Helms Mills

Contents Notes on contributors

xi

Acknowledgements

xv

1 Introduction: resisting gender, gendering resistance ROBYN THOMAS, ALBERT J.MILLS AND JEAN HELMS MILLS PART I Constructing selves: autoethnographies 2 Refusing to be ‘me’ JOANNA BREWIS 3 Personal resistance through persistence to organizational resistance through distance JEFF HEARN PART II Resisting subjects in context 4 Resistance to diversity initiatives PENNY DICK 5 Gendering new managerialism KIRSTIE S.BALL 6 Gendered identities and micro-political resistance in public service organizations ANNETTE DAVIES AND ROBYN THOMAS 7 Reforming managerialism? Gender and the navigation of change in higher education in Sweden and England JOHN CHANDLER, JIM BARRY AND ELISABETH BERG 8 When plausibility fails: towards a critical sensemaking approach to resistance ALBERT J.MILLS AND JEAN HELMS MILLS 9 Resistance to organizational culture change: a gendered analysis DEBORAH M.SHEPHERD AND JUDITH K.PRINGLE PART III Questioning the politics in micro-political resistance

1 17

18 32

53

54 69 86

102

117

134 148

10 Webs of resistance in transnational call centres: strategic agents, service 149 providers and customers KIRAN MIRCHANDANI 11 The bearable lightness of being: identity formation, resistance and 164 gender considerations among the UK television workforce GILLIAN URSELL Index

179

Notes on contributors Kirstie S.Ball is Lecturer in Organizational Management, Department of Commerce, University of Birmingham. She is the author of a number of theoretical and empirical papers and books on surveillance in organizations including those published in Organization Studies, Ethics and Information Technology, and Surveillance as Social Sorting (Routledge, 2002) and is joint editor (with David Lyon, Clive Norris, Steven Graham and David Wood) of ‘Surveillance in Society’, a new Ejournal. She has spoken nationally and internationally on surveillance practice at work, and in the national media on this issue. She also writes on masculinity in organizations, new managerialism (with Damian Hodgson and Chris Carter), discourse and the body in organizations (with Damian Hodgson), and human resource information systems. Jim Barry is a political sociologist and Professor of Gender and Organization based in the East London Business School at the University of East London. He is Co-director of the Organization Studies Research Group and a member of the European Network on Managerialism and Higher Education. He has published on gender and politics, gender and organizations, gender and public service in India and the UK, gender and work-stress, gender, managerialism and higher education, gender and business ethics, and lone parenting and employment. Elisabeth Berg is a Docent (Reader) in sociology in the Department of Human Work Sciences at Luleå University of Technology in Sweden. Her earlier research considered organization, gender and social politics. Her later research concerned women in female-dominated organizations where she explored the ways in which they handled their careers. Some of her findings are published in her book Kvinna och chef i offentlig förvaltning (Women and Management in Public Service) (Liber, 2000). More recently her research has involved gender and organization in academia in Sweden, England and the Netherlands. She is a member of the European Network on Managerialism and Higher Education. Joanna Brewis is Reader in Management at the Essex Management Centre, University of Essex. She has undergraduate and doctoral degrees from UMIST, and has previously worked at the University of Portsmouth. She has published in journals including Gender, Work and Organization, Administrative Theory and Praxis and Human Relations and has also contributed to several edited collections as well as cowriting Sex, Work and Sex Work: Eroticizing Organization with Stephen Linstead (Routledge, 2000). Her long-standing research interests centre on the intersections between gender, sexuality, the body, identity and processes of organizing. John Chandler, Ph.D., is a sociologist teaching organization studies in the East London Business School at the University of East London. His current research interests include gender and managerialism in public services. He is a Co-director of the Organization Studies Research Group and a member of the European Network on Managerialism and Higher Education. His publications include Questioning the New

Public Management (Ashgate, forthcoming), edited with Mike Dent and Jim Barry, and Organisation and Management: A Critical Text (Thomson Learning, 2000), edited with Jim Barry, Heather Clark, Roger Johnston and David Needle. Annette Davies, Ph.D., is Senior Lecturer in Organizational Behaviour at the Cardiff Business School, Cardiff University. Her main research interests relate to issues of gender, change and managerial identities in public service organizations. She has a particular interest in the restructuring of the police service and the construction of new policing identities. She is currently involved in a number of research projects investigating gendered managerial and professional identities in a range of organizations in the UK, Sweden and Finland. She has published widely in, for example, Journal of Management Studies, Sociological Review, Public Management Review and Critical Perspectives on Accounting. Penny Dick is a lecturer in Organizational Behaviour at Sheffield University Management School. Her research interests are in the management of diversity, stress, and recruitment and selection, taking a critical perspective on these areas. She is particularly interested in the analysis of power, resistance and identity in understanding both organizational practices and the behaviour of individuals in organized settings. She has recently been awarded an ESRC grant to explore the management of flexible working practices in the UK police service. Jeff Hearn is Research Professor, University of Huddersfield, UK, and Academy Fellow and Professor, Swedish School of Economics and Business Administration, Helsinki, Finland. His authored, co-authored and co-edited books include The Gender of Oppression (Wheatsheaf, 1987), The Sexuality of Organization (Sage, 1989), Men, Masculinities and Social Theory (Routledge, 1990), Men in the Public Eye (Routledge, 1992), ‘Sex’ at ‘Work’ (Harvester Wheatsheaf/Prentice Hall, 1987/1995), Men as Managers, Managers as Men (Sage, 1996), Men, Gender Divisions and Welfare (Routledge, 1998), The Violences of Men (Sage, 1998), Consuming Cultures, Transforming Politics (both Macmillan, 1999), Hard Work in the Academy (Helsinki UP, 1999), Gender, Sexuality and Violence in Organizations (with Wendy Parkin, Sage, 2001), Gender Divisions and Gender Policies in Top Finnish Corporations (with Anne Kovalainen and Teemu Tallberg, Swedish School of Economics, 2002), and Information Society and the Workplace (co-ed. with Tuula Heiskanen, Routledge, 2004). He is currently researching men, gender relations and transnational organizing, organizations and management. Jean Helms Mills is an Associate Professor in the Department of Management at Saint Mary’s University, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada. Seventeen years with the airline industry have instilled in her the need to make sense of the culture of organizations. She is the author and co-author of two books—Making Sense of Organizational Change (Routledge, 2003), and Workplace Learning: A critical approach (with John Bratton et al.; Garamond, 2003). She is the Associate Editor (for the Americas) of the journal Culture and Organization, and recently edited a special edition on ‘Exploring the gendered character of organizational cultures’. Currently she is involved in a longterm study of culture and discriminatory practices in the airline industry, funded by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. Albert J.Mills, Ph.D., is Professor of Management at Saint Mary’s University, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada. His research interests revolve around the theme of human

liberation and the impact of organization on people. Current research projects include: the gendering of organizational culture; management theory development and social context; identity, existentialism and the workplace. He has published in a variety of journals, including: Organization Studies, Organization; Gender, Work and Organization; Studies in Higher Education; Studies in Cultures, Organizations and Societies; Culture and Organization; the Journal of Management Education; the Journal of Management Systems; the British Journal of Guidance and Counselling; the Canadian Journal of Communications; Personnel Review; The Finnish Journal of Economics; Hallinon (Finnish journal of administrative studies); Tamara (the journal of critical postmodern theory); the Canadian Review of Sociology and Anthropology; and the Journal of Management Psychology. He has also co-authored and co-edited seven books, including: Organizational Rules (Open University Press, 1991), Gendering Organizational Analysis (Sage, 1992), Reading Organization Theory (Garamond Press, 1995), Managing the Organizational Melting Pot: Dilemmas of Workplace Diversity (Sage, 1997), and Gender, Identity and the Culture of Organizations (Routledge, 2002). Kiran Mirchandani is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Adult Education, Community Development and Counselling Psychology, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education, University of Toronto. She has edited one book and published over a dozen articles in refereed journals and books. She uses a feminist anti-racist perspective. Her research is on home-based work, telework, organization development and change, self-employment and contingent work. Judith K.Pringle is a senior lecturer in the Department of Management and Employment Relations at the University of Auckland. She teaches courses on women in organizations and gender and diversity. Her research focuses on issues of gender, diversity, and the experiences and careers of women in organizations. Recent work includes study of the functioning of women-run organizations of diverse ethnic groups. She has published in Personnel Review, Organization, International Journal of HRM, Asia Pacific Journal of Human Resources, Women and Management Review, International Review of Women and Leadership, Career Development International, and has contributed chapters in edited books. In 1999 she co-authored The New Careers: Individual Action and Economic Change (Sage). Deborah M.Shepherd is a senior lecturer in the Department of Management and Employment Relations at the University of Auckland. She teaches courses in managing change, leadership, and organizational culture. Her research interests include organizational change and innovation; issues inhibiting growth in SMEs in New Zealand; organizational culture in multinational organizations; workplace diversity; and leadership. She has published in Personnel Review and Journal of Management Inquiry. Robyn Thomas, Ph.D., is Senior Lecturer in Organizational Behaviour at Cardiff Business School, Cardiff University. Her research interests centre on critical perspectives on management and organization and in particular on managerial and professional identities. She has written about constructing and disciplining professional/managerial identities in public and private sector organizations. Current research projects include: management of knowledge intensive organizations (in Finland, Sweden and the UK); theorizing professional identities under New Public

Management; policing identities, policing performance and change. She has published in a variety of journals and books, including articles in Organization Studies, Organization, Gender, Work and Organization, Critical Perspectives on Accounting, Culture and Organization, Public Administration and Public Management Review. Gillian Ursell is presently Director of the Centre for Journalism at Trinity and All Saints College, an affiliate of the University of Leeds. She is also a council member of the Broadcast Journalism Training Council, and participates in the regional centres of the National Council for the Training of Journalists and the Royal Television Society. Academically, her work builds upon a substantial history of empirically grounded analyses of work organization and employment relations. In 1992, this involved an investigation of work and employment change in British television, for which, in 1997, she was awarded her doctorate. Subsequent to her doctoral research, she has been exploring the link between the specific work and employment arrangements of media production and the specific characteristics of the media product being made. She has published in a range of journals, including: Media, Culture & Society, Critical Perspectives on Accounting, and Journalism: Theory, Practice and Criticism.

Acknowledgements Books are deceptive. Their covers carry the names of the authors, the title and the publisher. With an edited collection there is the added advantage that the names (and some highlighted details) of all the contributors also appear in print. This gives all the credit to the editors and the contributors and a hint of recognition to some unknown persons in the employ of the publisher. In short, the collective effort of several unknown others is hidden from view. We want to rectify that in this important space. Thanks go to Catriona King, the former senior editor at Routledge, for seeing merit in this project and ensuring that it was undertaken; Rachel Crookes of Routledge for keeping a careful and caring eye on us to ensure that we completed on time; Diana Wallwork for her scrupulous copy editing; and Anette Risberg for her ideas on the title of the book.

1 Introduction Resisting gender, gendering resistance Robyn Thomas, Albert J.Mills and Jean Helms Mills

Introduction: the fall and rise of workplace resistance This book is about workplace resistance, a topic that has a long pedigree within studies on organizations. However, its popularity has been somewhat cyclical with a number of studies during the late 1980s and early 1990s suggesting that workplace resistance has declined or even been effectively eradicated. This demise has been attributed to declining trade union membership and the concomitant shift to a service sector economy (traditionally less unionized than manufacturing), and a more transient, vulnerable, temporary and therefore passive workforce (Prasad and Prasad, 1998). However, it has been the ‘outflanking’ (Collinson, 1994) of workplace oppositional practices that has been the main focus of the ‘resistance as a thing of the past’ genre of writing, a development attributed to ‘new’ forms of management control (Knights and Willmott, 1989; Sewell and Wilkinson, 1992; du Gay, 1993; Townley, 1993; Willmott, 1993; Grey, 1994). Appropriating aspects of Foucault’s (1977) work on panoptic surveillance and discipline, studies have drawn attention to new forms of surveillance and the selfdisciplining subject in modern organizations. Here it is suggested that ‘new’ forms of management control, aimed at the ‘hearts and minds’ of workers, effectively colonize worker subjectivities such that they participate in their own subjugation, removing the presence of opposition. Dominant organizational discourses thus ‘create’ these ‘designer workers’ where there is no longer a difference between workers’ conceptions of self and that offered within the organizational discourse (Jacques, 1996). Furthermore, it is suggested that the postmodern era has heightened feelings of insecurity and vulnerability, stimulating the need for greater security of the self, upon which new management control practices feed (Alvesson and Willmott, 2002). Of course, things are not so straightforward. Over the past decade, a number of studies have challenged suggestions that ‘all is quiet on the workplace front’ (Thompson and Ackroyd, 1995). This ‘second coming of resistance’ has led to some fairly heated debates on structure and agency. While the epistemological roots of these debates have been diverse, ranging from a reiteration and reaffirmation of labour process inspired studies through to the appropriation of post-colonial theory, queer theory, feminist theory and poststructuralism, common to all is the refutation of the demise of oppositional practices. The contributions to this edited volume illustrate that resistance is ‘alive and kicking’, albeit not necessarily revolutionary in effect. Taking up a theme emerging in the literature, the thesis of this book is that definitions of resistance need to be broadened to appreciate those micro-political practices often overlooked in earlier critical inspired studies of workplace opposition. Notably, the book brings together two key debates

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within the field of organization studies: theorizing on gender, and ways of understanding resistance. These debates have been given renewed vigour with the ‘postmodern turn’ (Best and Kellner, 1997) in organization studies and feminist theory but within largely separate literatures. In recent years, a number of (pro)feminist writers within organization studies have recognized the contribution that a fusion of these literatures might offer in understanding issues of power, subjectivity and agency. This book represents a growing interest in the contributions that feminist theorizing can offer to the study of organizations. The book focuses on issues of gender and resistance in organizations and, in particular, presents theorizing which attends to the dualistic debate of compliance versus resistance to offer more generative understandings of resistance. It is therefore argued that the theoretical insights from alternative epistemologies and disciplines, notably feminist theory, can reinvigorate resistance studies and present forms of resistance (or ‘oppositional practices’) otherwise overlooked in functionalist and critical labour process inspired studies. Arguing this, we not only focus on resistance acts and behaviours but also examine discursive forms of resistance, i.e. resistance at the level of identities and meanings. Therefore, the chapters in this book contribute to the development of a more sophisticated conceptualizing of gender and the micro-politics of resistance in two ways. First, focusing on the lived experiences of women and men in a range of organizations, the book presents a range of empirically grounded understandings of the character and nature of resistance that has greater nuance and complexity than that currently offered. Second, in broadening the definitions of resistance, the book offers more detailed and varied understandings of resistance that can account for a range of means and motives for individual struggles to appropriate and transform dominant norms.

Conceptualizing resistance The rich heritage of studies on workplace opposition is mainly concentrated at the level of the collective, focusing on overt and often violent protest against managementimposed controls. In addition, individual forms of low-level ‘misbehaviour’ have also been studied (Ackroyd and Thompson, 1999). Accounting for the causes of such resistance, ‘mainstream’ functionalist studies have concentrated on the management of change. Analysis of forms of resistance within functionalist accounts of organizations tends to pathologize both resistance and resistors, with acts of resistance being viewed as both temporary and irrational, the outcome of cognitive failures by individuals and/or groups to appreciate the inherent good and ultimate benefit from the change initiative (Coch and French, 1948; Judson, 1991). However, it is within critical accounts that the core of resistance studies can be found. Here is seen a long tradition of research on forms of workplace conflict, either organized and collective forms such as strikes, coming out of an industrial relations tradition (Hyman, 1989), or unofficial acts of counter-productive behaviour, or ‘misbehaviour’, that arise in the effort bargain, including sabotage, deviance, mischief and antagonism (Ackroyd and Thompson, 1999). Theoretically informed by Marxist and neo-Marxist perspectives, resistance is framed in terms of class struggle, seen as the natural outcome of structural relations of antagonism between capital and labour. These studies have contributed a rich and influential challenge to the functionalist domination within organization studies.

Introduction

3

However, a number of tensions can be highlighted with existing conceptualizations of workplace resistance. These relate to definitions of resistance and what does and does not ‘count’ as resistance; the identification of forms of resistance; and the subject/object of resistance. First, in defining resistance, considerable energies have been spent on putting boundaries around, and demarking differences between, categories of resistance, compliance, accommodation and consent (Kondo, 1990). Definitions of resistance are generally conceived of as something in opposition to managerially enforced controls and are presented in a mutually reinforcing control-resistance dyadic relationship. However, as Kondo (1990) argues, to present resistance, accommodation, consent or compliance in neat categories suppresses differences within and between these categories suggesting a mutual and temporal ‘fixidity’. A less limiting approach is to view resistance as something socially constructed in context, rather than resorting to a neo-positivistic and rational framework (Sewell, 2000) and pre-conceptualizing what constitutes ‘real’ resistance. Second, there is the tendency to determine a priori which acts and behaviours constitute resistance, in effect essentializing resistance (Prasad and Prasad, 1998). A discursive construction of resistance examines how resistance is produced and performed in different contexts, specific to events, actors and practices. Finally, studies on resistance have, in line with organization studies in general, been largely silent about gender, both in the embodied sense and symbolically. The appreciation of resistance as the collective, overt actions of groups of male blue-collar workers still forms the framework of recognition when most people think of resistance. Early labour process inspired studies have largely concentrated on blue-collar male, or ‘genderless’ workers in factory settings, where the gender of the researchers and researched was not recognized as having an impact on the knowledge generated. There have been some studies that have considered the genders of the researcher and of the researched. For example, studies on female workers have focused on resistance of female factory workers (Pollert, 1981, Ezzamel et al., 2003), administrative and service workers (Gottfried, 1994), female professional workers (Katila and Meriläinen, 2002; Thomas and Davies, 2002; Kerfoot, 2003; Meyerson and Scully, 1995) and women in Asian and developing countries (Kondo, 1990; Scott, 1985). Generally, however, gender has been ignored or under-explored in the majority of resistance studies (Tancred-Sheriff, 1989). Managerial and professional employees have also received scant attention. Thus, analysis of resistance has presented reactions by a homogenous and genderless body to that which is imposed on it, thereby reducing individuals to structurally and environmentally determined phenomena. Therefore, analysis of resistance has often privileged structure over agency and there has been a general ignorance of resistance at the level of the individual. The result is analysis that oscillates between ‘worker-as-docile-automaton’ (Fleming, 2002:194) and overly romanticized images of worker resistance. Unless the act or behaviour studied falls into a narrowly defined and often politically inspired notion of resistance, it goes unnoticed, resulting in the impression that workplace resistance is a thing of the past. The chapters presented in this collection suggest that traditional conceptualizations of resistance present only a partial script. In particular, they highlight how many resistance practices—both at the level of behaviours and at the level of identities and meanings— are complex, contradictory, ambiguous and nuanced. Several of the chapters in the

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collection pick up on more recent interest in workplace resistance that has drawn attention to the omnipresent forms of routine, mundane, low-level and subtle forms of oppositional practices, which are overlooked by the somewhat grandiose conceptualizations found in earlier studies. Furthermore, several chapters also focus on forms of discursive resistance at the level of the individual subject, an aspect of resistance given greater scrutiny with the increased focus on socio-ideological controls aimed at the capturing of the ‘hearts and minds’ of workers (Alvesson and Willmott, 2002). Therefore, conceptualizations of resistance are not solely confined to acts and behaviours, but also to interpretive challenges to managerial discourses. This focus on discursive resistance is still underdeveloped within the organizational literature, despite its detailed development in feminist and post-colonial literatures. However, in recent years, the contribution of alternative knowledges for re-imagining resistance has been recognized. A significant focus of recent studies has been on what has been termed ‘routine’ resistance (Scott, 1985, cited in Prasad and Prasad, 1998:226); those forms of low-level, subversive, informal micro practices. Thus we have seen a widening in scope of resistance studies to examine the motivations of different groups and individuals to resist, in a wide range of workplace and cultural settings. In addition we see a broadening of what ‘counts’ as resistance, to emphasize the more routine, low-level and individual forms of resistance, socially constructed in context.

Gendering resistance Gender and agency Those feminists at pains to ‘gender organization studies’ were not endeavouring to ‘add women and mix’ but to transform the field, to be able to think in new ways and reenvisage knowledge about organizations. Likewise, the gendering of resistance has also brought to light new ways of seeing and thinking about resistance, radically challenging traditional notions of resistance and oppositional practices. The contribution of feminism and post-colonial theory, together with insights from poststructuralism, can be seen as key contributors to the rekindling of resistance studies and presenting new ways of understanding resistance. Issues of agency have long been a concern within feminist theory. Feminism is a political project, with its raison d’être being the transformation of gender relations to eradicate women’s subordination. Resistance can be understood as part of wider concerns with issues of agency that form a core to feminist analysis of gendered relations as durable but not inevitable and unchanging. This challenge to the inevitability of gender relations provides the source of resistance to feminism, although there are many internecine battles and autocritiques on how this resistance might be played out, and to what effects. A detailed debate has thus built up within feminist theory on forms of resistance and issues of political adequacy partly in reaction to the early overly deterministic analysis of patriarchal oppression in first-wave feminism (McNay, 2003). In recent years, there has been increased interest in Foucauldian-influenced studies, both in feminist theory and in organization studies, drawing on Foucault’s conceptualization of power and the subject. Much of this research has tended to

Introduction

5

emphasize the more deterministic interpretation of Foucault, focusing on subjectification as subjection (McNay, 2000). However, drawing on Foucault’s conceptualization of power has led to a move away from an essentialized subject who can ‘authentically’ resist power (defined as repressive) to a more complex, fluid and generative understanding of power and agency. For poststructuralist feminists this has meant a revisioning of resistance from a relatively passive and oppositional activity by victims of oppression, to more proactive and generative understandings (ibid.). This has resulted in a focus on the subjective interpretations of disadvantage, challenging forms of gender inequality and a refusal to accept subjectivities and identities defined in dominant discourses (Sawicki, 1994; Weedon, 1993). In other words, rather than viewing resistance merely as the reaction to a specific form of management control, a more sophisticated understanding of resistance is offered, one that can accommodate the ambiguities and complexities of the dialectics of freedom and constraint involved in the process of subjectification. This presents a more invigorated concept of agency than that offered in many traditional accounts of workplace resistance. Within feminist theory there has been a move away from ahistorical theories of patriarchy and female subordination to present a more constructive notion of agency that recognizes gender identity as robust yet not immutable. By questioning the notion of fixed and stable gender identities, and recognizing that identities are socially constructed rather than biologically determined, new spaces are opened up for alternative voices, new forms of subjectivities, new meanings and new values (Weedon, 1993). Thus there has been a shift of focus from presenting women and men as clear-cut homogenous groups and from the reduction of masculinity and femininity to a simple dualism, biologically determined. The deconstruction of categories of gender enables a multiplicity of individual experiences to be reflected on, therefore, and enables the move away from presenting women as subordinated by male dominance, failing to capture the complexities of agency. From an empirical agenda, this advances theorizing from previous organizational research that has either negated or privileged the feminine. Micro-political resistance Weedon (1993:111) defines micro-political resistance as ‘resistance to the dominant at the level of the individual subject’. This involves contests over meanings, the articulation of counter discourses and ‘the production of alternative forms of knowledge or where such alternatives already exist, of winning individuals over to these discourses and gradually increasing their social power’ (ibid.). Thus a micro-political resistance takes place at the point of critical reflection—those ‘moments of difficulty’ (Rajchman, 1991, quoted in Sawicki, 1994) that occur between an individual’s notion of self (itself derived from discourse) and the subjectivity offered in a dominant discourse. This offers an agential self, a thinking subject with the will and capacity to resist through the reflection upon, and challenging of, the hegemonic ways of being, offered in dominant discourses. A micro-political resistance enables a breaking out of the strait-jacket of ‘all or nothing’ revolution to focus on the ‘thousand pin pricks’ of individual struggle that demonstrate in a myriad different ways ‘the viability of alternative ways of behaving’ (Martin and Meyerson, 1998:343). A micro-political approach can explain the slow, subtle, but pervasive change that is brought about when

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individuals think, act and speak out, to rewrite, resist and challenge the dominant ways of thinking and classifying. It is aimed precisely where power resides—in action. However, there are questions over the political adequacy of micro-political approaches to resistance, and how they can be worked through in practice. Micro-political approaches represent what can be seen as a ‘quiet challenge’ (de Certeau, 1984, quoted in Fleming, 2002:194) to forms of oppression. Given their small scale, subtle and often hidden challenges—often at the level of identities and meanings—they can be dismissed by those viewing resistance as something that makes big statements and large-scale differences to dominant norms (Hartsock, 1990; Meyerson and Scully, 1995). In particular, there are tensions over the ability to bridge the local to impact on the collective. However, there are limitations and constraints arising from subscribing to forms of dualistic thinking that places distinctions between the micro, meso and macro levels. As Knights (2000:192) argues, ‘the global is embedded in the local, because subjects are formed, deformed, and continually reformed by world events and therefore are not detached from the global in their more localized practices’. Furthermore, the importance of small-scale change as a trigger for larger-scale changes should not be underestimated. As Newton (1998) argues, critiquing the false dichotomy between micropolitical and collective forms of resistance, in most instances change in gender relations has been brought about through the interweaving of individual and group consciousness raising. Therefore, not only does micro-political resistance contribute towards improving employees’ material circumstances, but it also ‘shapes and reshapes employee identity, redefines the nature of work and authority relationships, alters the symbolic order of the workplace and restores some measure of dignity into less respected jobs’ (Prasad and Prasad, 1998:251). Ultimately, micro-political resistance presents us with an agential self able to see and construct alternative ways of seeing the world and living within it. This is not to present an overly romanticized and voluntarist image of resistance. The difficulties in challenging the ways one ‘is’ form a difficult struggle, which perhaps is underestimated in some of the writings on micro-political resistance (Bordo, 1993; Collinson, 1994). As Bordo (1993) comments, it is a constant challenge to step out of the discursive strangleholds that encourage us to look into the mirror and see what is wrong, instead of what is right. Relatedly, then, while we can appreciate the importance and process of self-stylization, a number of writers have argued that some micro-political approaches to resistance under-theorize and under-appreciate the strength of the imposition of socio-cultural determined practices on the self. In the collection that follows we hope to reflect on important aspects of the debate around the issue of gender and the micro-politics of resistance. Feminist debates within/around the micro-politics of resistance The chapters in this book have been grouped in three discrete sections—‘Constructing selves: autoethnographies’, ‘Resisting subjects in context’, and ‘Questioning the politics in micro-political resistance’. We begin the book, appropriately enough, with Jo Brewis’ focus on the self and her struggles to resist being ‘me’. This is in many ways a courageous autoethnography because it lays bare her very personal struggles with identity and self. Her chapter explores the struggles that can be felt in the construction of the self through reflecting on that self in relation to forms of power/knowledge that attempt to

Introduction

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imprint their mark upon it. In the process she illustrates a number of interesting problematics. Drawing on Foucault’s work on the techniques of the self, Brewis illustrates the creative agency of individuals to confound dominant discourses through the act of releasing one’s self from oneself (‘se deprendre de soi-même’ (Rabinow, 2000:xxxviii)). She also illustrates the processes of self-bricolage—the practices of liberation never reaching an end, and the pain as well as pleasure arising from engaging in this ‘release’. Brewis’ discussions of resistance and gender are embedded within her analysis. The latter forms part of what she calls her ‘identity project’, which is multi-layered and informed by gendered truths. For Brewis, resistance lies not so much in challenging pressures to conform but in adopting a process for understanding the constraints on self and identifying the possibilities of alternative identity projects. Without denying the significance of social influences and the continuing problematic of power/knowledge, Brewis draws attention to the profound importance of techniques of resistance that begin with the self. Self and identity in an academic setting is also the context of Jeff Hearn’s contribution (chapter 3). His approach is similar to that of Brewis in that he engages an autoethnography methodology but relies more on public documents to develop his account. Using Collinson’s (1994) notions of ‘resistance through persistence’ and ‘resistance through distance’, Hearn documents and makes sense of his experiences as both participant and observer in the three-year-long appointment process for a professorial post in a Finnish university. Resistance through persistence, in this case, refers to Hearn’s own resistance to the collective organizational resistance to his application for the position, through challenging the various misrepresentations of him and the organization’s refusal to engage in dialogue over the issue. Resistance through distance describes the organization’s response to his application, involving a range of behaviours designed to block his application, which was seen as representative of international linguistic and cultural threats. Hearn’s chapter illustrates the interconnections between individual resistance (as persistence) versus organizational resistance (as distance), forms of homosociality and cultural cloning. Hearn draws attention to the role of the deviant and marginal voice but also the resistance behaviours of the dominant, reminding us that resistance is an interactive process involving various layers of action and reaction. In particular, Hearn looks at the interplay between transnational, organizational and individual processes of identity construction, power and resistance. Foreshadowing Meyerson and Scully’s (1995:589) ‘outsider within’ tempered radical, Hearn reveals how an individual’s marginal status also enables the raising of issues and concerns that fall outside the scope and realm of formal, organized resistance. Within this framework resistance is viewed as a reactive process that is engaged through various layers of political enactment. Central to the account is Hearn’s attempt to maintain an authentic sense of identity in the face of organizational misrepresentations and distancing. Gender is viewed as a series of processes that are embedded in the reproduction of male homosociality, informed and maintained by particular forms of male dominance within specific configurations of activities (e.g. issues of national identity coupled with the privileging of ‘scientific’ pursuits). The question of agency remains largely embedded in the argument that change may lie in challenging local

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practices and encouraging the development of ‘more complex, multiple forms of knowledge’. Moving to studies of resisting subjects in context (Part II), Penny Dick (chapter 4) draws on a set of ‘unstructured conversations’ with sixteen police officers to examine resistance to diversity initiatives within the UK police service. Theoretically, the chapter re-theorizes resistance through decentring it and illustrating the complexities of discursive resistance. Like Brewis (chapter 2), Dick takes up a Foucauldian notion of power to focus on the discursive construction of policing identities and how this affected reactions to diversity initiatives. Rather than focusing on resisting individuals, resistance is viewed as a culturally available discursive repertoire—or discursive resource— available to individuals to make sense of their organizational experiences. She also emphasizes the socially constructed nature of resistance and therefore eschews a Grand Theory of universal resistance. Dick’s approach overlaps with Hearn’s chapter in that they both locate resistance within wider socio-cultural frameworks. In this case she illustrates how individual constructions of the self involve forms of resistance through taking up particular subject positions within wider discursive formations that celebrate individualism and self-actualization (Rose 1996). In taking up these particular subject positions, the two individuals cited in the chapter effectively resist other ideologies (discourses) of diversity and equal opportunities at large in the organization. Dick’s chapter provides a detailed critique of ‘mainstream’ functionalist accounts of resistance (often invoked when considering resistance by organizational members to initiatives such as diversity management) where resistors are pathologized as irrational or cognitively impaired. The chapter also critiques the tendency to portray resistance as collective and thereby to lose the heterogeneous motivations of individuals that lie behind group expressions of resistance. This, Dick notes, raises tensions for identity politics based on notions of collective identity, for the problematizing of collective resistance can result in the end of emancipatory identity politics. Dick also emphasizes the ontological complexities surrounding resistance as a result of its social construction and shifting meanings within different contexts and within different groups. In other words, what might be resistance for one group or individual in one situation might not be so labelled by different actors or in a different situation. Furthermore, the researcher’s constructions are also implicated within this—a point rarely recognized by those working to a priori notions of resistance. Dick’s chapter and approach to resistance effectively illustrate how and why initiatives designed to improve the lot of minority groups in organizations can founder as they will tarnish the subjectivity of any individual seen to benefit from them. This is particularly clear in explaining why those who are likely to benefit from such initiatives might also resist them, given that they can disrupt the self-constitution as an autonomous and selfactualizing individual. In a case study of a UK building society, Kirstie Ball (chapter 5) explores the intersection of discourses of new managerialism and masculinities. Using a gender lens, she explores the gendered nature of new managerialism (practices such as empowerment and total quality management), often presented as a feminization of management (see for example, Fondas, 1997). Drawing from Foucault, using a discursive understanding of resistance, Ball examines the gendered nature of new managerialism and its resistance, described as a ‘subject-centred discourse analytic approach’. Ball notes the possibilities

Introduction

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brought in by new managerialism to shake up embedded masculinist discourses and reconfigure gendered relations. However, she finds that rather than challenging the gender regime of the organization new managerialism has been mapped on to existing gender relations, serving to reinforce and embed them and therefore leaving dominant masculine hegemonies unchallenged (see also Chandler et al. in chapter 7). Drawing on a subject-centred discourse analysis, Ball illustrates the relationship between gender and resistance, with traditional gender orders in the organization being preserved and reincorporated into the new managerialist discourse. She sees resistance as an inevitable part of the mundane, and focuses therefore on the routine side of resistance, which is ‘accomplished through discursive (re)constructions of organizational actors’. From this perspective resistance is a constant series of interactions that engage an employee’s ‘emotional responses, patterned behaviour, intellectual assumptions, and reasoned decisions’ (Prasad and Prasad, 2001: 110). In the process some elements of specific worker subjectivities are absorbed and some rejected in a constant process of compliance and resistance. Ball sees gender—specifically forms of masculinity—as arising from, and being maintained through, the structure and flow of dominant discourses of management practice. Within this framework agency appears to be ongoing (in a constant flow of activity) but reactive. In other words, it is the form, rather than the privileging, of masculinity that changes with new managerialism. New managerialism is also the subject of the next chapter (6) by Annette Davies and Robyn Thomas, with the focus being on its manifestation as New Public Management (NPM) in the UK public services. The chapter presents an empirical illustration of a generative paradigm (McNay, 2000) of resistance. Taking up insights from poststructuralist feminists (Weedon, 1993; Sawicki, 1994), the authors argue that the focus of resistance is at the level of meanings and subjectivities, arising from the tensions and struggles felt between critically reflexive notions of self and the subject positions promoted within dominant discourse. The chapter draws attention to the conditions of possibility for resistance as offered in the looseness around meanings arising from competing discourses. Focusing on the texts of two public service professionals, the authors illustrate how resistance is better conceived of as having a polyadic relationship with discourse, thus contrasting with the more traditional ‘Newtonian’ (Fleming, 2002) cause and effect dyadic relationship of resistance. In particular, the chapter offers an empirical illustration of the processes of micro-political resistance and how social selves manoeuvre in relation to discursive practices. The motivation to resist is derived from the marginalized status of the resistor within the organization—not as a powerless and silenced individual but as one who is epistemologically privileged. Davies and Thomas’ chapter illustrates how individuals construct themselves as marginal, proposing the concept of ‘self as maverick’, where the individual is seen to draw on alternative subjectivities, derived from notions of the feminine self—as a mother, and a female leader, for example. This presents a complex interweaving of the self as other in resisting the dominant subjectivities promoted within the organizational discourse. The chapter shares with that of Ball the notion of the micro-politics of resistance as a constant, ever-changing ‘micro guerrilla war’ (Alvesson and Sköldberg, 2000) in which individuals, ‘when faced with complexity and difference, respond in unanticipated and innovative ways’. They differ with Ball, however, in emphasizing that such responses

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may not only hinder but also reinforce social change. In this regard they move beyond the reactive aspects of agency, suggesting (like Brewis, chapter 2) that resistance is formulated within the process of identifying practices of the self through critical reflection that can help to ‘formulate tactics whereby we can live in the world’. Chapter 6 differs from most of the other chapters in its attempt to avoid privileging gendered standpoints, whereby one standpoint (masculine) is replaced with another (feminine). The authors do, however, recognize that this ‘presents a complex situation for the articulation of emancipatory practices’. As with a number of other chapters in the collection (see, for example, Ursell in chapter 11 and Dick in chapter 4), the authors consider the political adequacy of micro-political resistance and the extent to which micro-political resistance can transcend local spheres, to challenge collective norms. They conclude that a ‘micro-politics of resistance focuses on the small-scale changes that can have incremental effects, and that can make differences to how women live their lives, and live with themselves’, without the need of resorting to a grand narrative of liberation. John Chandler, Jim Barry and Elisabeth Berg continue the theme of new managerialism, or specifically New Public Management (NPM), in chapter 7. Here they question the extent to which the introduction of NPM has disrupted gender relations within academia—gender relations, which are anything but meritocratic. Furthermore, they explore the extent to which resistance (or accommodation) to NPM is itself a gendered response. Exploring resistance, the authors propose an empirically constructed understanding of resistance, eschewing a priori constructions. Their approach thus recognizes the social construction of resistance; its inherent ambiguity and cultural and historical situatedness. Their model of resistance resides at the level of the dynamic interrelations of subjectivity. The authors draw on Alcoff’s (1988) work which, while acknowledging that gender identity is not immutable, asserts that it is still more durable than perhaps suggested in some of the poststructuralist writings. Agency is thus located within a field of experience, with the individual’s notions of self being constructed through interactions with others. By way of addressing some of the tensions in the political adequacy of micro-political approaches, where resistance might be seen to be locked in the local, the authors draw on the work of Melucci who emphasizes the shifting collective orientation of social individuals and thus points to the transformative potential of identity-work, not least through collective action. Thus Chandler, Barry and Berg point to the importance of embedding resistance within wider social and institutional processes, including the women’s movement as a source of alternative conceptions of self. These ‘alternative selves’ stimulate resistance (albeit in fluid and diverse forms). The women’s movement is viewed as a source of resistance since it ‘provides subjects with a challenge to the values underpinning NPM— especially its performativity and abstractness—and to its inhumanity as well as to its methods (seen in the preoccupation with measurement, control and hierarchy)’. Within this framework Chandler, Barry and Berg recognize that NPM cannot be viewed simply as a discourse with purely negative consequences for feminist change; it can also be viewed as a lever for change in challenging the embeddedness of masculinities within the academy. Their approach, therefore, emphasizes how identities are socially contingent, processual, negotiable, contingent and dynamic. They focus principally on the ‘why’ of resistance, preceded by the ‘how’. Gender is relevant, they argue, in explaining the ‘why’

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of resistance. The chapter raises some rather awkward questions in relation to the efficacy of conceptualizing resistance at the level of meanings and identities. They ask to what extent can such a view of resistance be seen as a strategic act imbued with agency? Core to their concern lies the extent to which the notion of critical reflection implied within the micro-politics of resistance suggests the actions of a rational and conscious individual and therefore is imbued with overtones of voluntarism. In chapter 8 Albert J.Mills and Jean Helms Mills move the discussion to the development and application of a ‘critical sensemaking approach’ to understanding resistance, gender and change. As with Chandler et al., Mills and Helms Mills are concerned to develop a theoretical bridge between micro and societal levels of analysis. To that end they propose a model of critical sensemaking comprising four elements: formative contexts, organizational rules, discourse and sensemaking, and in doing so provide a notion of sensemaking that emphasizes the embedded nature of dominant discourses yet still enables a working of agency to account for the processes of the development of discriminatory practices. The chapter draws on Weick’s (2001) study of the Polish Workers’ Defence Committee (KOR), which illuminates how sensemaking properties serve to inform acts of resistance. Resistance resides at the level of the identity, with the need to secure a sense of identity being a key sensemaking trigger. Echoing to some extent the argument of Dick (chapter 4), Mills and Helms Mills contend that the conditions of possibility for resistance arises if an individual’s sensemaking of their current situation does not gel with their sense of self, which is rooted in their past experience. The chapter then goes on, through content analysis of archival material, to apply critical sensemaking to a study of changing employment relations in Trans-Canada Air Lines (the predecessor of Air Canada) in the period 1937–1940. Crucially, the authors focus on the effectiveness of resistance and in doing so strike at the heart of debates on the political adequacy of micro-political resistance. They too, like Davies and Thomas in chapter 6, question the extent to which small-scale changes might lead to transformation of collective norms, leaving the question open for further research. In chapter 9 the issue of resistance to employment equity policies is returned to (see Dick, chapter 4). Using a gendered culture lens, Deborah M. Shepherd and Judith K.Pringle analyse gendered layers of micro-political resistance to organizational culture change, focusing on individual narratives within the organization. Through a case study of a cultural change programme in an IT developer and manufacturer, the authors focus on issues of resistance surrounding attempts to introduce a new form of socio-ideological control, aimed at shaping meanings, norms and behaviours. Echoing Dick’s chapter (4) in highlighting the individualistic values lying behind resistance to change initiatives, Shepherd and Pringle argue that using a gender lens can bring new understandings to resistance to change, which they define as ‘any conduct that serves to maintain the status quo in the face of pressure to alter the status quo’ (Zaltman and Duncan, 1977:63). The authors note the prevalence and enduring presence of masculinities within the organization, which the change initiative, in promoting more feminized forms of working (such as collaboration, valuing of difference, interdependence) served to challenge. In a vein similar to that of Davies and Thomas (chapter 6), the chapter illustrates how and why the ‘feminization’ of the workplace might be resisted. The core argument is that a gendered lens reveals important insights into the sources of resistance in organizations—insights that might otherwise be

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overlooked. In particular, the chapter draws attention to the need to appreciate the importance not only of the role of professional identities but also of gendered identities in understanding resistance to change. The chapter questions why ‘attempts to change a masculine dominated culture to one which values and encourages feminine characteristics was resisted’. Within this approach the question of agency is embedded in the contention that uncovering resistance as ‘resistance’ (i.e. naming certain actions as resistance) can contribute to a broader questioning of the gendered character of organizational change and change programmes. The last section of this edited collection consists of two chapters that build on some of the tensions already raised in some earlier chapters on the notion of micro-politics of resistance—the first (chapter 10) draws on post-colonialist insights and the second (chapter 11) draws on post-Marxist insights. In chapter 10 Kiran Mirchandani considers the political bite of the micro-politics of resistance, picking up a number of criticisms within feminist theory that micro-political resistance offers a somewhat etiolated version of resistance. As McNay (2000:4) comments, resistance defined as ‘difference’ from the dominant subject position might be reduced to a truism if it is used to describe any act or thought that does not comply with the dominant norm. In other words, resistance so defined is reduced to merely an integral and necessary act of identity construction. Furthermore, and again echoing tensions within feminist theory, Mirchandani’s chapter notes the tendency to underestimate the strength and pervasiveness of normalizing discourses. As Bordo (1993) argues, the strength and recuperative nature of sedimented discourses might be underestimated in micro-political approaches. Mirchandani’s chapter challenges the dichotomous conceptualization of powerresistance, arguing for a conceptualization of individuals as ‘connected and embedded within…a web of diverse resistant forces’. Hence she emphasizes the need to locate individuals within wider discursive settings. She suggests that gendered relationships are located within ‘globalized relations and work processes [that] are constituted and reconstituted on a continuous basis’. As such they are open to change. The global economy is not ‘inevitable and self-generating’. Through a study of call centre employees in India Mirchandani illustrates how resistance behaviours—while not necessarily slowing down ‘the proliferation of the global economy’ or fundamentally shifting ‘the unequal power relations between rich and poor nations’—can undermine the constitution and reconstitution of gendered subjectivities within the discourses of globalization. Here she contends that ‘assuming that groups and actors act in resistance only to transnational corporations’ serves to reify those corporations and falsely attribute to them ‘enormous coherence and unity’. For Mirchandani agency lies in responses to and within the contradictions and spaces that are opened up by transnational disconnections (e.g. when US companies try to reproduce American subjectivities in a call centre in India). In the final chapter (11) Gillian Ursell reviews her gender research in the UK television industry to question the viability and vitality of a micro-politics of resistance. The chapter begins by suggesting that the value of a focus on the micro-politics of resistance may lie in the generation of ‘insights into factors conditioning identity formation and the performance of gender in occupational settings’. Ursell sees some potential in this in so far as it allows us some greater understanding of the ‘mundane realities of women’s existence’ and contributes ‘to academic argument about the

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character and inner workings of contemporary western society’. Beyond these arguments she raises a number of doubts about the efficacy of a micro-political focus on resistance, not only in what it can reveal about women’s lives but in its liberationary potential. In the process the chapter raises a number of disquieting points. Ursell begins by contending that a micro-political approach to resistance is a discourse that arises out of ‘the cultural logic of late capitalism’ (Jameson, 1991) and, as such, provides only a limited and limiting insight into contemporary gender relations in the modern organization. Arguing that ‘the thesis of subjectification […] renders the notion of a micro-politics of resistance in identify formation as irrelevant’, Ursell challenges that if ‘workers reveal aspects of collectivity and commonality in their identity performances, we may regard the postmodern condition as an incomplete or partial understanding of contemporary western society’. She then goes on to test that proposition through a study of the UK television industry, concluding that ‘television production employment may [necessitate] the individuation of individuals but, in that it simultaneously creates categories of differential employment experience along gendered lines, it also produces collectivity’. Ursell’s finding draws attention to two more ‘enduring features’ of gendering within television production—‘the practice and thereby the experience of gender-related employment inequalities and dissatisfactions’ and ‘the presence of a premodern archetypal masculinist construction of woman as gendered oppositive’. For Ursell a micro-political resistance focus can do little to address these issues other than the sense of an individual ‘negotiating for personal space within a fabric of social relationships’—a space which in the television industry may be rewarded but ‘as an object captured for commodification’. Thus, in the last analysis, Ursell views ‘the micropolitics of resistance in regard to gender identity formation’ as, at best, one of ‘trying to resolve what are potentially competing demands on one’s time and resources’.

Conclusions It is not the endeavour of this collection to offer a Grand Theory on Resistance. Rather, the chapters in this collection present resistances that point to its social construction in specific contexts, spaces, times and subjects. They represent new ways of thinking about, and seeing, resistance, and new contexts for action in which groups and individuals can think, express themselves and act. These ‘new’ ways of understanding resistance are still theoretically in their infancy and this volume represents an important contribution to the debates and empirical illustrations on gender and the micro-politics of resistance. In putting this collection together we have tried to reflect some of the key debates around a focus on the micro-politics of resistance, gender, agency and social change. It is inevitable that many of the contributions draw on Foucauldian and feminist poststructuralist approaches but we have also included work that draws on insights from a gender lens, sensemaking, masculinity theory, post-colonialism and post-Marxism. In the process we hope that we have sharpened debate by providing not only points of connection but also contention across the different contributions. We have also attempted to include papers that reflect different contexts, both in terms of organization/industry and national context. To that end the collection draws on research from university settings in the UK, Finland and Sweden; the police force in the UK; North American call

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centres in India; a UK building society; an American IT company operating in New Zealand; the UK television industry; and a Canadian airline company. We began the debate with a carefully crafted and convincing account of the value of techniques of the self for resisting profound notions of self and we have ended with an equally well-crafted and convincing account of the problems of a micro-political focus to resistance. We leave it to you to develop a way through the various indices of an important and valuable debate that disquiets many of our traditional notions of gender and resistance and gendered resistance.

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Jameson, F. (1991) Postmodernism: or, the Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism, London: Verso. Jermier, J.M., Knights, D. and Nord, W.R. (eds) (1994) Resistance and Power in Organizations, London: Routledge. Judson, A.S. (1991). Changing Behavior in Organizations: Minimizing Resistance to Change, Cambridge, MA: Blackwell. Katila, S. and Meriläinen, S. (2002) ‘Metamorphosis: From “nice girls” to “nice bitches”: Resisting patriarchal articulations of professional identity’, Gender, Work and Organization, 9, 3:336–354 Kerfoot, D. (2003) ‘The problematic professional: Gender and the transgression of “professional” identity’. In J.Barry, M.Dent and M.O’Neill (eds) Gender and the Public Sector, London: Routledge. Kondo, D. (1990) Crafting Selves: Power, Gender and Discourses of Identity in a Japanese Workplace, Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Knights, D. (2000) ‘Autonomy retentiveness! Problems and prospects for a post-humanist feminism’, Journal of Management Inquiry, 9, 2:173–186. Knights, D. and Willmott, H. (1989) ‘Power and subjectivity at work: From degradation to subjugation in social relations’, Sociology, 23, 4:535–558. McNay, L. (2003) ‘Agency, anticipation and indeterminacy in feminist theory’, Feminist Theory, 4, 2:139–148. McNay, L. (2000) Gender and Agency: Reconfiguring the Subject in Feminist and Social Theory, Cambridge: Polity. Martin, J. and Meyerson, D. (1998) ‘Women and power: Conformity, resistance and disorganized coaction’. In M.Kramer and M.A.Neale (eds) Power and Influence in Organizations, Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. Meyerson, D.E. and Scully, M.A. (1995) ‘Tempered radicalism and the politics of ambivalence and change’, Organization Science, 6, 5:585–600 Newton, T. (1998) ‘Theorizing subjectivity in organizations: The failure of Foucauldian studies’, Organization Studies, 19, 3:415–447 Pollert, A (1981) Girls, Wives, Factory Lives, London: Macmillan. Prasad, A. and Prasad, P. (1998) ‘Everyday struggles at the workplace: The nature and implications of routine resistance in contemporary organisations’, Research in the Sociology of Organizations, 15:225–257. Prasad A. and Prasad, P. (2001) ‘(un)Willing to resist? The discursive production of local workplace oposition’, Studies in Cultures, Organisations and Societies, 7: 105–125. Prasad, P. and Prasad, A. (2000) ‘Stretching the iron cage: The constitution and implications of routine workplace resistance’, Organization Science, 11, 4: 387–403. Rabinow, P. (2000) ‘Introduction’. In M.Foucault Ethics, Subjectivity and the Truth: Essential Works of Foucault 1954–1984, Volume 1, ed. P. Rabinow, London: Penguin. Rajchman, J.(1991) Truth and Eros: Foucault, Lacan, and the Question of Ethics, London: Taylor & Francis. Rose, N. (1996) Inventing Ourselves: Psychology, Power and Personhood, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Sawicki, J. (1994) ‘Foucault, feminism, and questions of identity’. In G.Gutting (ed.) The Cambridge Companion to Foucault, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 286–313. Scott, J. (1985) Weapons of the Weak: Everyday Forms of Peasant Resistance, New Haven, CT: Yale University Press. Sewell, G. (2000) ‘The prison-house of language: The penitential discourse of organizational power’. In R.Westwood and S.Linstead (eds) The Language of Organization, London: Sage. Sewell, G. and Wilkinson, B (1992) ‘Someone to watch over me: Surveillance, discipline and the just-in-time labour process’, Sociology, 26, 2:271–291. Tancred-Sheriff, P. (1989) ‘Gender, sexuality and the labour process’. In J. Hearn, D. L.Sheppard,P.Tancred-Sheriff, andG.Burrell (eds) The Sexuality of Organization, London: Sage, pp. 44–55.

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Part I Constructing selves

Autoethnographies

2 Refusing to be ‘me’ Joanna Brewis

Introduction Feeling myself very reluctantly coming to consciousness, I try to ‘assume the position’; have a sip of water, pull the pillow over my head, think soothing thoughts—but it’s too late. My mind has kicked in, gnawing and gnawing, round and round like a maddened animal in a cage. So I either start crying, get up and pace restlessly around, or stare, not focusing, at the pages of a book I am utterly unable to read. Eating is almost impossible, especially when part of me relishes the weight loss. I am physically forcing food down, chewing tiny mouthfuls over again in an effort to placate my tumultuous stomach. And if I think about what I am doing I feel like vomiting. Even then I retch constantly so timing is of the essence. I cannot work. I cannot concentrate—well, I can, but only on what I’m worrying about. It’s always there, pushing out everything else, new and worse ramifications emerging with every minute, becoming more paranoid and fantastic. Mornings are always worst—I think I just exhaust myself by a certain point in the day and settle down into a husk-like calm. Specific words stand out like daggers on a page, or in a film, or on the radio. I’m like a parent reviewing content for a susceptible child—except I am both parent and child. What can I do? I can’t do anything. I have to wait for this horrible, sickening, churning sense of doom, this sense that nothing will ever be good again, to pass, or pray for a miracle (which, even as a thoroughly lapsed Catholic, I do a lot).

In September 1999, I moved in with my then partner, entailing a change of city, in order to start a new job. I began to drive 140 miles three times a week to and from work. I was teaching unfamiliar courses to unfamiliar students in an unfamiliar environment and at the same time developing spring term courses from scratch, and working on the manuscript for my first (co-authored) book. By the end of term, I was looking forward to the Christmas holiday, feeling more tired and stressed than usual. I then had what is

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probably best described as a contretemps with an academic journal. It was, to use a cliché, the last straw. On 17 January 2000, after a very difficult vacation and a short time back at work, I was signed off sick for what turned out to be a period of some three and a half months. The diagnosis was ‘nervous debility’, a diplomatic rendering of what might more accurately be called chronic reactive anxiety and depression. I spent fourteen weeks at home with my parents in the north east of England and the remainder in London preparing to return to work. This was the second such episode that I have experienced—the first started just prior to submitting my Ph.D. thesis in December 1995—but (apparently unusually) it was much worse than the first. Self-indulgent as it sounds, I felt at times as if I would never recover, especially in the middle of an anxiety spiral. In fact, during the most tortuous days, I convinced myself that the only solution was to quit my job, a step which I came within hours of taking, only to be talked out of it by my partner who, like others, felt I was in no condition to make such a life-altering change. I even considered a permanent move back to Newcastle to live with my parents—something I would never contemplate under ‘normal’ circumstances. But the antidepressants finally kicked in and I felt able to return to work (after two abortive attempts). I eventually did so on 2 May 2000, drove to campus in a state of panic and spent most of the day proof-reading two articles to meet deadlines and trying not to cry. What this chapter aims to do is to make some sense of why this series of events occurred, and to explore the implications of the subsequent changes I have made to my way of being-in-the-world, using an analysis derived from Foucault’s work on the ‘techniques of the self’. I suggest that my identity as over-achieving adherent to the Protestant ethic has resulted in significant ‘costs’ (Knights and Vurdubakis 1994:189)— two breakdowns which came about after periods where I put myself under even more pressure than usual. Indeed I argue that these episodes represent a violence that I inflicted on myself as a result of my self-image and the ways in which I performed it on a daily basis. Here, then, I attempt to theorize my identity project and to explore the price I have paid for relating to myself in a particular way, for being preoccupied with a specific ‘truth’ of ‘self’. I focus on my own subjectivity in order to attend to the ways in which it has been produced, to foreground the experiential reality of subjectivity more generally and to argue that we can work to be, think and do in different ways. I will therefore also explore the ways in which I have more recently begun to try and take care of myself, both in the specific Foucauldian sense and in the wider sense of attempting to minimize the difficulties I have encountered. Perhaps the most important trigger for this was an anxiety management group I attended at a London hospital during the summer of 2000. As a result of the group, I have made a concerted effort to be, think and do differently. I am still working on this new way of ‘being me’, which represents an attempt both to discover what I am—to identify the constraints I have imposed on myself for more than thirty years—and to refuse what I am—to experiment with another form of identity project (Foucault 1983:216). But, and importantly, for Foucault it is not the case that being in one way is somehow superior to being in another: instead, he argues that we need to be alert to the different ways in which we could be and to begin to make conscious choices about how we relate to ourselves. Freedom he suggests lies in the making of these choices, in ‘the practices of liberation’ (Foucault 1988:50), as opposed to in some ‘better’ space which we attain as a

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result of challenging who we think we are. Again this is directly reflected in my own experience in that my attempts at a new way of being have been both difficult to maintain and fraught with drawbacks of their own. This analysis also suggests that my self‘knowledge’ has become so fixed that I will often draw without reflection on my ‘old’ ways of being. In sum, this chapter discusses the violence that is concealed in the terms of closure of my sedimented identity (Connolly 1998:122), and how I have more recently attempted to modify that identity. The first section of my argument deals in more detail with Foucault’s analysis of the techniques of the self in order to set my experiences in a theoretical context.

The techniques of the self: from Antiquity to modernity In his later work, Foucault begins to examine what he calls the ‘techniques of the self’…the procedures, which no doubt exist in every civilization, suggested or prescribed to individuals in order to determine their identity, maintain it, or transform it in terms of a certain number of ends, through relations of self-mastery or self-knowledge. (Foucault 1994:87) Here he focuses specifically on the ways in which we constitute ourselves as subjects; in other words, how western societies have dealt with the question of the ‘work’ we should do on ourselves to achieve moral or spiritual probity, happiness, wisdom and so on, with regard to sex in particular. What, he asks, are the various processes by which the subject has come to exist? Foucault (ibid.: 177–178) asserts that the techniques of the self, in whatever historical period, imply ‘a set of truth obligations: discovering the truth, being enlightened by truth, telling the truth. All these are considered important either for the constitution of, or the transformation of, the self.’ Both techniques of the self and ‘truth obligations’ are also, he suggests, temporally dynamic: the ways in which we as human beings are enjoined to labour on ourselves, and in so doing to discover, be enlightened by and tell the truth, vary over time (ibid.: 291). In the first centuries of the Roman Empire, for example, Foucault (1990:65–67) suggests that the emphasis on paying attention to oneself began, among other changes, to have more to do with such a practice as a route to happiness, ‘enabling one to delight in oneself’, as well as being a means of curbing one’s desires. With regard to the truth obligations characteristic of this epoch, Antiquity emphasized self-construction, the appropriation of logoi (‘truths’) to live by so as to provide oneself with a mode of beingin-the-world. Acquiring these truths involved communicating with confidants, engaging in exercises like living in poverty for short periods every month, the regular scrutiny of one’s behaviour and meditation. This last, especially in late Antiquity, involved the compilation of hupomnēmata—notebooks recording ways to struggle against personal defects or challenges, as well as material for self-reflection. The hupomnēmata therefore brought together a series of ‘fragments’ of truth received in everyday life into a ‘guide for conduct’, forming the basis for making oneself so that the logoi became fully

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subjectified. They were also heterogeneous and selective: the writer was required to consider what they encountered by way of ‘truth’ in the light of its relevance to their own lives, and to note down only that which had “circumstantial use value” (Foucault 1994:209–214, 273–274). These disparate splinters of truth, then—the various techniques, norms and patterns of behaviour which the individual identified as significant in the care of themselves—were, so the Ancients counselled, to be unified into a personal art of living. Relatedly, Foucault (1992:23) tells us that Ancient ethics ‘should be understood, not as an expression of, or commentary on, deep and essential prohibitions, but as the elaboration and stylization of an activity in the exercise of its power and the practice of its liberty’. So, while rudimentary codes existed concerning the appropriate ways to behave, each citizen decided to what extent they actually obeyed these prescriptions. Few sanctions were available for those who transgressed, save failing to live a ‘good, beautiful, honorable, estimable, memorable and exemplary’ life (Foucault 1994:286). This is not to say that Antiquity was somehow liberal as compared to later epochs; indeed Ancient ethics were relatively forbidding (Foucault 1988:258; 1990:237; 1992:249–250). But there was no imposition of this ‘work on the self’ through law or obligation: instead, ‘[p]eople [decided] for themselves whether or not to care for themselves’. (Foucault 1994:271). Caring for self involved choosing to live in a particular way within which one determined one’s own constraints (Poster 1986:210). However, as Christianity began to replace paganism, a different set of western techniques of the self/truth obligations apparently emerged. Here the emphasis was on telling the truth of self, on the ‘hermeneutics of self’; being able to recount who you are, what happens within you, the sins you have committed, the temptations you have faced, and bearing witness against yourself either in prayer or in confession (Foucault 1994:178). Having faith in God was seen as enabling believers to engage in continual introspection with the help of truths gleaned from religious texts and teachers. The key technique here is self-detipherment, so as to be able to distinguish between the impure thoughts, which come from Satan, and the pure truth of God. Christianity, Foucault argues, therefore substituted the building of a self with the knowing and subsequent renouncing of a self, a casting off of ‘the devil and all his works’. Writing, in contrast to the hupomnēmata, became a way of bringing thoughts to light so as to make the devil’s invidious influence less powerful. Instead of constructing oneself from the ‘outside in’, as in Antiquity, one was adjured to bring the ‘inside out’, and subsequently to reject it—the self became a ‘hermeneutical reality …an obscure text requiring permanent decipherment’ (Bernauer and Mahon 1994:146). Although Foucault also notes that the regular and remorseless transformation of one’s inner self into discourse was in all likelihood something only practised by a small and devout minority, he suggests that this was none the less set down as an ideal for all good Christians such that a ‘fundamental duty’ existed to pass ‘everything… through the endless mill of speech’ (1979:21). This technique of self was justified, not through living a noble and beautiful life as in Antiquity, but through promises of eternal salvation. Foucault makes relatively little of the progress from early Christianity to modernity, perhaps because of his untimely death. However, he does suggest that the religious justification for the hermeneutics of the self declined from the eighteenth century onwards, such that it gradually became incumbent on us to ‘know’ ourselves instead

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through the ‘truth’ of objectively arrived at, dispassionate knowledge about the human condition –for example, around the ‘normal’/‘abnormal’ ways to experience and express one’s sexual desires (Foucault 1994:267). Foucault also points out that the practice of self-renunciation began to die out at around the same time, such that From the eighteenth century to the present, the techniques of verbalization [of self] have been reinserted in a different context by the so-called human sciences in order to use them without renunciation of the self but to constitute, positively, a new self. (Foucault 1994:249) What Foucault implies here is that, post-Enlightenment, the goal of the techniques of the self changed. That is to say, the new moderns no longer aspired to spiritual purity but rather to ‘universal humanity’: ‘what was demanded and what served as an objective was life…man’s concrete essence, the realization of his potential, a plenitude of the possible’ (Foucault 1979:145), as laid down in Enlightenment doctrine on innate human rationality and in particular in emerging knowledges such as psychiatry and psychology. Here the Christian connection between the frailty of the flesh and the need to confess fractured into a practice of the self underpinned by many diverse knowledges. However, if we try to connect what Foucault has to say about early Christianity with his writings on modern techniques of self, it seems that the hermeneutics of the self—the search for a truth of self—has endured. One important development here was the secularization of the confessional as deployed in psychoanalysis. The injunction to commute every desire into discourse so as to surface our ‘most secret nature’ therefore has a long lineage (Foucault 1979:21, 60). But, as suggested above, the postEnlightenment techniques of the self which still prevail in contemporary western society apparently turn, not on ‘knowing’ oneself through the ‘truth’ of divine teachings, but on ‘knowing’ oneself through the ‘truth’ of science, through what has been systematically ‘identified’ as the ‘reality’ of ‘humanity’. As Bernauer and Mahon (1994:151) suggest, in modernity ‘one recognizes and attaches oneself to a self presented through the normative categories of psychological and psychoanalytic science and through the normative disciplines consistent with them’. If we moderns do not ‘know’ ourselves in this way, we will not be condemned to an after-life in Hell but rather to being understood and understanding ourselves as less than fully human—deviant, aberrant, perverse. What is invoked here is a positive hermeneutics of the self, as opposed to the mortifying hermeneutics upon which Christianity is based (Hindess 1998:55–56). Still, for Foucault, we are in fact not discovering ourselves via the modern hermeneutics of the self, but making ourselves after the ‘truth’ of what we see to be human, as told to us by powerful knowledges like psychiatry and psychology. What he suggests is that, contrary to the modern preoccupation with the scientifically derived truth of self and the emphasis on rational self-decipherment, there is in fact no underlying essence, no ‘natural’ humanity to which we gain access through introspective navelgazing. Instead, we moderns come to believe in a ‘truth’ of the ‘self’, which at the same time compels us to aspire to live in a ‘truly human’ way. We take pleasure in ‘knowing’ who we ‘are’, in ‘luring’ the truth out into ‘the open’ (Foucault 1979:71). We identify ourselves in ways which we classify as ‘normal’—as heterosexual, say—and thereby feel

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as if we ‘belong’. We are controlled (/control ourselves) through ‘the power of the norm’ which is ‘effective because it is relatively invisible’ (McNay 1994:94–95). Again, then, although moral stipulations do exist in modernity, the way that we are charged to work on ourselves perhaps renders such strictures redundant, because we largely discipline ourselves. In sum, and to sketch a very complex body of work in a way that does it no justice, Foucault suggests that 1 the truth obligations of Antiquity were to build a self based on external ‘truths’ which one selected for their personal relevance; 2 the truth obligations of Christianity were to confess oneself, to tell the ‘truth’ about oneself, in order to renounce Satan’s influence; and 3 the truth obligations of modernity are to ‘know’ the ‘truth’ of oneself through what has been rationally ‘identified’ as ‘true’ about the human race. So, in line with my focus here on the reality of modern subjectivity, what does Foucault have to say about the possibilities held out to us by contemporary techniques of the self?

Counting the costs: what might it mean to be modern? Foucault is not, as some claim, the philosopher of the modern Gulag. He always insisted on the possibility that we moderns might resist what we are told is true about ourselves: his is not a vision of a contemporary society consisting of docile bodies, trapped in ‘inescapable subjection to a range of pre-existing disciplinary codes and imperatives that between them determine the very shape and limits of…freedom’ (Norris 1994:161). For Foucault, the truths to which we are exposed, and among which we come to ‘know’ ourselves, are multiple. The specific way of knowing self upon which an individual embarks is therefore never predictable, because we each become ‘spoken by…many discourses’ (Alvesson and Deetz 2000:98). Modern identity is an ongoing and unstable project because we are continually working to maintain a coherent sense of ourselves among the various truths available. Furthermore, the effects of these various truths make us both subject and agent: as we come to ‘know’ ourselves, we are enabled to think and act on the basis of what we believe to be true and to resist what we do not accept. We commit ourselves to a particular version of self, giving us a platform from which to think and act, and we simultaneously begin to reject anything that does not conform to that self. But Foucault also argues that our refusal to accept certain versions of the ‘truth’ is always over-determined, precisely because we are so preoccupied with the truth. As he points out, for example, the environmentalist movement opposes a version of truth (which depicts the earth as a fruitful source for endless capitalist appropriation) with its own truth concerning the balance of life processes, and so on. Thus, one escaped from a domination of truth not by playing a game that was totally different from the game of truth but by playing the same game differently, or playing another game, another hand, with other trump cards. (Foucault 1994:295)

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This example characterizes the way in which modern resistance draws on one ‘truth’ to counter another, the implication being that the knowledge regimes that produce us both empower us, in the sense of making us able to ‘do or become certain things’ and resist others, and also disempower us because they place constraints around what it is possible for us to be, do and think (Alvesson and Deetz 2000:104; Patton 1998:65, 66). Such resistance, Foucault argues, promises little, because all such identity projects close off alternatives in the name of truth and thus represent ‘a narrowing and impoverishment of human possibilities’ (Bernauer and Mahon 1994:143). An obsession with what can only ever be a temporal truth makes no space for experimentation with other ways to be, think and do. It means that we continue to live in circumscribed ways which always imply specific costs. To return at this point to my own experiences, I contend that it is relatively easy to see the price I have paid for thinking of myself in a particular way. I propose that the episodes of anxiety and depression described earlier represent the costs of my own selfimage, the subjectivity that I have constructed over the last thirty-four years. What is therefore needed at this point is a closer examination of that identity project, focusing on the ways in which it draws on various ‘truths’ in order to elucidate how my way of being ‘myself’ has taken a particular, very personal toll. First, I am an older child and, like many older children, spent my teenage years struggling against my parents, testing the boundaries around sex, alcohol, going out and so on. Being bullied at school apparently only exacerbated a resultant determination to be ‘myself’. My self-image as ‘bolshy’ has expressed itself in many ways: a refusal to be ‘political’ at school, followed by a dramatic conversion to the left and feminism at university; insisting on a year out, and finding myself on a kibbutz as a result—hating it at first but determined to ‘show them’ (whoever ‘they’ were) that I could handle it; experiencing much the same in my first term at university, and in my first permanent job, but again ‘sticking it out’. In general, my identity as strong-willed has translated into a reluctance to show ‘weakness’—even where it would perhaps have been less stressful to do so. For me, being ‘human’ has turned in part on being determined and finishing what I have started. Relatedly, the fact that I was raised as a Catholic means that I have also ‘learnt’ something common to all Catholics of my acquaintance. This ‘lesson’ is guilt, the need not to let myself or others down. Letting myself down involves such ‘misdemeanours’ as putting on weight, failing to exercise and so on. The fear of letting others down has played an equally significant part in my life to date—the assumption that relationships depend on remembering to send birthday cards, on calling when one has promised to do so, on not being late, has dogged me to the extent that, when others have not reciprocated, I have felt let down myself. At the same time, I have made a lot of the tokens of friendship—such as the letters I received when living in Israel, or more recently e-mails from friends who live in other cities and countries. For the most part, only those closest to me—my family or current partner—have been the recipients of my often explosive anger, even when the cause is someone else’s behaviour, because these have apparently been the only individuals who I believe will forgive me. Not wanting to let self or others down has also characterized my working life, which has been one of long hours, rigidly-adhered-to deadlines, allowing students to take up chunks of my time, anally retentive preparation for conferences, teaching, publications,

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job interviews and my Ph.D.viva and finding it difficult to say no to additional responsibilities. As a colleague of mine once put it, I displayed all the symptoms of ‘impostor syndrome’. The more I was told I appeared self-assured and good at what I did, the harder I worked to conceal my assumed inadequacies. Being ‘human’ in this respect, for me at least, involved working to stave off ‘failure’ in the way I look after my body, in my relationships with others and in my career. My deep-seated fear of being ‘found out’ is also linked to insecurity about my environment, and a desire to control it wherever possible. I failed to buy two properties when living in Portsmouth, dreaded opening official letters, checked things over and over, maintained superstitions religiously: the belief that disaster is just around the corner has always characterized my thinking patterns. I also felt guilty when taking time off. Only when I was too tired to sit at a keyboard any more, when the house was tidy, the washing up done and all necessary calls made could I switch off. Perhaps predictably, ‘being’ someone who is at one and the same time strong-willed and insecure also manifests itself in a certain sense of invulnerability; a belief that I can withstand the demands placed upon me, in my career in particular. I have historically taken a perverse pride in working late and in being a perfectionist to the extent that these practices became a core part of my everyday being-in-the-world. I have, it seems, felt shored up by the efforts I put in—perhaps because these were the only ways in which I felt able to keep my world ‘ticking over’. Significantly, moreover, my professional life almost always assumed precedence over my personal life: working weekends for the six months before handing in my Ph.D. thesis when this was also the only opportunity I had to see my partner at the time is one example. So my identity project has been that of a hard-working, competitive and achievementoriented individual, a risk-averse workaholic who bases her self-worth on others’ judgements and career progress, puts work first and has difficulty relaxing. These were my ‘truths’ of ‘self’, what I believed in as irrevocably characterizing me as a human being. But this specific way of being-in-the-world also resulted in serious costs. Both episodes of anxiety and depression, coming as they did immediately after the submission of my Ph.D. thesis and the manuscript of my first book, also reveal how preoccupied I have been with self-affirmation, and my fear of being ‘unmasked’. Working to ‘prove’ myself on a regular basis became second nature to me and was a vital part of my selfregard—but the downside of this constant labour was, in December 1995 and January 2000, mental and physical collapse. Moreover, both episodes left me feeling psychologically weak: why, I wondered, did I react this way to the slings and arrows of working life, when others assumed equally burdensome workloads and appeared to cope beautifully? I contend that this in itself testifies to the ‘truths’ that I have been living by, the belief that I was responsible for ‘holding it all together’ and that I could and should do so—Dews’s (1984:84) ‘stifling anguish of responsibility’. However, the second episode was distressing enough to suggest to me that, for all the rewards my beliefs about myself had brought me—a relatively successful career, a loving relationship with my family, a reasonably wide network of friends—they also led to this collapse, and that such collapses would only recur if I did not begin to try to be, think and do in different ways. I had, it seems, to begin to challenge the ‘truths’ by which I lived; to work to become other than what I was (Patton 1998:76).

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With this in mind, Foucault’s discussion of the techniques of the self—and to some extent his entire oeuvre—poses the following questions: what are we and what are we today? What is this instant that is ours? …it is a history that starts off from this present day actuality…to try to detect those things which have not yet been talked about, those things that, at the present time, introduce, show, give some more or less vague indications of the fragility of our system of thought, in our way of reflecting, in our practices. (Foucault 1996:411) He endeavours to illuminate the ways in which our contemporary experience of relationship to ourselves is both spatial and temporal and therefore can be changed. This is not to suggest that he is nostalgic for the ethical practices of Antiquity and its emphasis on choosing to care for self (Foucault 1988:244, 1990; 67–68, 238–239; 1992:253): instead, he seeks to disrupt any sense that the way we live at present is somehow inevitable, to suggest that there are perhaps more open and fluid ways in which to relate to self. The next section of this chapter outlines the relevant arguments and again connects them to my own experiences.

Releasing oneself from one self: the critical ontology Foucault’s alternative to modern techniques of the self, preoccupied as they are with living according to a universal human ‘truth’, is to propose that we develop the ‘critical ontology of self’: ‘an attitude, an ethos, a philosophical life in which the critique of what we are is at one and the same time the historical analysis of the limits imposed on us and an experiment with the possibility of going beyond them’ (Foucault 1984:50; 1994:319). He calls upon us to take our inspiration from the Ancient techniques of the self to develop the kind of relationship to self which enables us to move beyond an absorption with an enduring ‘truth’ of that self—and therefore asks us to begin to release ourselves from one self, to understand that there is no inevitable way to be, think and do, to experiment with other ways of being, thinking and doing. This critical ontology, however, does not afford us any form of utopia. As we already know, Foucault does not believe in any essential rightness, goodness and richness in the human condition which can be achieved through struggling against repression (Foucault 1988:120–121). Instead, he argues that freedom is a process rather than a condition. Thinking, being and doing in different ways than those to which we currently cling will not necessarily make our lives more fulfilling, because these new practices carry their own costs. However, it will at least afford us a measure of liberty in choosing how to relate to self, in understanding the almost limitless possibilities of being-in-the-world. This is what Foucault (ibid.: 156) rather guardedly describes as his optimism, his sense that many things experienced as necessary are in fact circumstantial. He insists, then, that I do not think it is possible to say that one thing is of the order of ‘liberation’ and another is of the order of ‘oppression’… I do not think

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that there is anything that is functionally—by its very nature—absolutely liberating. Liberty is a practice. So there may, in fact, always be a certain number of projects whose aim is to modify some constraints, to loosen, or even to break them, but none of these projects can, simply by its very nature, assure that people will have liberty automatically, that it will be established by the project itself. (Foucault 1984:245) What Foucault asks us to do is two-fold; first, to analyse the (self-imposed) limits that we currently exist within, the ‘truths’ to which we currently hold, and, second, to experiment with transgressing these limits. We are challenged to examine our lives to deduce the singular and the contingent, and to have the courage to abandon these ‘truths’, to construct for ourselves a new way of being-in-the-world. This is what Rabinow (1994:xxxix) refers to as self-bricolage: a ‘tinkering’ with self, a reconstruction from heterogeneous materials of who and what we are, and how we think, behave and act. As well as the Ancient techniques of the self, Foucault borrows here from the work of Baudelaire to approvingly assert that Modern man, for Baudelaire, is not the man who goes off to discover himself, his secrets and his hidden truth; he is the man who tries to invent himself. This modernity does not ‘liberate man in his own being’; it compels him to face the task of producing himself. (Foucault 1984:42; 1994:312 italics in original) The requirement here is to be curious; to constantly attend to what is happening around us, to engage, as Rabinow elegantly puts it, in ‘a patient disentanglement from the encumbrances of contingency’ (1994:xl). As Foucault points out, this is a more autonomous practice of self than that which currently prevails in modernity: it owes something both to Antiquity and to a specific strand within nineteenth-century art criticism in its call to build a personal ethics. None the less, he does not provide any firm principles for living in this way: as he suggests, ‘the idea of a program of proposals is dangerous. As soon as a program is presented, it becomes a law, and there’s a prohibition against inventing’ (Foucault 1994:139). Foucault cannot therefore guarantee that we are waging the right struggles, that we are embarking on experiments of self which will render us better off, because to do so would be to impose ‘decisional closure’ (Knights and Vurdubakis 1994:192). Instead, he wants his work to be unsettling, and argues that it aims to describe that-which-is by making it appear as something that might not be, or that might not be as it is…history serves to show how that-which-is has not always been; i.e., the things which seem most evident to us are always formed in the confluence of encounters and chances during the course of a precarious and fragile history… It means that they reside on a base of human practice and human history; and that since these things have been made, they can be unmade. (Foucault 1988:36–37)

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Thus his critiques focus in particular on how specific claims to truth become privileged and stabilized, in an attempt to unfreeze them and to reactivate what is currently hidden from view. Moreover, Foucault counsels that a key element of the critical ontology of self is that it is endless. Because there is no essential freedom, we must render ourselves ‘permanently capable of getting free’ of ourselves (Foucault, cited in Bernauer and Mahon 1994:152). Foucault asks that we therefore come to ‘know’ ourselves only on an ‘until further notice’ basis—that we work against ‘the continuing power of forgetfulness’: that is, we always have ‘more to do’ (Connolly 1998:119). My contention here, on the basis of the above analysis, is that the ways in which I have begun to change my engrained patterns of being, thinking and doing over the last three years or so to some extent chime with what Foucault requires of us in the critical ontology of self. At the same time they reveal the costs that new ways of being, thinking and doing might imply as well as the labour entailed—a project of the self constructed over thirty years plus is far from easy to dismantle. I now outline some of the relevant aspects of this process in order to clarify my argument. As suggested, for me the most significant element of this ‘discovery’ and subsequent ‘refusal’ of myself was the anxiety management group. It was in this experience that many of my attempts to live differently originated. The group was based around cognitive behaviour therapy, defined in an introductory leaflet as combining an approach which centres on ‘challenging’ thoughts which make us feel ‘anxious or depressed’, illuminating ‘their relationship to feelings and behaviour’, and the assumption that ‘What has been learned can be unlearned, no matter how long these problems have been experienced’ (CHCS NHS Trust, n.d.: 4, 5). It involved being seen by two psychologists at the same time as three others who shared similar problems, in the hope that I would learn to cope with my anxiety and be reassured that my symptoms were not unusual. The group’s primary focus was work-related anxiety, given the particular predispositions displayed by its members. As with many interventions of this type, the accent was on learning to think, be and do in more ‘realistic’, less anxiety-inducing ways. This could of course be read in a much more conventionally modern way—as the dissemination of ‘truths’ about how to be more fully human, how to ‘realize our potential’. Foucault (1979:65–68) is cynical about the truth effects of such therapeutic processes, and comments on the ways in which power is conferred, through knowledges such as psychology and psychiatry, on therapists as able to offer a definitive reading of other people’s difficulties. Importantly, however, the way that the group was managed in practice by one of the psychologists, and the dynamics between the participants and the facilitators, ensured that it was in fact much more concerned with choosing to live differently in order to experiment with minimizing anxiety-related symptoms, to ‘cut’ the ‘costs’ of our existing identity projects in ways that we ourselves selected. More specifically, during the course we discussed various manifestations of anxiety— physical (arguably linked to Foucault’s ‘being’), cognitive (‘thinking’) and behavioural (‘doing’)—and were asked to relate these to our own experiences and to begin to try out different ways in which we could be, think and do according to our particular symptomatologies. For instance, the focus during one of the behavioural sessions was ‘checking behaviours’, and the potential ways in which these can be alleviated. Since this

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was a problem I had found especially debilitating, often returning to the same locked door or thoroughly extinguished flame several times, I began to adopt some of the recommended principles, including exposure—refusing to check and learning to endure the resultant anxiety as opposed to ‘giving in’ and going back—or self-assurance—for example, saying out loud ‘The door is locked’ or ‘The oven is off’. Other salient recommendations in this area included deliberately taking time out (e.g. allowing myself to go for cigarettes with a friend at work) and doing things instead of procrastinating about them (e.g. making what I regarded as ‘difficult’ phone calls to friends I hadn’t spoken to for some time). As far as physical symptoms were concerned, we were taught various relaxation exercises, which again I found helpful in my most anxious moments. Moreover, the enjoinder to reflect on the material aspects of anxiety also encouraged me to undertake other changes, to my diet in particular. But perhaps the most powerful aspect of the course for me was the sessions which focused on thinking processes; on how the way we interpret what happens to us affects the impact of these life events. Here the emphasis was on the sense of threat that anxious cognitions turn upon, the ‘automatic’ appearance of such thoughts in particular situations and possible techniques for controlling them. The ‘thinking errors’ I noted as especially relevant to me included ‘catastrophizing’—being convinced that the worst will happen even when it is highly unlikely—which is well illustrated by my long-standing fears of being sued for breach of copyright or libel. Again I began to try and work on these cognitive patterns; looking at the evidence for and against my anxious thoughts, imagining how others might see the same situation and identifying alternative ways of thinking and their subsequent effects on my anxiety levels. More than three years later, I am still cultivating these new ways of thinking, being and doing. I am now much more willing to miss deadlines if necessary, to start work late and finish early and to refuse to take on extra projects unless I feel they can be accommodated within my existing load. I have practised dealing with checking behaviours to the extent that I now only ‘check’ sporadically. If I feel particularly stressed, I try to take time out to relax. I now avoid certain foods as much as I can (e.g. those that contain caffeine, or gluten, of which I am intolerant) and endeavour to drink a lot of water. Most importantly, however, I am working on my cognitive approach to the world, and trying to avoid the automatic anxiety spiral which accompanies potentially stressful experiences by constructing what happens to me in a different way, and telling myself that this is an equally viable way of seeing the situation. Overall I would say that I have begun to think that it might be acceptable to ‘let’ others ‘down’—indeed I have started to try and question whether I am letting them down at all; to reevaluate my relationships in terms of what I can expect from others and what they are ‘entitled’ to expect from me; to try and confront my fears (e.g. around having ‘enough’ money in my bank account); to deal with stressful situations (like official e-mails or letters) immediately; to work against my tendency to perfectionism (e.g. handwriting student feedback); to put my private life first (e.g. spending some weekdays with my partner as opposed to being at my desk from first thing Monday morning to close of play on Friday); to not take responsibility for everything (e.g. during a conference I recently coorganized, trying not to worry if delegates missed meals or did not attend certain sessions); and to approach situations where I am being judged differently (e.g.

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endeavouring to construct my application for a promotion as not necessarily reflecting badly on my abilities if it failed). However, I find this new way of being ‘me’ burdensome and many of my efforts to ‘refuse’ who I am have been less than completely effective. I still feel I have to finish whatever I have started; I still retain my superstitions; I still find it hard to relax; I still drink coffee and Coke and eat foods containing gluten; I still drink and smoke, often to excess, and worry about the consequences; I am still very body-conscious; I still fret about what other people think of me; and I still experience overwhelming sensations of panic. In many ways, then, I will without reflection draw on my old ways of being, doing and thinking, because they are so deeply embedded and so well practised. Moreover, my experiments where ‘successful’ have proved challenging in and of themselves. Avoiding particular foods when I am eating out is often difficult, not to say tedious and liable to provoke comment. Working against feelings of guilt also continues to be testing, especially when it slides into an aggressive insistence that I will not do a particular job because I have not yet developed the ‘right way’ of saying no. Oddly enough, taking time off has proved difficult in another way—as if letting myself relax has opened up the challenge of self-motivation per se, so that one day away from my desk turns into several—as well as the associated difficulties of prioritizing one’s time after a ‘holiday’ period of this kind. It seems to me, then, that Foucault’s claim that ‘liberty is a practice’ is directly applicable to my own experiences. I have spent considerable time reflecting on what I have become over the last thirty-odd years, as well as working to change this identity project, but this has proved challenging, boring and anxiety-making in almost equal measure, as well as not in any straightforward way producing a happier ‘me’. To be sure, I feel much better than I did three years ago. I have also managed to render some of my new ways of being-in-the-world habitual. But I do not feel that these represent a better personal ‘truth’: instead, they are simply alternative ways of ‘being myself’ which carry with them downsides of their own. Moreover, the situation in which I now find myself is precisely one of having to be sensitive to these costs, in order that my new identity project does not come to represent a ‘truth’ of self which is as problematic as my old one. As Foucault asserts, the liberation that he speaks of ‘does not manifest a contented being…wherein the subject would have attained a complete and satisfying relationship [with themselves]. Liberation opens up new relationships of power, which have to be controlled by practices of liberty’ (cited in McNay 1994:131). In conclusion, my intention here has been four-fold: first, to outline the ways in which we moderns are enjoined to interpret ourselves, as compared to techniques of the self from other epochs; second, to describe the price I have paid for my own ‘truths’ of ‘self’; third, to review my efforts to change how I think about what happens to me; and, fourth, to suggest that, although we might be ‘free’ to make alterations in this regard, these alterations are by no means easy nor are they a passport to a better way of life. That is to say, from my viewpoint at least, the ‘freedom’ which Foucault identifies in the ‘practices of liberation’ is both risky and demanding. His choice of words in describing a modernity which ‘compels’ us to face the ‘task of producing’ ourselves should therefore be read, as I believe he intended, with extreme care. In other words, the critical ontology of self is not a matter of resisting the various discursive restrictions which we have imposed on ourselves in the assumption that we will thereby attain freedom, but rather of accepting

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that what makes us free is the ability to resist in this way, even if such experimentation is demanding and does not always produce measurably positive results.

References Alvesson, M. and Deetz, S. (2000) Doing Critical Management Research, London: Sage. Bernauer, J.W. and Mahon, M. (1994) ‘The ethics of Michel Foucault’ in G.Gutting (ed.) The Cambridge Companion to Foucault, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 141–158. CHCS NHS Trust [City and Hackney Community Services NHS Trust: Primary Care Psychology] (n.d.) Information for Patients: What You Should Know about Psychology Services in Primary Care, mimeo. Connolly, W. (1998) ‘Beyond good and evil: the ethical sensibility of Michel Foucault’ in J.Moss(ed.) The Later Foucault: Politics and Philosophy, London: Sage, pp. 108–128. Dews, P. (1984) ‘Power and subjectivity in Foucault’, New Left Review, 144:72–95. Dreyfus, H.L. and Rabinow, P. (1983) Michel Foucault: Beyond Structuralism and Hermeneutics, Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Foucault, M. (1979) The History of Sexuality, Volume 1: An Introduction, London: Allen Lane. Foucault, M. (1983) ‘Afterword: the subject and power’ in H.L.Dreyfus and P.Rabinow Michel Foucault: Beyond Structuralism and Hermeneutics, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, pp. 208–226. Foucault, M. (1984) The Foucault Reader, P.Rabinow (ed.), London: Penguin. Foucault, M. (1988) Politics, Philosophy, Culture: Interviews and Other Writings 1977–1984, L.D.Kritzman (ed.), New York and London: Routledge. Foucault, M. (1990) The Care of the Self: The History of Sexuality, Volume 3, London: Penguin. Foucault, M. (1992) The Use of Pleasure: The History of Sexuality, Volume 2, London: Penguin. Foucault, M. (1994) Ethics, Subjectivity and Truth: Essential Works of Foucault 1954–1984, Volume 1, ed. P.Rabinow, New York: The New Press. Foucault, M. (1996) Foucault Live (Interviews, 1961–1984), S.Lotringer (ed.), New York: Semiotext(e). Hindess, B. (1998) ‘Politics and liberation’ in J.Moss(ed.) The Later Foucault: Politics and Philosophy, London: Sage, pp. 50–63. Knights, D. and Vurdubakis, T. (1994) ‘Foucault, power, resistance and all that’ in J.M.Jermier, D.Knights and W.R.Nord (eds) Resistance and Power in Organizations, London and New York: Routledge, pp. 167–198. McNay, L. (1994) Foucault: A Critical Introduction, Cambridge: Polity. Norris, C. (1994) ‘What is enlightenment?’: Kant according to Foucault’ in G. Gutting (ed.) The Cambridge Companion to Foucault, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 159–198. Patton, P. (1998) ‘Foucault’s subject of power’ in J.Moss (ed.) The Later Foucault: Politics and Philosophy, London: Sage, pp. 64–77. Poster, M. (1986) ‘Foucault and the tyranny of Greece’ in D.C.Hoy(ed.) Foucault: A Critical Reader, Oxford: Blackwell, pp. 205–220. Rabinow, P. (1994) ‘Introduction’ in M.Foucault Ethics, Subjectivity and Truth: Essential Works of Foucault 1954–1984, Volume 1, ed. P.Rabinow, New York: The New Press, pp. xi–xlv.

3 Personal resistance through persistence to organizational resistance through distance Jeff Hearn

Introduction The micro-politics of power and resistance in and around organizations are not easy to encapsulate on the page. In this chapter I address the intersections of various powers and resistances in and around organizations, and tensions between meanings and materialities of subjectification, by examining the complexities of personal resistance to organizational resistance to transnational change. Personal resistance, largely through persistence, is examined in relation to organizational, collective, institutional resistances to perceived change and external threat, largely through distance (Collinson, 1992). I have for a long time researched questions around men, gender, sexuality, violence, organizations, management, and multiple social divisions. In the early 1990s I became clear on the need to bring together these research areas, usually considered separately by different groups of researchers. While doing so (Hearn and Parkin, 2001), I found myself in the middle of an accumulating series of organization violations: the simultaneous occurence of organization and violation. Thus I did not plan to study these specific issues; rather this arose inadvertently through being an applicant and participant-observer in a three-year long professorial appointment case in a Finnish university. Various questions and contradictions are examined through this case study material, drawing on publicly available documentation. These have included a bizarre series of organizational events, with false information, invention of procedures and many exclusionary practices. In writing up the case I have developed a reflexive composite methodology, combining participatory action research, documentary analysis, critical life history, memory work and autoethnography. I use my own knowledge, through keeping very detailed records, along with many public documents. The extracts here are parts of a long, complicated organizational application process for a professorial post at the University of Helsinki. The formal process began in August 1998, the informal process earlier; it was ‘resolved’ in terms of a formal appointment in April 2001. Though this text is in part autobiographical, it is not simply an autoethnography; the public availability of documents, as is central in the Finnish system, has been the prime data source. In one sense the Finnish system is ‘open’; all applicants are made known publicly (unless, unusually, they specifically request this information to be withheld); usually three referees or ‘experts’, virtually always from other universities, are appointed to review the 10–15 publications chosen by each candidate, along with their CV, and research and publication record. The documentation on this refereeing, the formal proposal making recommendations for appointment and the Faculty decision-making are all public. My relation to this material is complex and various. I am an aggrieved party, and also a sociologist, an organizational sociologist and a sociologist of violence, a ‘foreigner’, an

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ethnically non-Finnish immigrant. I may take or be placed in other subject positions in relation to this material. Analysing these events is also part of science; it records, albeit partially, what happens in ‘the seat of science’. How exactly to write this has been a challenge. Previous versions have used the first and the third persons, as within some memory work (Haug, 1987; Widerberg, 1999). I have also considered writing it anonymously or anonymizing the narrative. However, in view of the large amount of publicly available documentation and the widespread reporting of this in the media, this would be disingenuous. Following Mykhalovskiy (1997) I decided that the use of the second person was an appropriate compromize but also provided a creative ambiguity.1

The ‘events’ Phase I: the opening ploys 17 August 1998 Advertisement issued for a Professor of Sociology, University of Helsinki. No criteria for evaluation of comparative merit given. Paragraph included stating that the usual language criterion can be waived for non-nationals. There appears to be a specific open invitation for non-Finns to apply. You apply. From the beginning your application is handled differently. 19 November 1998 Faculty Secretary lists the 12 applicants (seven then, or become during the process, members of the Department) and proposed referees. You listed, unlike other candidates, as Ph.D. and without any title, even though you are research professor, professor II and guest professor—in three countries. 27 November 1998 You wrote pointing out this error, asking for letter to be attached to your application, and for this to be confirmed. No answer received. 3 December 1998 Faculty Secretary confirmed the referees and requested 15 publications by 28 Dec. 1998, With no response to your 27 Nov. 1998 letter, you wrote (7 Dec. 1998) to the Dean. You received a reply from Faculty Secretary dated 10 Dec. 1998, referring to letters of different dates to those sent, suggesting mistake in title probably resulted from staff reading application in a hurry, as the day in question was the closing day for about ten professorships. No specific mention of request for 27 Nov. 1998 letter to be included in application was made, though its contents noted. 7 October 1999 referees’ statements made public, as was composition of the Faculty Working Group to manage the recommendation to the Faculty (Professors Hannu Niemi, Klaus Helkama, Jukka Siikala, Tapani Valkonen). One of referees unusually was Vice-Dean in same Faculty and Professor of Social Policy there, He, Professor Risto Eräsaari, placed Dr Gronow first, Professor Sulkunen second, and placed you in one of the lowest rankings. Professor Eräsaari’s statement has many inaccuracies and misunderstandings. He used inaccurate terminology in describing your

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career and summarized some of your publications in ways which were difficult to connect with their content. He stated that your published work was ‘not participating in current scientific discussion’ and did not constitute ‘general sociology as it is understood in Finland’. This despite you having by far the highest publication rate, both overall (almost twice the next candidate; and far greater than referee himself) and in mainstream sociology journals, and by far the highest citation rate in the international citation indexes (seven more than the next candidate; and about 40 more than the ‘expert’, especially in mainstream sociology journals (10 more than the next candidate). The second referee, Danish Professor Peter Gundelach, found it ‘very difficult’ to distinguish the first and second, and placed Professor Sulkunen first and you second. He argued that you were narrower than the first candidate, even though you had about twice as many publications and more publications in your non-specialist areas than the first in his specialist areas. The third referee, Academy Professor Elianne Riska, placed you first (‘in a class of his own’). The Academy Professorship is the highest academic position that can be held, and Professor Riska was the only sociology professor holding the position then; indeed there has not been another sociologist Academy Professor since. None of the referees mentioned your highest academic position. Phase II: the invention of procedure 11 October 1999 You emailed the Faculty Secretary, the Working Group and Professor Honkapohja, informing them that there are a large number of inaccuracies and misunderstandings contained in the referees’ statement, of your intention to complain, and asking if the 40 per cent gender rule on state organizational committees applies to the working party charged with the task of dealing with the process. On 11 Oct. 1999 on the second point, the Faculty Secretary emailed: ‘The 40% gender rule does not apply to the working group preparing the Faculty decision. It would be impossible, too, because what we need first is expertise, and there still are, sorry to say, very few women in professorial positions in the universities, although the situation is slowly improving.’ In fact there are two women professors in the same department as one of the members of the Working Group, who himself is a specialist in professional ethics. 19 October 1999 Departmental leading group proposes that it is ‘not possible’ for the demands of the post to be fulfilled by someone not meeting the national language criterion, in contradiction to the public advertisement. The leading group comprises two applicants (who withdraw), one acting professor (man) in the discipline concerned (close, recent publishing collaborator of one of the leading candidates), two professors (both men) from other disciplines, two students.

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21 October 1999 You wrote Comment I to Faculty Secretary, the Working Group, Professor Honkapohja, Vice-Rector Wilhelmsson, as an interim measure, saying longer Comment to follow. 1 November 1999 Wrote longer Comment II (eight pp. plus 19 pp. appendices). Both correspondences copied to the Faculty. These inaccuracies in the statements and other matters unacknowledged and not passed on to Faculty members. Vice-Rector and Law Professor Wilhelmsson informed that it is usual practice for correspondence to the Faculty to be copied to Faculty members. When this was not done, you copied this on 15 Nov. 1999 to all Faculty members at own expense. This said clearly, ‘It should be stressed that I was not, in my application…making an application for exemption [from the language criterion] but rather following the course of action made available by the advertisement.’ Prior to this, it appears that Faculty members had not been informed of your correspondence to the Faculty. Specific written questions brought no acknowledgement or response. 17 November 1999 Faculty received recommendation from Departmental leading group to exclude you on language grounds. Faculty referred matter back to the Department for further justification. 1 December 1999 Following advice from very senior Finnish academics, you informed Rector, Vice-Rectors and Head of Administration of the ongoing process. 14 December 1999 Departmental leading group reaffirmed recommendation to exclude you on language grounds. 17 January 2000 After seeing Faculty agenda you emailed Faculty members regarding six key procedural and substantive points. 19 January 2000 Seventeen months after post was advertised, 15 months after applications, and three months after the referees’ statements had been opened, the Faculty voted, after long discussion, 15/2 to exclude your application from considerarion on language grounds. Many substitute members were present; the background to the matter was not explained to the meeting, including that this exclusion was being proposed after the referees’ statements had been obtained. The matter of your application on the language criterion was misinterpreted and your previous statements ignored. One of the objectors, Professor Ekholm, submitted a written paper describing the proposal as ‘illogical and shameful’. In the Finnish system complaints can be made on the following grounds: ‘[The Chancellor] may cancel the decision [i.e. the proposal of the Faculty], provided that (1) a procedural error has occurred that may have substantially affected the decision, or (2) the decision is evidently based on misapplication of the relevant legislation or on an error which may substantially affected the decision [sic].’ Both these grounds were relevant.

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9 March 2000 You delivered the first formal Complaint (I) (Hearn, 2000a) on the following grounds to Chancellor Risto Ihamuotila (217 pp.): 1 The mishandling of the language criterion. 2 The presence of substantive errors of fact in the referees’ statements: not just incidental errors or matters of academic opinion but of such a major, serious and grave nature that they deny full credibility to some of the statements. 3 Other administrative and procedural errors. The Complaint asked the Chancellor to: • Nullify the decision of the Faculty of Social Sciences to exclude your application on the language criterion, and as a result declare that an English-speaking candidate should be considered on an equal fooring to the other candidates. • Nullify the decision of the Faculty on the order of the recommendation for the post. • Refer consideration of the post back to the Faculty, drawing their attention to the substantive errors in the referees’ statements, and administrative and procedural errors. Phase III: the falsification of information While the Chancellor considers the case, the matter is reported in the press. 16 April 2000 You are interviewed in main national Swedish-language newspaper in Finland, Hufvudstadsbladet (HBL), along with an interview with Dean Niemi. In this he gave inaccurate information that the advertisement said that teaching in Finnish was essential and attacked the Swedish-speaking universities for excluding Finnish-language Finns from posts. 19 April 2000 Strong responses published in HBL from the two main Swedish-speaking universities, Åbo Akademi and Swedish School of Economics, refuting these allegations. 26 April 2000 Letter from you published in HBL pointing out inaccuracies in Dean Niemi’s interview. This included quotation from Vice-Rector Wiihelmsson, disagreeing with Dean Niemi. This letter detailing misrepresentation not responded to. 24 May 2000 A letter from Professor Edward Andersson, Emeritus Professor of Law, published in HBL expressing implicit support for the complaint, in discussing another disputed chair appointment in the university. 27 May 2000 The birthday interview in HBL with Rector Raivio, Helsinki University, published, with statements favouring the complainant case. 31 May 2000 You emailed, and 2 June 2000 delivered by hand, letter to Chancellor reminding him that where there was a claim of

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discrimination on grounds of nationality then as the highest national court or tribunal he is obliged to refer the matter to the European Court of Justice, if he is considering refusing the claim. In the EU legislation this concerns the right of EU citizens to be treated equally when applying for jobs within the Member States. According to the Treaty establishing the EEC (Treaty of Rome, since revised as the Treaty of Amsterdam), the following articles apply: Article 12: ‘Within the scope of application of this Treaty, and without prejudice to any special provisions contained therein, any discrimination on grounds of nationality shall be prohibited.’ Article 39 para 1 and 2: ‘1. Freedom of movement for workers shall be secured within the Community by the end of the transitional period at the latest. 2. Such freedom of movement shall entail the abolition of any discrimination based on nationality between workers of the Member States as regards employment, remuneration and other conditions of work and employment.’ Article 234: ‘The Court of Justice shall have jurisdiction to give preliminary rulings concerning: the interpretation of this Treaty; the validity and interpretation of acts of the institutions of the Community; the interpretation of the statutes of bodies established by an act of the Council… Where any such question is raised in a case pending before a court or tribunal of a Member State, against whose decisions there is no judicial remedy under national law, that court or tribunal shall bring the matter before the Court of Jusrice.’

You pointed out that these conditions apply in that there is prima facie evidence of discrimination on grounds of nationality; the Chancellor is in the last instance deciding this case; and he is equal to the highest court or tribunal deciding this case, against whose decisions there is no judicial remedy under national law. As all bodies having jurisdiction in the Member States are covered by Article 234 and there is no clear-cut precedence on the possibility of excluding university professors from the right to apply for professorships in other Member States, the Chancellor cannot decide the case in favour of the decision of the Faculty without having brought the matter for consideration to the European Court of Justice. 11 June 2000 Article published on ‘front page’ of main national newspaper Helsingin Sanomat on the case. 22 June 2000 Chancellor upheld that part of your Complaint dealing with language, referred the matter back to the Faculty, including placing your application back into consideration (Ihamuotila, 2000). The Chancellor’s decision informed that the post had been advertised in 16 Nordic newspapers outside Finland, something not previously made known. The other parts of the Complaint—procedural errors and gross substantive inaccuracies—were not upheld.

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30 June 2000 You wrote to Faculty Secretary asking for dates of Faculty meetings in the coming term; list of all Faculty members and substitute members; and whether she is willing to pass this email on to Faculty members and substitute members. 25 August 2000 You received from her dates of the Faculty meetings in 2000, nothing else. 9 September 2000 You wrote to Faculty members, informing them of the situation as there had been previous inaccurate information circulated in the public domain. 13 September 2000 Appointment of reconstituted Working Group, with Professor Risto Alapuro replacing Professor Valkonen. 4 October 2000 Recommendation from the Working Group to place Professor Sulkunen first, you second, Professor Falk third, brought to the Faculty meeting. The matter placed on the table awaiting more argumentation. 25 October 2000 Faculty met again, with same recommendation, without further argumentation, accepted 15/2. The Faculty votes to put you second after Professor Sulkunen. It includes as the first point in its formal recommendation to the Chancellor a clearly false and possibly libellous statement that you are a researcher of Professor Riska’s research team for the period 1 Aug. 1997 to 31 July 2002. This is beyond belief. This false information was repeated in reports in the national press (Helsingin Sanomat, 26 Oct. 2000). This evidence in the Faculty recommendation demonstrates decision-makers in the Faculty, presumably including the four Working Group members present, have not read your application of over two years earlier, in which the nature of your earlier contact with Professor Riska was mentioned at seven points. This grave matter offends natural justice, is discriminatory and not checked with those concerned. No systematic merit comparison had been made between leading candidates, though there was some reference to international scholarship in making the recommendation for the third place. This criterion had not been used regarding first and second places. 21 November 2000 You delivered second formal Complaint (II) (Hearn, 2000b) to Chancellor Risto Ihamuotila (86 pp. plus Complaint I as Appendix). Like the first, he sent a copy of your Complaint to Lord Chancellor Paavo Nikula. This second Complaint was made on the presence of repeated and systematic procedural and substantive errors which may substantially affect the decision, and that constitute discrimination on the grounds of nationality. The Complaint included systematic merit comparison between the recommended candidate and yourself, on the basis of: (a) biased presentation of information in the Working Group recommendation, that is, criteria mentioned in favour of Sulkunen, not compared with your performance (seven in number); (b) items in applications omitted in comparison in the recommendation (16 in number). In 22 of these criteria you scored more highly (usually much more so) than Sulkunen; the only contrary criterion was that you had

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published in fewer journals in your specialist area (gender: 9) than Sulkunen in his specialist area (alcohol: 13). Phase IV: showing positions, resistance and refusal The Chancellor asked the Faculty to comment on the Complaint. At least one of the questions was wrongly reformulated compared with your Complaint. You did not claim that Professor Eräsaari was ‘esteellinen’ (to be disqualified through there being a formal obstacle to him not having an interest in the case), and that he should not be referee; you pointed out a number of extremely serious matters in relation to his statement and his position in relation to other candidates, including gross inaccuracies; evidence of non-reading of your work; discriminatory treatment of different candidates; his close socializing with at least one of the leading candidates. 17 January 2001 Proposal disagreeing with the Complaint brought from Working Group to Faculty meeting; further justification and argumentation asked for by Faculty members, including more transparent comparison; matter tabled. 7 February 2001 Proposal brought to Faculty meeting not modified significantly, and subject to even longer debate. It addresses four questions in relation to your Complaint. These are only some of the questions raised in your Complaint. Thus a lack of response to a number of your Complaint questions. The responses contained in the Working Group’s proposal made to the Faculty did not answer many points in your Complaint; the answers that were given were both extremely vague and raised further issues absent from Faculty previous statements. For example, the answer given to question 1 is clearly discriminatory: it alleges that the only reason for the inclusion of the (false) statement about Professor Riska in the Faculty’s recommendation in October 2000 was to draw attention to the ‘similarity’ of research orientation between her and you. This seems very unlikely; this was not menrioned at all in the earlier recommendation to the Chancellor; and no other possible ‘similarities’ between the research orientation of other referees and any other candidates were mentioned, so constituting discrimination. Another example is the Faculty’s new statement making reference to the ‘possible future impact’ of Professor Sulkunen and you. This is a new, if vague criterion. However, as the process had by then been proceeding for over two and a half years, there is empirical evidence available to consider ‘possible future impact’. For example, up to that time your publication of four books, a fifth in press and two more contracted since the application date (all with international publishers, and covering issues from information society to political transformation to consumption to children to organizational analysis); 24 refereed articles and chapters; research grants with the Academy of Finland and the EU; leadership of Academy and NorFa-funded research groups/networks. The vagueness and inadequacy of these criteria complements the Faculty’s refusal to respond to or complete a clear systematic merit comparison.

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After very long debate the Working Group’s proposal, that there was no problem with the original decision, passed 12/8, with seven professors (including three professors from the Working Group), one assistant and three students for the proposal; seven professors and one assistant against the proposal. Thus the majority (7–4) of the professoriate receiving the proposal were against the proposal. Eight [sic.] written dissenting statements to the decision were submitted. Women professors were prominent in the proposing motions against the Working Group proposal and articulating the arguments. Large number of written dissenting statements indicates the matter’s seriousness. Allegation of voting irregularity in the Faculty February meeting, namely that request for closed vote was said by the Faculty Secretary to be legally impossible. It appears that this is not so, as closed voting has been used in other faculties of the University. One of those voting for the Faculty proposal (a student) actually wrote one of the statements setting out his critique of the proposal. This adds credence to the importance of closed voting in such a case. In two of the statements there is reference to the refutation of the allegation that you know those who have opposed the proposal to the Faculty, although you did not know any of those people. This contrasts with the mass of contacts that there are between other applicants, Faculty members, Working Group members, Departmental leading group and Professor Eräsaari. 15 February 2001 The University of Helsinki Equality Committee issued a statement agreeing that there appeared to be many inaccuracies and errors in the process (for example, in the comparison of the applicants’ qualifications), but that the language issue was ‘the only clear case of discrimination against foreign applicants’. They also agreed that ‘…cooperation or acquaintance relationships…between the candidates and assessors, and their significance, must be considered in an equal manner for Finnish and foreign applicants’. 5 March 2001 You wrote to Chancellor, drawing his attention to eight new key points related to your second Complaint. You asked the advice of his Legal Secretary on how to respond to these matters and also asked whether you will be formally asked to comment on them. 12 March 2001 The Chancellor’s Secretary replied ‘It seems that the Chancellor’s Office has enough information on the case, so that it can be already decided without asking another formal response from you …the points you have brought forward in your latest letter have been taken into account.’ 26 March 2001 The Chancellor dismissed the Complaint (Ihamuotila, 2001) and appointed Professor Sulkunen, without observing EU law.

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How do we make sense of this? There are multiple possible perspectives on and readings of this material. I focus here on micro-organizational processes and practices in the exclusion of ‘outsiders’, in terms of powers, resistances, homosociality and cultural cloning. A multi-layered understanding of the interconnected levels of powers and resistances, and how they are sites for both reproducing and challenging homosociality and cultural cloning, can thus be built up. Powers and resistances: transnational, organizational and individual First, these events involve various interconnected forms of powers and resistances. Put simply, one can distinguish three levels of analysis of these powers and resistances: macro, transnational beyond the organization; meso, organizational; and micro, individual and group—as well as the contradictions between and around them. In this case, there appears to be resistance to ‘internationalism’ in a nationally based academic discipline. Broadly, the micro-processes of personal resistance are constructed mutually in relation to meso collective, institutional, organizational resistances, to what are perceived as external macro threats. The individual resistance is here largely resistance through persistence, the organizational largely through distance (Collinson, 1992). The macro level, beyond the organization, in this case refers particularly to the increasing transnational impacts on (national) academia. In Europe, transnationalizing influences include major processes of increased Europeanization of academia, not least from the EU and its increasing impact on research. Higher education, universities and academia are changing from an historical period of local, national disciplines to one characterized by greater diversity, and increased Europeanizing and transnationalizing influences (and indeed resistances) upon what have been primarily national disciplines and contexts. The uneven transnationalization of academia is a process that has been well established for a relatively long time in most natural sciences. In terms of English use, this has been strongly reinforced by US hegemony, growth of information/communication technologies and the Internet, and the establishment of English as the primary scientific language for many disciplines. This process of language change is more recent and less developed in the social sciences and the humanities than in the natural sciences. This is for several reasons. First, the social sciences and the humanities often focus on local, cultural, linguistic objects and resources. Second, the nation, despite its profound problematization, has frequently been the taken-for-granted ‘cultural’ framework of social sciences and humanities. Third, in some cases social science, humanities and natural science have developed historically in close association with political projects of nationalism, imperialism and post-imperialism. The meso level in this case means primarily the part of the organization that has the main decision-making powers: the Faculty as a significant sub-unit of the university organization. In this instance, it also interestingly overlaps closely with the social (national) construction of academic disciplines, which are themselves organizational

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phenomena, not reified abstractions. However, the organizational also refers to the whole university organization, including the actions of the Chancellor and his advisers. The university’s organizational resistance to change or potential change, both macro and micro, was largely by a long series of distancing methods: that is, not doing certain things—not acknowledging or using my full academic title, not giving accurate information in documents and to the press, claiming that I was not involved in scientific debate, not responding to my communications by email, letter and telephone, not passing on letters to those concerned, not responding to legal arguments, not keeping Faculty minutes publicly available on the web, and so on. Of course, in one sense, not doing things is a form of action, but still the distinction of distanced non-action and persistent, engaged action is of use. At the same time, organizational resistance also involved the active and consistent assertion of a national agenda, especially by those in the Department. For example, although the post was advertised as open to non-Finns and non-Finnish and -Swedish language users, when the reality of application came, this was reformulated. The presumed place of sociology in relation to nation (in terms of the labour market, the function of national universities in the state, media and civil society, and study of the ‘home’ society) is made clear in the Departmental Leading Group statement arguing, contrary to the advertisement, that my application should be excluded: because of the character of the discipline [sociology] Finnish language has a different position compared with for example the natural sciences and national economy; it is not only studying Finnish society and producing sociologists for the Finnish labour market, but also bringing the contents of international sociology to discussion in Finnish society and transmitting knowledge on Finnish society to international debate. The Finnish language in Finnish sociology is made especially important by the global [sic] turn of sociology which underlines the significance of texts. (Departmental Leading Group, 14 December 1999). The nationalistic interpretation of sociology is clearer still in the students’ statement: Sociology as a discipline has an important task, specifically in studying Finnish society. A sociologist who is active in Finland has to be able to follow events in society, on which it is not possible to get profound information in other languages…the sociologists studying Finnish society are Finnish and Swedish speaking. (Kontakti, Student Sociologists Association, 3 December 1999). Apart from the inaccuracy of some of these statements, the nation remains unproblematized, beyond sociological understanding. However, the argument that what I do does not constitute ‘general sociology as it is understood in Finland’, even though I have the most extensive publications and broadest range of publications in international refereed sociology journals and by far the highest citation rate in international sociology and other journals, now becomes more understandable, as does one referee’s placing me lowest on research even though I have by far the largest international research/publication

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record. Similarly, Professor Eräsaari claims that while I have many publications I ‘do not participate in actual scientific discussion’ (3 Sept. 1999). This would seem a strange statement in relation to mathematics, chemistry, linguistics and many other disciplines. This is despite having, of the applicants, the highest international sociological citation rate, and the highest participation in international sociological journals and publishing.2 Almost everyone likes ‘internationalism’, as long as it is not in their own backyard. Academic NIMBY-ism3 parallels local racist and xenophobic NIMBY-ism. Universities are well able to produce fine organizational policy statements on internationalism and ‘diversity’; putting these into practice is more difficult. The so-called internationalism of the University of Helsinki has not been operating in this case.4 Cultural resistance to global hegemonic powers can itself facilitate the development of more or less explicit racisms and xenophobias. There is no one centre (Bauman, 1995; Hearn, 1996). There are contradictory forces in the transnational reconstruction of disciplines: first, those that seek to embrace difference and diversity, ‘Europeanization’, comparative studies, post-colonialism and ‘internationalism’, as a sign of value, if only rhetorically; and second, resistance and reluctance in this often somewhat remote pressure to move from a relatively implicit nation(alism) to a relatively explicit transnationalism. These latter forces include the defence of local, national languages, national(istic) often maledominated traditions, jobs for local nationals, and local educational practices against international, often Anglophone forces. These resistances are in part against cultural, linguistic and knowledge imperialisms, with their own gender and other powers. In addition, these contradictions are heightened in several ways. They are especially important in small nations, which may be both asserting their nationhood and defending against ‘global’ and transnational forces, including the hegemony of English. In the Finnish case this is complicated by the very high cultural homogeneity and low immigration (99 per cent of residents are ethnically Finns), and the incomprehensibility of Finnish to non-Finnish speakers (unlike, say, Scandinavian languages). Interestingly, it was the Finnish minority Swedish language press (6 per cent of Finns are first language Swedish-speaking) that took most interest in this case, so that it was then reported internationally. These contradictions may take on extra strength when the institution concerned is a capital city university that sees itself as a national leader and has historically been able to be relatively impervious to external pressures. They may be heightened by the local character of institutional politics, such as a tradition and assumption that a university is beyond accountability. The micro level involved both those within, such as those who wrote dissenting opinions, as well as myself and various supporters outside the organization. In contrast to the organization’s distancing resistance to macro changes, my resistance was to the organization’s collective resistance; it was characterized by persistence—of refuting the basic lack of accuracy in the university’s statements, by responding to further inaccuracies, by continuing contact even when there was no previous response, by engaging and persisting. These experiences also necessarily constitute me, as an outsider and ‘foreigner’, as a certain kind of transnational academic, and a non-Finnish man of a certain age, class, status and so on. The sheer consistency and variety of the discriminations and of misrepresentations of myself has been a strange, worrying and violating experience, especially as a ‘foreigner’. It has often been hard work, first to uncover and then meet quick deadlines; but though a

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burden, it has not been totally terrible. Reading many misrepresentations about oneself is an illuminating experience; one that both challenges and reinforces a social constructionist view of the self. There has also been repeated invention of new grounds that have been inaccurately applied to disadvantage my application. The lack of explicit criteria from the beginning was a clear absence of equal opportunities policy, matched by the consistency of the advantage of my application when considered through open measurable merit comparison, something consistently avoided by the decision-makers. At the same time, it certainly has had a profound effect on my perception of Finland, of entering a new country, and how people shrug their shoulders and just take such things for granted; there is in my perception a deep passivity and quiescence here, that I can thereby distance ‘my self’ from. On the other hand, there are several reasons why the experience has been bearable for me. It has been very important to have the support of a few people (some covertly) in avoiding internalizing the status of violated victim. I have also simply found it very interesting, almost an extra research project in itself. I have also been able to maintain a psychological distance, partly because I am not a Finn, and partly because the misrepresentations, argumentations and shifts in criteria have been so crude and lacking in sophistication. It has been clear, for example, that the documentation has often been prepared in such a way that it is not expected to be closely scrutinized (I kept wondering why they did not do a better job of the argumentation; I fantasized about offering myself as a consultant!), and at times (sociologically) inaccurate conceptualizations have been used in relation to nationality and ethnicity. It is hard to say if this was carelessness, incompetence or simply the knowledge that it was unnecessary to do these things well, as the outcome was known. The successful candidate was appointed to the post as Acting Professor before the case was resolved. We have here examples of the dialectics of power and resistance (Giddens, 1979; Hearn and Parkin, 1987/1995), or more fashionably power/resistance. Moreover, these three levels develop dialectically, with macro change occurring or threatened through meso and micro initiatives and reactions. Power and resistance—individual/collective, persistent/distanced—are themselves gendered and ethnicized, set within gender and ethnic relations. Homosociality Transnational powers and resistances are themselves frequently homosocial: look at any meeting of ‘world leaders’. There is certainly nothing intrinsically progressive about transnational forces, as the history of various forms of imperialism makes clear. However, at the same time, transnationalization can open some spaces for challenging national patriarchies and local homosocialities of men. Collective, distanced resistance, of the university organization, to change away from local homosociality and homosocial reproduction, is itself homosocial and homosocially reproductive. Similarly, such resistance can be seen as resistance to threats to cultural cloning and can itself be seen as examples of cultural cloning in action. Distanced, non-action reproduces, homosocializes, culturally clones itself. And, as already noted, local and national resistances include the defence of local, national languages, national(istic) often male-dominated traditions, jobs for local nationals, and local educational practices.

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The contradictions between national resistance and ‘internationalization’ are characteristically intensely gendered, as those in positions of relative institutional power, usually men, seek to defend their, previously more autonomous, feudal domains. Internationalization, for example, in the use of English can have contradictory effects, including undermining the monopolistic power of local, national experts and supervisors, usually men, who previously could be very difficult, if not impossible, to challenge. This is especially the case with the Finnish language which is not understood outside Finland. Working in English, even with its various cultural and linguistic imperialisms, does make possible comments, co-operation and critique from those outside Finland, including, for example, both senior academics and professors and colleague doctoral students. Furthermore, the small nation phenomenon, even when there is relatively less gender inequality can mean that small groups of actors, usually men, can dominate decisionmaking, formally or informally. Thus the small nation status may intersect with assertion of nationhood, defending against ‘global’ and transnational forces, and men’s gender domination, including homosociality and homosocial reproduction. Organizational resistance in male-dominated organizations is itself likely to be homosocial. This broad perspective on homosociality draws on a range of recent studies on universities as gendered organizations (e.g. Davies and Holloway, 1995) and men in universities more specifically. The latter have addressed gendered structural change in university management, the power of certain white, middle/upper class, apparently heterosexual men (Carpenter, 1995; Hearn, 1999, 2001a); universities as sites of men’s organizational cultures, in which various masculinities are reproduced (Collier, 1998); men’s maintainance of managerial power, as in appointment and promotion (Martin, 1996); men’s relations with men, homosociality and men’s homosocial desire (Roper, 1996); and conflation of men’s practices with ‘normal’ working practices (Martin, 2001). Gender relations are a lot about men, both men-women relations and men-men relations. The episodes described are largely examples of men’s practices in operation, that have definite, often exclusionary, implications for women. This is not to say that there were not women involved. Rather the documented impact of women was relatively minor; in some respects women were excluded, specifically from membership of the key working parties acting on behalf of the Faculty, with five men and no women members; on the other hand, in the most recent Faculty meeting it was women professors who put forward the two major counter motions from the body of the meeting. Policy development on gender equality needs to examine how men facilitate or block gender equality. There are clear examples of men’s homosocial power here in this case study, but ‘this power’ is not monolithic, nor is it only in relation to women; it is also directed at and between men; it intersects with other social divisions, such as nationality, language and ‘culture’; it is conscious and not so conscious, deliberate and scarcely thought through; it is colluded with and is resisted; it is multi-layered. These events exemplify both structural patriarchal power and various forms of individual agency. There are also issues here of how such homosociality bears on organizational and disciplinary decision-making and gatekeeping in the implementation of gender equality and ‘equal opportunities’. These events also show that while there has been much recent discussion about equal opportunities and gender equality in higher education, a gross separation of policy and implementation remains. Devising policy statements on gender

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equality is not easy, implementing policies more difficult still. Universities may have policies for the whole university but these may not be reproduced in practical conduct of the (male-dominated) university, the (male-dominated) faculty, the (male-dominated) department, the (male-dominated) research group or the individual academic, male or female. In such practices, gendered structures are reproduced. This includes the gendered conduct of men-men relations. It highlights the operation of ethnicized homosociality (Roper, 1996), including the conduct of gender (in)equality across formal boundaries, between those within and outside universities, and between universities. For example, as already noted, the quality of the documentation produced by the Working Group and the Faculty has been very poor indeed in terms of professionalism, logical and reasoned argument, evidence, accuracy, and sometimes confusion in terminology. One reason for this may be that there has developed a norm that departments do not interfere with each others’ business—a convenient ‘gentleman’s agreement’. This was broken initially on this occasion by some economics professors who, quite reasonably, seemed worried about the reputation of the Faculty internationally. Resistance in this case has been led initially by men economics professors, and later by women professors. Key issues seemed to concern the Faculty’s reputation, the neglect of international scholarship and the lack of fair merit comparison. Ethnic, gender and other forms of equality are not just about procedures but also the content of academic work, research and scholarship, and the construction of the (nongendered, non-ethnicized) mainstream. A focus on gender questions in academic research and scholarly work is unwelcome for some academics, especially some men gatekeeping academics. It is still quite possible to be a respected male social science academic and not read, support, understand or cite scholarship by women, especially feminist scholarship. Changing academic content is also part of reducing gender inequalities and promoting gender equality in academia. This raises the question of homosocial policing of disciplines by the attempt to exclude work on gender from them, on the grounds that this is not part of the mainstream. As a ‘foreigner’ and a researcher on gender, I may come to be seen as doubly dangerous: partly as the unknown other, and partly designated as a ‘social woman’ or a ‘suspect man’ by some men, because of my research on gender (even though I have done more on ‘other’ areas than many of the other sociologists concerned). Cultural cloning These questions are not only about gender relations; gender never exists in any ‘pure’ form; it is always constructed and operating in relation to other social divisions and differences. While my emphasis here is partly on gendered relations, universities are simultaneously structured by other social relations; gendered social relations are simultaneously classed, ethnicized, sexualed,5 and so on. This is crucial in the development of ‘internationalism’ in universities. A focus on the notion of cultural cloning, the normative preference for sameness (Essed and Goldberg, 2002), may help to highlight the social construction and reproduction of sameness and social preferences for certain perceived social ‘types’ of persons. This may act as a more general principle than focusing on homosociality alone. The question of gendered power intersects with cultural, ethnic, national and international issues. Homosocial reproduction is a form of cultural cloning but not the only relevant

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social division in operation. The episodes recounted provide information on the complexities of national, cultural violations in exclusion of ‘outsiders’, in which multiple social divisions operate. We can ask what kind of ‘clone’ is preferred in such cloning cultures. As an outsider, a ‘foreigner’, a non-Finn, a non-participant in local networks, a publicly identified pro-feminist man studying gender and men, men’s sexualities and men’s violences (as well as many other subjects)—in short, a non-clone—I have been a clear cultural other, not part of the cloning culture(s), for many concerned. The misrepresentation of me may be based on ignorance, blatant exclusion and probably some threat and fear. I have had reports from informants working in the organization of key players saying ‘No foreigners in this job’ and ‘They will be taking all our jobs next’: the classic cries of racism. Putting together an agenda around gender equality along with those on ethnicity, ‘race’, nationality and language may challenge universities to rethink their supposed ‘internationalism’. This would involve not just grand, general statements but rather an agenda rooted in the very everyday practice of academic life. For example, the proposals made from the Departmental Leading Group were not existing departmental policy, as is clear from the Departmental Leading Group’s own written statements. Such matters could have been discussed and made clear before the appointment process was begun, not well over a year later. This is one of the easiest ways of ‘doing discrimination’ or indeed ‘doing gender’. Arguments of the Departmental Leading Group and the Faculty were thus made at the wrong time; for example, the ex post facto reference to the idea that the announcement was made for a Nordic market (not a full international market) that was included in the Faculty proposal. This is a novel idea and may have been in the minds of certain, though not all, key actors, for the papers were sent to the referees without noting this. The reference to the ‘Nordic market’ is an example of ‘making up’ policy as you go; indeed the Faculty altered the wording on this point in its decision from that presented in the recommendation brought to it. Universities are set within their local, cultural, national ‘traditions’. They may be like other local employers. In the Finnish case, we are talking of a country that has been particularly ethnically homogeneous, even by Nordic standards, and certainly compared with many European countries. The rates of unemployment of non-Finns are high: about 29 per cent in 2002 (Helsingin Sanomat, 2003; for the largest black group, Somalis, the figure was 74 per cent in 1999 according to Statistics Finland, and 68 per cent in 2000 according to the Ministry of Labour (Helsingin Sanomat, 2001b). While there is a very slowly emerging debate on racism,6 the political climate is indicated by a recent statement by the Head of Research of the National Economic Research Institute that ‘our own people’ should be employed first, before foreigners (Helsingin Sanomat, 2001). In this perspective sociology is part of the national cultural climate towards ‘foreigners’ and other others, and the cultural violations made possible in xenophobic national constructions. There is also the issue of the construction of (un)ethical and (im)moral practices within cloning cultures. The episodes recounted here raise the issue of whether there are any limits, ethical, empirical or otherwise, on what can be written, say, by referees, however inaccurate the statements are. Another issue is the non-disclosure of close

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personal friendships in the process. One might have thought that it is the responsibility of universities and senior academics to make known the details of their close personal connections. This is not referring to socializing in public as a normal part of university duties, rather to the acceptance of domestic entertainment from at least one of the other candidates. The ethical content of ‘expert’ statements is rarely challenged. Individual responsibility can be avoided: ‘I am not responsible’ seems to be a favourite plea of men who dominate such collective powers. More generally, there are many aspects of this case that might contravene the ‘good professional conduct’ guidelines of the other national sociological associations (for example, http://www.britsoc.org.uk/profprac.htm).7

Conclusion There are contradictory forces in academic disciplines: those embracing difference and diversity, as a sign of value, if only rhetorically; and those resisting this often rather remote pressure to move from a relatively implicit nation(alism) to a relatively explicit transnationalism. The latter include the defence of local, national languages (against English), national(istic) often male-dominated traditions, jobs for local nationals. My and some other individuals’ actions can be seen as individual resistance to more collective resistance to ‘international’ cultural and linguistic threats. This analysis of the micro-politics in and around organizations has sought to highlight several levels of action—transnational, organizational, individual—and several perspectives—powers and resistances, homosociality, cultural cloning. Each of these is intimately interconnected with the(ir) others. Furthermore, cultural cloning operates in association with the social production and reproduction of difference and differentiation, both of and by those not part of the dominant sameness. Social processes of cloning sameness and (re)producing differentiation operate at multiple levels: locally, nationally, transnationally. There is no one centre. Transnational homosocial powers themselves may be challenged and may threaten national, local, organizational homosocial cloning cultures, which resist them as a ‘generalized other’. Such transnational threats occur both through general processes that are very difficult to specify (as in the use of English on the Internet) and through particular micro, individualized processes. In this case the latter were characterized by persistence in resistance, and yet are still much easier for organizational homosocial cloning cultures to resist by resistance by distancing, as an ‘individualized other’. Furthermore, these resistances are dialectically related to each other, whereby one resistance spawns counter-resistance: resistance to resistance a double dialectic. Violations, resistances, homosocialities and cultural clonings are probably becoming more transnational in character. The transnationalization of academia may widen the scope of possible violations in universities, and in turn resistances to them. These resistances include the possibility of challenging local homosocial cultural clonings, and producing more complex, multiple forms of knowledge, beyond the immediate control of cloning cultures and their most powerful, usually male, members. In this sense at least, this is arguably a modernist story, and one that raises complex uncertainties about the

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nature of knowledges and the relations of Ones and Others (Hearn, 1996; Fawcett and Hearn, 2004), so leading on to altogether bigger questions than the local skirmishes here.

Acknowledgements I thank all who have given support during this case; that most cannot be named is itself part of the social process of organizations, disciplines and violations. This chapter has developed from several previous conference papers, including that given at the European Sociological Association Conference, August-September 2001. This (Hearn, 2001b) was circulated extensively in Helsinki; specific requests were made to key actors (including Professors Alapuro, Niemi, Valkonen and Wilhelmsson, and Chancellors Ihamuotila and Raivio) to correct any factual information; none were given. I especially thank Liisa Husu and Jean Helms Mills for their helpful comments.

Notes 1 Other significant issues include possible self-indulgence; DeVault (1997) and again Mykhalovskiy (1997) are very helpful here in interrogating and problematizing this notion. 2 Information gleaned at the time appears to suggest that Eräsaari had one lifetime international citation. 3 NIMBY—slang for ‘Not in My Back Yard’. 4 The University’s own public policy statements make clear the importance of ‘the production of internationally published scientific articles’ (ACA/OECD in Fogelberg and Pajala, 1997:15). The University’s own ‘Strategy for the Development of International Operations 1996–2005’ has as its very first point: ‘3.1 Internationalization of Research. 3.1.1… The aims of the development of research at the University of Helsinki are the following:

• the production of nationally and internationally significant, highstandard research, • the development and promotion of new fields of research and a wide range of research interests, • active participation in the research and development programmes of the EU.’ (Luikko, 1996:10) 5 That is, have meaning in relation to sexuality (Hearn and Parkin, 1987/1995). 6 There is an underdevelopment of Finnish sociology of race and ethnicity. Indeed sociological terminology was used inaccurately in the departmental and Faculty documentation in this case. 7 For example, ‘Members should act in ways which ensure equal opportunities for all students, colleagues or job applicants irrespective of age, class, disability, ethnicity, gender, political beliefs, sexuality, “race”, religion. Steps should be taken to increase participation from minority groups at all levels…Members should take care to ensure that direct or indirect discrimination does not take place at any stage in any selection procedure—advertising, response to preliminary enquiries, shortlisting, interviewing…Members should not knowingly misrepresent the findings of…the work of others…In reviewing the work of others…members should avoid conflicts of interest. They should also normally avoid

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participating in review procedures where they have a close positive or negative connection with those under review.’

References ACA/OECD ‘The Development of an Internationalisation Quality Review Process at the Level of Higher Education Institutions’. Cited in Paul Fogelberg and Kaija Pajala (eds) An Internationalisation Quality Review Process: University of Helsinki, 1996, Helsingin yliopiston arviontihankkeita (Evaluation Projects of the University of Helsinki) 5, Helsinki, 1997. Bauman, Zygmunt (1995) Searching for a centre that holds. In: Mike Featherstone, Scott Lash and Roland Robertson (eds) Global Modernities, London: Sage, pp. 140–154. British Sociological Association (n.d.) Good professional conduct, available at: (http://www.britsoc.org.uk/profprac.htm). Carpenter, Gillian (1995) The relationship between collegiality and patriarchy. In: A.M.Payne and L.Shoemark (eds), Women, Culture and Universities: A Chilly Climate? Conference proceedings, Sydney: University of Technology, Sydney Women’s Forum, pp. 58–67. Collier, Richard (1998) ‘Nutty professors’, ‘men in suits’ and ‘new entrepreneurs’: corporeality, subjectivity and change in the law school and legal practice. Social & Legal Studies, 7(1), 27– 53. Collinson, David L. (1992) Strategies of resistance: power, knowledge and subjectivity in the workplace. In: John Jermier, David Knights and Walter Nord (eds) Resistance and Power in Organizations, London: Routledge, pp. 25–68. Davies, Celia and Holloway, Penny (1995) Troubling transformations: gender regimes and organizational culture in the academy. In: Louise Morley and Val Walsh, (eds), Feminist Academics: Creative Agents for Change, London: Taylor & Francis, pp. 7–21. DeVault, Majorie L. (1997) Personal writing in social science: issues of production and interpretation. In: Rosanna Hertz (ed.), Reflexivity & Voice, Thousand Oaks, CA.: Sage, pp. 216–228. Eräsaari, Risto(1999) ‘Expert statement’ on applicants to Professor of Sociology, University of Helsinki. Essed, Philomena and Goldberg, Theo (2002) Cloning cultures: the social injustices of sameness. Ethnic and Racial Studies, 25(6), 1066–1082. Fawcett, Barbara and Hearn, Jeff (2004) Researching others: epistemology, experience, standpoints and participation. International Journal of Social Research Methodology, 7(3). Giddens, Antony (1979) Central Problems in Social Theory, London/New York: Macmillan. Haug, Frigga (1987) Female Sexualisation, London: Verso. Hearn, Jeff (1994) The organization(s) of violence: men, gender relations, organizations and violences. Human Relations, 47(6), 731–754. Hearn, Jeff (1996) Deconstructing the dominant: making the one(s) the other(s). Organization, 3(4), 611–626. Hearn, Jeff (1999) Men, managers and management: the case of higher education. In: Stephen Whitehead and Roy Moodley (eds), Transforming Managers: Engendering Change in the Public Sector, London: UCL/Taylor & Francis, pp. 123–144. Hearn, Jeff (2000a) Complaint to Chancellor Ihamuotila on the appointment of Professor of Sociology, University of Helsinki, 6 March 2000, 217pp. Hearn, Jeff (2000b) Complaint to Chancellor Ihamuotila on the appointment of Professor of Sociology, University of Helsinki, 21 Nov. 2000, 86pp. plus 217pp. Appendix. Hearn, Jeff (2001a) Academia, management and men: their connections and implications. In: Ann Brooks and Alison MacKinnon (eds) Gender and the Restructured University, Buckingham: Open University Press, pp. 69–89.

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Hearn, Jeff (2001b) ‘…Sociology as it is understood in Finland…’: diverse sociological perspectives on ‘national sociology’ in a Europeanising contex. European Sociological Association Conference, Helsinki University, August 2001. Hearn, Jeff and Parkin, Wendy (1987) ‘Sex’ at ‘Work’, Brighton: Wheatsheaf; 2nd edn (1995) Hemel Hempstead: Prentice Hall. Hearn, Jeff and Parkin, Wendy(2001) Gender, Sexuality and Violence in Organizations: The Unspoken Forces of Organization Violations, London: Sage. Helsingin Sanomat(2001a) Ikääntyvä Suomi tarvitsee siirtolaisia. Tulevaisuudessa on pulaa sekä huippuosaajista että perusduunareista. 12 August. Helsingin Sanomat(2001b) Somaleita alkoi tulla Suomeen 1990. 26 March. Helsingin Sanomat(2003) Kaksi prosentti. 13 August. Ihamuotila, Risto (2000) Helsingin yliopiston kanslerin päätös. Annettu Helsingissa 22.6.2000 N:o 123/4/98, 7pp. Ihamuotila, Risto(2001) Helsingin yliopiston kanslerin päätös. Annettu Helsingissa 26.3.2001 N:o 123/4/98, 4pp. Luikko, Anna(ed.) (1996) Strategy for the Development of International Operations at the University of Helsinki 1996–2005. Reports and reviews by committees and working groups of the University of Helsinki 68a, Helsinki. Martin, Patricia Yancey (1996) Gendering and evaluating dynamics: men, masculinities and managements. In: David L.Collinson and Jeff Hearn(eds) Men as Managers, Managers as Men, London: Sage, pp. 186–209. Martin, Patricia Yancey(2001) ‘Mobilizing masculinities’: women’s experiences of men at work. Organization, 8(4), 587–618. Mykhalovskiy, Eric (1997) ‘Reconsidering ‘table talk’: critical thoughts on the relationship between sociology, autobiography, and self-indulgence. In: Rosanne Hertz (ed.) Reflexivity & Voice, Thousand Oaks, CA.: Sage, pp. 229–251. Roper, Michael(1996) ‘Seduction and succession’: circuits of homosocial desire in management. In: David L.Collinson and Jeff Hearn(eds) Men as Managers, Managers as Men, London: Sage, pp. 210–226. Widerberg, Karin (1999) Alternative methods—alternative understandings: exploring the social and multiple T through memory-work. Sosiologisk tidsskrift, 2, 147–161.

Part II Resisting subjects in context

4 Resistance to diversity initiatives Penny Dick

‘Resistance’ within the management literature generally has tended to be unproblematically conceptualized as a largely negative response by workers to initiatives by senior management that are implicitly presented as ‘progressive’. Diversity initiatives are often presented as ‘progressive’ and it is clear that resistance to such initiatives does occur. However, this ‘resistance’ has yet to be addressed from a theoretical perspective, perhaps because it is a politically sensitive area in organizations. One of the problems in addressing ‘resistance’ especially within the field of diversity, arises from the taken-forgranted assumption that increasing and managing organizational diversity should be in the interests of all organizational members and that those who ‘resist’ such initiatives are racist, sexist or in some other way, ‘incorrect’. In this chapter, I want to argue that the concept of resistance needs to be re-theorized in ways that de-centre ‘resisting individuals’ as the analytic focus. Instead, we need to understand ‘resistance’ as being a culturally available discursive repertoire that individuals can use to make sense of their organizational experiences. To understand why ‘resistance’ is expressed and indeed to understand its origin, we need to locate diversity initiatives within a broader socio-cultural and organizational context, in which individualism is valued and promoted as a core liberal-democratic ideal. Using a form of discourse analysis informed by Foucauldian principles, I will show how resistance to diversity initiatives expressed by male and female members of a UK police force can be understood as a response to perceived unequal access to promotion opportunities. However, I want to problematize the hegemony of the discourse of ‘selfactualization’ which ‘motivates’ upward mobility and show how this discourse operates at the individual level to ensure that the structural features of organizations that are implicated in limiting career advancement opportunities are rarely challenged or questioned. In my account, I will argue that the expression of ‘resistance’, especially to diversity initiatives, is an inevitable response in hierarchical organizations. Problematizing individuals who express such resistance is unlikely to increase the success of diversity initiatives and, in fact, the ‘political correctness’ that such problematizations promote is more likely to be used to discredit and discount diversity initiatives.

Resistance to diversity initiatives A growing concern for practitioners and academics working within the field of diversity management is resistance both to practices and to ideas that underpin the field. For example, Barry and Bateman (1996) warn that diversity initiatives, such as ‘familyfriendly’ policies, that are designed to accommodate parents with family obligations by providing ‘special treatment’ (e.g. opportunities to expand personal networks through family-based activities), may, in the longer term, alienate and create dissatisfaction

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among members of majority groups, who are put at a disadvantage through not having opportunities to expand their own personal networks. Similarly, Ellis and Sonnenfield (1994) in a review of three US-based diversity initiatives, found that such training undermined its own goals, largely because it alienated white males, who believed themselves to be ‘vilified’ by the training. It would, nevertheless, be a mistake to assume that ‘resistance’ to diversity initiatives is the sole domain of organizational dominants. Resistance is also expressed by minority groups who perceive the rhetoric of diversity management as failing to deliver in terms of access to opportunities, and who also resent the idea of ‘assimilation’ or ‘acculturation’ that is implicit in many approaches to diversity management (Prasad et al., 1997). More intriguingly, resistance is also expressed by members of minority groups to the notion that they need ‘special’ attention or differential treatment (Marshall, 1984), or that they are oppressed relative to so-called organizational dominants (Dick and Cassell, 2004). Increasingly, a more critical and theoretical approach to diversity management is being sought in order to help organizations, academics and practitioners deal with the dilemmas that the management of diversity can create (Dick, 2003; Dick and Cassell, 2002; Lorbiecki and Jack, 2000; Prasad et al., 1997). As the few short examples above indicate, attempting to support one sector of the workforce, deemed ‘different’, can alienate other sectors of the workforce. However, attempting to treat everyone as if they were the same can breed resentment from groups who both perceive themselves to be different and value those differences and wish them to be acknowledged. On the other hand, there are members of minority groups who are opposed to being ‘singled out’ as different. In this chapter, my aim is to contribute to theoretical debates and positions on ‘resistance’ in work organizations, focusing specifically on resistance to diversity management initiatives. To achieve this aim, I will first discuss some of the limitations of mainstream or ‘functionalist’ approaches to understanding resistance, before moving on to discuss and illustrate some recent contributions to the theorization of resistance that have been made by critical management scholars. I then focus on the issue of resistance to diversity initiatives by presenting some data taken from a research project into diversity management within a UK police force. Resistance is theorized as a ‘subjective position’ that is taken up within discourses that constitute individuals in quite specific ways. Finally, I discuss the theoretical implications of this position.

Theoretical issues in diversity management The issue of resistance within the diversity management literature has received scant attention. Clearly, however, understanding resistance is crucial if we are to articulate and deal with the contradictions and tensions that are produced by the practices and ideas that construct the diversity management discourse. One of the main reasons why resistance has not received much attention is because much of the literature is framed by a functionalist set of assumptions (Lorbiecki and Jack, 2000). The functionalist approach is implicitly unitarist in its assumptions (Boxall, 1996), presenting diversity management as an issue of mutual interest and concern to all individuals and groups in organizations. Within this approach, diversity management and its goals are treated as rational. It is

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presented as self-evident that it is in everyone’s interests for individual differences to be managed and to be managed in ways that produce economic advantages for the organization (Lorbiecki and Jack, 2000; Prasad and Mills, 1997). Resistance, while not directly addressed in this approach, is implicitly presented as ‘irrational’: a response that needs also to be managed, by exposing the ‘resistors’ to the logic of diversity management, through education, training and, eventually, attitudinal and cultural change (e.g. Cox, 1993; Kandola and Fullerton, 1998). This functionalist perspective has received criticism from a number of directions. Resistance as ‘irrational’ First is the assumption that diversity management can be understood as having a fixed meaning across all groups and individuals in organizations. As Prasad and Mills (1997) argue: ‘we have a potpourri of popular views and opinions on what constitutes workplace diversity, without a serious consideration of the multiple and possibly conflicting meanings attributed to the term’ (p. 13). If we accept that diversity management is likely to hold different meanings for different organizations, different groups and different individuals across space and time, then understanding resistance becomes rather more complex than is typical in the mainstream diversity literature. As illustrated above, ‘resistance’ to diversity management is neither confined to organizational dominants nor to any specific aspect of it. The functionalist approach with its assumption of instrumental rationality does not enable us to understand this complexity because ‘resistance’ is consigned to the irrational and psychological realm (as evidenced by the focus on attitudes and beliefs). Effectively, this means that resistance, along with those who express it, is pathologized. This is particularly evident when resistance to diversity management is expressed by the ‘privileged’. While many authors acknowledge that privilege is not to be confused with a personal intention to oppress those who are ‘different’ (e.g. Jacques, 1997), it is nevertheless the case that if the privileged do express resistance to diversity initiatives, they may be constructed as ‘politically incorrect’. No matter how carefully we attempt to frame the effects of privilege or ‘debunk’ the complaints of the privileged, there is a growing sense among some sectors of society that ‘political correctness’ has gone too far (ibid.). There is no clearer illustration of this belief than the diversity movement itself which was at least partly taken up in response to the perceived antipathy towards affirmative action in North America (Lorbiecki and Jack, 2000; Prasad et al., 1997). Though a sensitive and contested issue within diversity management, the implicit ‘blame’ that is imputed to the privileged for the position of minorities is doing little to further our understanding of the dilemmas within this field. If we are to understand why the privileged ‘resist’ diversity initiatives, we need to be clear about what is being resisted, how this resistance is being expressed and by whom, and to locate this resistance within broader socio-cultural and historical processes. Resistance as ‘psychological’ We also need to move away from the implicit psychologism that is contained in many functionalist accounts of resistance, in which the answers to the problems of diversity

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management are seen to lie in largely ‘educational’ activities, such as training, designed to change attitudes, challenge stereotypes and raise consciousness (Cavanaugh, 1997). Here, the ‘problems’ of diversity management are largely understood as cognitive in nature, developing from faulty perceptions and inaccurate beliefs (Henriques, 1998). While, clearly, beliefs and attitudes are important in understanding issues in diversity management, the privileging of cognitive or psychological accounts of these issues deflects attention away from structural or institutional factors (Prasad and Mills, 1997), as well as power processes (Henriques, 1998; Cavanaugh, 1997) that reproduce inequality and discrimination. Resistance as collective Implicit in the mainstream diversity literature is the notion that resistance can be understood as a collective response within relatively homogeneous groups. For example, the idea that ‘majorities’ might resist certain diversity initiatives that disadvantage them (e.g. Barry and Bateman, 1996), or that minorities will ‘resist’ discriminatory practices. However, research suggests that this notion of collective resistance fails to account for the heterogeneity within groups. For instance, there is research to suggest that members of minority groups judged to be the Victims’ of discrimination do not perceive this to be the case (e.g. Sheppard, 1989; Dick and Cassell, 2002). This is unsettling from the perspective of emancipatory projects, because if we dissolve the boundaries around different social categories within organizations we effectively remove any collective basis for action (Liff, 1996). Conversely, if we insist on grouping individuals together, in order to further (or challenge) the interests of that group, we risk alienating individuals who resent being positioned in this way. A key issue here is that as researchers we tend to privilege our own construction of the status quo in any given organization or social setting; for example, by positioning some groups as ‘victims’ and other groups as ‘privileged’. If we accept that reality is socially constructed then we need to accept our own construction as equally as subjective as that of any other person involved. The question then becomes not which version of the status quo is ‘correct’ (e.g. are women victims of discrimination or not?), but rather, why is the status quo constructed in different ways and by whom?

Theorizing resistance: critical perspectives Thus far, I have argued that ‘resistance’ to diversity initiatives is not only an underexplored phenomenon, but also an ontologically complex phenomenon, because of the way its meaning shifts within different contexts, and as it is expressed by different groups. I have further suggested that traditional ‘functional’ accounts of resistance are inadequate for understanding this complexity. A more fruitful line of exploration has been developed from critical management theorists, who have attempted to incorporate some of the issues addressed in the sections above into the concept of resistance (e.g. Knights and Willmott, 1989; Jermier et al., 1994; Tucker, 1992). Rejecting the functionalist perspective on management and organizations, these authors have taken, as their starting point, the Marxist conception of

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organizations as essentially pluralistic, consisting of groups whose interests are opposed on the basis of the structural properties of society, notably class. Marx believed that resistance was an inevitable consequence of the unequal relations of power subsisting between the owners of capital and ‘workers’ that enabled the former to realize surplus profit. ‘Revolutionary class consciousness’, Marx believed, would eventually lead to workers collectively resisting the exploitation inherent in capitalist modes of production. The failure of the working classes to collectively rebel and overthrow capitalism, however, is not an indication that Marx’s view of the capitalist mode of production was wrong, rather that his ‘once and for all’ understanding of resistance (Jermier et al., 1994) was overly simplistic. Resistance can take many forms, from the mundane to the extreme, and even apparent consent to organizational and managerial controls can contain elements of resistance. Additionally, as I have argued above, resistance is expressed by members of different groups, at different times, for different reasons, and cannot, in any sense, be understood as a universal phenomenon. Marx’s and later Braverman’s (1974) analysis of the labour process tended to neglect the role of the individual in the process of subordination within organization power relations. Marx’s notion of ‘false consciousness’ to explain the apparent ‘consent’ to exploitation by workers in capitalist organizations effectively relegates the individual to the status of a ‘judgmental dope’ (Garfinkel, 1967). Recent attempts to account more adequately for both consent and resistance at the level of the individual within organizational power relations have used the work of Michel Foucault. It is beyond the scope of this chapter to provide details of Foucault’s work on power (see Smart (1985) for a highly accessible overview), but a brief summary of his ideas on resistance will be presented. Foucault views power not only as an array of techniques, as opposed to a commodity, but also as an essentially productive rather than oppressive phenomenon (Smart, 1985). Power operates by the production of knowledge (discourse), which is targeted at specific groups in society with the aim of disciplining them. This knowledge production process is motivated by challenges to existing power relations in any given sector of society. In order to maintain the status quo, knowledge about the attributes of the group challenging those relations must be generated, so that they can better be known and hence controlled. Foucault argues that this control is achieved as individuals self-regulate, taking up ‘subject positions’ in discourses that effectively prescribe desirable modes of ‘being’. However, the very techniques used to generate discourse and to ‘discipline’ the target group through it result in resistance—‘there are no relations of power without resistance’ (Foucault, 1980:142). This is because the knowledge production process is uncertain and precarious. The discourses that are generated about any given group are seldom the same and are often contradictory. As discourses proliferate, more and more ‘subject positions’ become available for people to take up (Knights and Vurdubakis, 1994), and it is as people struggle to construct an identity within these disparate discourses of ‘being’ that resistance is produced. It is these ideas that critical management scholars have incorporated into their conceptualizations of resistance (Kondo, 1990; Collinson, 1994; Fleming and Spicer, 2003).

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Subjectivity and resistance at work Kondo (1990) studied the identity of female Japanese part-time workers in a sweet factory in Tokyo, focusing specifically on the part-time female workers whose working conditions were far inferior to those of their full-time male colleagues. Kondo argues that a major part of the Japanese female identity is constituted through the discourse of ‘uchi’, roughly translated as ‘home-life’. This means that work is never treated as a serious part of the Japanese woman’s life, despite the fact that many of them and their families are absolutely dependent on this part-time work for survival. ‘Uchi’, therefore, effectively operates to secure these women’s consent to appalling working conditions because their identity is more firmly anchored within the home than in work. None the less, ‘uchi’ is also the means by which some of these women resist dominant Japanese work values, such as demonstrating absolute loyalty to the firm—these women would often take a few days unauthorized leave and justify this through ‘uchi’. Collinson (1994) examined how manual workers in a heavy vehicle manufacturing company reacted to a company initiative aimed at ‘culture change’ through emphasizing teamwork and communication. Their historical experiences as manual workers had led them to see themselves as ‘commodities’ that management could hire and fire at will, and as second-class citizens who were excluded from strategic company issues and who received inferior pay and conditions in comparison to other occupational groups in the company. Their reaction to the ‘culture’ campaign was to dismiss it as ‘Yankee bullshit’ and to engage in a number of practices that served to distance their own identity as manual workers from that of management. For instance, as part of the ‘culture’ campaign, management introduced a bonus scheme whereby workers could earn extra money for increasing output over the ‘standard’ amount. Workers, however, were able to manipulate this scheme by setting their own parameters around what constituted the standard amount, rendering the achievement of increased output relatively effortless. Collinson argues that this ‘resistance by distance’ effectively reproduced the conditions of subordination that engendered chronic job insecurity, because these workers never actually challenged the processes through which they were treated as commodities. These studies illustrate the theoretical issues discussed above. Resistance is not only an active behavioural response to unequal relations of economic power, it is also a political and ideological response to management’s attempts to control workers through their identities or subjectivities. Resistance, therefore, is not simply about actions, it is about identity. Subjectivity, power, resistance and consent within the domain of diversity management. Having set out some of the key theoretical ideas that have informed recent explorations of resistance at work, I will now examine how these issues can be used to understand some of the dilemmas of diversity management that I discussed at the beginning of the chapter. Specifically, through a discussion of a UK police force, I illustrate how and why members of minority and majority groups express resistance to ideas and practices within the domain of diversity management.

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The police service in the UK The UK police service provides a somewhat unique, yet highly illustrative example of some of the dilemmas that diversity management can create. As a public sector organization funded by central and local government, the pressures to manage diversity more effectively have a largely political origin. Of particular concern to governments and police forces is how to increase the attraction and retention of women. The police service has made considerable advances in terms of equal opportunities over the last ten years with many forces (the traditional name for individual constabularies in the UK) appointing an officer or civilian as a dedicated equal opportunities specialist responsible for planning, implementing and disseminating forcewide diversity initiatives, and with the introduction, by several forces, of part-time working. None the less, Brown (1998) suggests that despite these initiatives the progress made towards greater gender equity has been ‘glacially slow’ (p. 279), as women continue to be under-represented in the ranks above sergeant. Resistance to diversity initiatives in the police force In the analyses below, I present some data taken from a project exploring the management of diversity within a police force in the UK. The project adopted an explicitly Foucauldian stance on understanding police officers’ reactions to and experiences of diversity management initiatives, particularly as they affect women. Thus, I was interested in identifying the discourses that officers used to construct their identities, and from there exposing the relations of power that produced, reproduced and disrupted these discourses. Collecting the data involved a set of unstructured conversations with sixteen police officers (six female, ten male) which centred on the research aims. This method, developed from the work of Hollway (1989) and Mama (1995), was based on the epistemological position that research is a form of knowledge production within a specific power relation: the researcher and the participant (see Dick and Cassell (2002) for full details of the methodology employed). In analysing the data, a form of critical discourse analysis was used, developed from the work of Fairclough (1992). This involved analysing the data in terms of a threedimensional framework, and on three different but related levels. The data were therefore analysed in terms of: text, the words and propositions used by participants; discursive practice, the effect that the interactional context has on the text produced; and social practice, the extent to which the propositions and ideas used by people reproduce or challenge broader ideological systems of belief. The three levels of analysis are: identity, how the text operates to produce identities for the individuals involved; relational, how the text constructs the relationships between the people involved; and ideational, the identification of specific ideological systems of belief. Because the method generated so much data, data sampling (Hollway, 1989) was used in the analysis. This involved analysing those parts of the conversation that were most closely related to the research aims. In order to encourage policewomen to seek promotion, many police forces operate a form of legal ‘positive discrimination’. This involves placing an advert for a given role, which includes a sentence along the lines of: ‘applications from women are particularly welcome’. The first extract analysed below is concerned with this issue. As the analysis will illustrate, such initiatives are not always

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welcomed by those at whom they are targeted, and the analysis attempts to provide a close examination of this resistance. Extract 1 (Rachel, female sergeant) R: You get—you get job applications and you read them and they say—applications are particularly invited from female officers ‘cos they’re under-represented which always galls me. Me: Why? R: Simply because you—I understand all the reasons why they do it—about positive discrimination and—they have to have—and I think most jobs are the same—they have to have a certain percentage of women in the job and then from that percentage you have to have—you’re supposed to have a certain percentage of those women in posts like in supervisors’ posts and in specialist posts—and they positively discriminate—But the reason it gets on my nerves is that you may well have—you know—if you have an interview for a job you do the work for it—and if you have a good interview then you get the job. But you will always get the percentage that say ‘Oh, you only got it because you’re a woman’ and the fact that they put that advert in a lot of job applications makes it twice as bad. Because it’s more or less saying ‘If you’re a woman apply for it—‘cos you’ve got a very good chance.’ But they always stick a paragraph on the bottom which counts as—sort of—countermands it—that’ll say, y’ know—‘However, the final selection will be on merit’. Well, it should be on merit anyway, regardless of the sex you are. Me: So it annoys you because basically other people may not think you got it on merit— they may think you got it because you’re a woman. R: Exactly. Me: Have you had that in this? R: No—Nobody’s ever said that to me—I mean people say it jokingly or whatever and I just sort of think—think what you like—you know—it doesn’t bother me really ‘cos I’m confident in my own ability—always have been and I think you’ve got to be. There’s no two ways about it—you have to be to survive, I think. Analysing extract 1 along the dimension of text involves identifying the propositions that are made by both myself and Rachel and examining their functions at the three levels discussed above: identity, relational and ideational. The first proposition constructed by Rachel is that positive discrimination is an inappropriate policy because jobs should be awarded on merit, not on the basis of social category membership. The large number of ‘hedges’ in Rachel’s lead up to this proposition suggests that she is anticipating a challenge to her position on positive discrimination. This illustrates the dimension of discursive practice. Being an academic researcher it is reasonable to infer that Rachel has positioned me as the more powerful party in the interaction, and she therefore feels it is necessary to justify her position in a way that will maintain the power relationship. Thus, all the hedges in the lead up to the proposition are ways of convincing me that she is not naïve about why positive discrimination is desirable in principle, thus deflecting any potential accusation that I might make regarding what might be considered as ‘inappropriate’ attitudes to women’s under-representation in the police service.

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Rachel’s proposition and how it is presented also does an important piece of identity work. She is able to present herself as a person who has ‘worked hard’ for promotion, and not as someone who was promoted as a ‘token’ woman. This is further reinforced by her statement that positive discrimination ‘galls’ her. When I ask whether anyone has suggested that her own promotion is an example of tokenism, she first of all refutes this ‘No’, and ‘Nobody’s ever said that to me’, but then suggests this has been said, but only as a joke. Consequently, she persuades me that this was not a‘real’ attack. Thus she constructs herself as someone who is judged by others as likely to have been promoted on merit. However, she performs another important piece of identity work when she says, ‘it doesn’t bother me really’, where she is constructing an identity as an independent and resourceful woman who does not need to depend on the favourable judgements of others to feel ‘confident’ in her own ‘abilities’. Because she is positioned favourably towards the police force’s treatment of women, she has to be careful in this extract when she implicitly criticizes the organization for their efforts at positive discrimination. Again, at the level of discursive practice, she needs to maintain consistency in her overall positioning if she is ensure that I judge her account as credible. To maintain this consistency, she deals with her implicit criticism of the organization (and, therefore, the contradiction in her overall positive positioning) by saying she ‘understands why they have to do it’, suggesting that this is an imposed and not a voluntary practice, and, to completely avoid criticizing her own organization, suggests that this is a practice that happens in ‘most jobs’, thus normalizing it. We can therefore understand Rachel’s resistance to this particular diversity initiative (encouraging women to apply for promotion), as a subjective position that she takes up to defend against the idea that her promotion was not based on her ability but on her gender. The achievement of this position is rendered precarious, however, because of the power relationship existing between Rachel and myself. In resisting this initiative, she is also potentially risking being judged as a ‘traitor’ to women’s rights, a position to which my own research agenda would suggest I subscribe. She therefore needs to cut a careful path between working up her own identity as a competent woman, while also condemning initiatives that could further women’s interests. At the level of social practice, we see the reproduction of ideology, as well as an instance of hegemonic struggle, where ideologies compete for dominance. The whole notion of merit-based promotion stems from broader discourses that promote individual attainment and upward mobility as highly desirable ends. This is never questioned by either of us throughout the extract. Rachel’s desire to climb higher and to climb higher by dint of her own competence is treated as self-evidently logical and rational. This is an example of discourse operating at the ideational level. There is evidence of hegemonic struggle, however, produced by the research relationship. The under-representation of women in management is a well-documented fact. To increase women’s progression up the management hierarchy necessitates taking steps (such as legal forms of positive discrimination) to encourage women to apply for promotion in many organizations, including the police. However, these practices have been resisted by other discourses that suggest that if women achieve promotion through such initiatives, it is on the grounds of tokenism, not competence. This counter discourse is always available to explain women’s promotion success. Women who are successful at achieving promotion are always potentially at risk, subjectively, from having the reasons for their success discredited. To

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construct an identity as a competent woman involves, as already discussed, the careful discrediting of initiatives that could be seen as ‘biased’ towards women. The very care that Rachel takes in discrediting the positive discrimination initiative is illustrative of how discourses promoting the importance of female representation compete with discourses promoting individual attainment. It is, none the less, the interactional context of the research interview that has alerted Rachel to this potential conflict in her positioning. I am going to extend this analysis slightly by examining a second extract, taken from a conversation with a male chief inspector. As discussed above, it is a mistake to assume that members of the organizational majority unproblematically experience privilege relative to organizational minorities. This second extract deals with this issue. In this extract, an apparently ‘privileged’ male resists the notion that discrimination is the domain of organizational minorities. Again, the analysis is focused on examining and explaining this resistance. Extract 2 (Martin, male chief inspector) Me: How’s your career now then? It’s obviously picked up. M: Yeah—I have a very different feeling about where I sit now. I went through a doldrum I suppose—would be the best way of describing it—particularly when I was away. I loved (the job) for the first time in my life. I was actually picked out as the sort of top person in the place and I was groomed and all the things that—so I was feeling really good. I was feeling tremendously good about myself and about my role. Loved the place but it was a three-year secondment which had to end. I went right up to the fence on getting promoted so I was looking at going back to sergeant—the guy who was running the place got in touch with my chief and sent a long letter saying—look what on earth are you doing—whether that had any bearing or not I don’t know but the next board I had which was three months before I came back—in 1992—but the board was so different. I was last in—they took me through it, smiled all the way through and they didn’t or barely took any notes and at the end of it said—we’re pleased to tell you you’ve passed. And that was unheard of. Me: What do you think swung it then? M: There’s a reasonable recognition around of myself and I’m not alone. There’s others who you could quite easily pick out who had been deliberately held back—the evidence was there—had I been female or black I’d have been able to take them to a Tribunal—they were discriminating against me because they didn’t like what I was and it was an individual based thing. Looking at this extract along the dimension of text, the chief proposition that Martin makes is that his struggle for promotion was caused by being ‘held back’ and not because he lacked ability. The account is carefully constructed to make this proposition highly credible. First, he describes going through ‘a doldrum’, before constructing the next part of the narrative, in which he describes enjoying the job for the first time. He juxtaposes this with the revelation that he was ‘picked out as the top person in the place’ and that he was ‘groomed’. Taken together, these statements construct an account that suggests that at least part of the reason for his lack of promotions in the past was lack of attention and recognition. His narrative then moves on to describe how he was eventually promoted,

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which he attributes partly to the mentorship of the person who ‘groomed’ him. However, by suggesting that the board was ‘so different’ and that their reactions to him were ‘unheard of’, he achieves the idea that some quality of his own was also important. This is reinforced by the last part of the extract in which he says ‘there’s a reasonable recognition of myself around’, but in order not to construct himself as bigheaded he suggests, ‘there are others’ who were also good, but being held back. He completes the extract by suggesting that because he was not from a minority he was unable to seek redress. This adds further credibility to his account, because in drawing on the notion that discrimination is not an explanation for career stasis that can easily be adopted by organizational dominants, he effectively justifies his decision not to seek redress. In this extract, we therefore see resistance to the notion that discrimination is the domain of organizational minorities. It is the identity work that produces this resistance, because Martin is attempting to construct himself as competent, which is difficult to achieve given that earlier in the conversation he told me that he had failed thirteen promotion boards. However, by imputing his failure to discrimination, and constructing the account as credibly as the analysis shows, he is able to work up his identity as a competent manager. Again, it is the level of discursive practice, the research relationship, that mediates this self-construction. At the level of social practice, the same ideology used unproblematically in Rachel’s account is evident here. Upward mobility achieved on the grounds of competence is taken for granted as a rational and logical desire. Furthermore, the dominance of discourses of ‘equality’ renders Martin’s account of his discriminatory treatment highly credible. This credibility is further reinforced by counter discourses targeted at initiatives designed to further the interests of minorities, which suggest that they ironically discriminate against organizational majorities. Notable in Martin’s extract is the ease with which he is able to construct this account. At the level of discursive practice, he does not anticipate having his account challenged by me, as being an advocate of ‘equal rights’ I would presumably find it difficult to maintain my overall positioning should I appear to imply that what is sauce for the goose is not so for the gander.

Commentary and conclusions The in-depth analyses above illustrate the complexity of resistance and raise several issues. First, the analyses show that resistance, in both instances, is a subjective position that is taken up by both participants within a broad ideological discourse that celebrates upward mobility and individual attainment. This ‘self-actualization’ discourse (Rose, 1996) is so dominant that it is never open to question or challenge throughout the two extracts. The self-actualization discourse is, in both extracts, used to construct an identity in which the individuals’ competence and abilities are emphasized. In constructing this identity, both participants resist other ideologies that are in broad circulation in organizations. In the first extract, resistance to ‘positive discrimination’ troubles the discourse that promotes the importance of women’s progression per se. While in the second extract, there is resistance to the idea of asymmetric discrimination, which is frequently implied by diversity management literature and policies. The specific interactional context of the

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research interview can be seen as ‘motivating’ this resistance, because it raised the possibility for both participants that their competence and ability could be called into question. Thus, while at one level these participants demonstrate resistance to different ideas about what counts as ‘fair’ promotion practices, at another they consent to the notion that upward mobility within a hierarchical organization is natural and desirable. What is never questioned is the whole notion of hierarchy, which in itself produces unequal access to opportunities. Second, this analysis suggests that for police managers at least, competence and ability are core dimensions of their occupational identities. Thus, while the interactional context of the research situation is central in ‘motivating’ the construction of this dimension of identity, it is probably reasonable to infer that any situation that simultaneously motivates and challenges this self-construction will have similar effects. The pursuit of upward mobility is one such situation. Where there are limited positions available to those who apply, discrimination must occur if a position is to be offered. However, the explanations available for ‘failure’ or ‘success’ are racially and gender differentiated. A white man who is promoted is unlikely to be judged as having achieved this on the grounds of ‘tokenism’ (unless he is gay), though he may be judged as being a ‘yes’ man, or ‘in favour’ (Dick and Cassell, 2002). However, a woman or black person who is promoted will always be aware that ‘tokenism’ is one possible and dominant explanation for her or his success. Conversely, a white man who fails to get promoted is unlikely, in the first instance, to attribute this to gender or racial discrimination (unless he believes a woman or racial minority person to have been promoted in preference to him as a ‘token’). However, discrimination could potentially be a highly salient explanation for a woman or ethnic minority person who is not promoted in preference to a white person. The analysis above implies that what is at stake in these ‘attributions’ is not the ‘reality’ of the situation experienced by these individuals, but a core dimension of their occupational identity—their ability and competence. Due to individualizing discourses we tend to understand ability and competence as individual attributes, not as social constructions produced by situations in which people perform. Thus, the so-called ‘attribution error’ can actually be re-cast as the effectiveness of the regulatory effects of discourse. In short, a dominant discourse in western societies is concerned with the celebration of individual attainment, and any situation where individuals are pitted against each other to secure access to limited opportunities will invoke the necessity to attempt to explain this in ways that do not compromise self-constitution in this discourse. From this perspective, therefore, ‘unfair’ discrimination can be understood as a discursive resource that is culturally available as an explanation for not securing access to limited opportunities. Seen thus, discrimination cannot be conceptualized as an objective ‘fact’. This is a difficult issue, given the research that demonstrates how members of certain minority groups are disadvantaged in organizations in terms of access to career structures and pay. However, from the epistemological position developed here, I would argue that we cannot verify that accounts of discrimination, such as that in extract 2, are ‘accurate’ reflections of such situations and, indeed, would argue that these situations would be perceived differently depending on the perspective of the observer. It is this ‘relativism’ of a social constructionist and more specifically Foucauldian position that has been the subject of much criticism (see for example, Reed (1998)).

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In focusing on discourse in its Foucauldian sense, I draw attention to the idea that discrimination is one way of interpreting actions that can lead to the subordination of certain groups in organizations. The very existence of discourses that construct discrimination as a reality, however, demonstrates Foucault’s power/knowledge relation. Such discourses have arisen from the unequal relations of power that exist in organizations between the subordinated and the power holders, enabling subordinated groups to question a dominant order in which their opportunities for advancement and success appear to be limited by practices that favour white middle-class men. We can therefore understand the ‘resistance’ that majority groups express towards diversity initiatives, or to the ideas that underpin diversity management as a product of the shift in power that has been produced by the movement. In conclusion, I have argued that actions that organizations undertake to promote or manage diversity will be constructed in a variety of different ways depending on the stake that individuals have in constructing such acts in certain ways. I have argued that in constructing accounts of the organization’s practices with regard to diversity, a key stake for the two police officers discussed here is the extent to which this facilitates their selfconstitution in discourses of individual attainment and integrity. As I have shown, however, resistance to such practices is not confined to organizational dominants, and organizational dominants can express resistance to the idea that they are privileged relative to minorities. This, I believe, highlights the difficulty in attempting to introduce and manage initiatives that are intended to improve the lot of subordinated groups. The power relations that exist in any organization, and which are reproduced through hierarchy and discourses of individual attainment, ensure that any initiatives that are designed to further the interests of some groups will be targeted with discrediting discourses and thus will compromise the subjectivity of any individual who benefits through them, and ensures that the credibility of the initiative will always be called into question at some time or other. Critical management theorists have been particularly concerned with understanding how individuals react to (and resist) situations of domination, but the argument presented here is that we cannot characterize a situation as involving domination without getting into the problematic position of speaking on behalf of people who may not see the situation as we do. Instead we can transcend this problem by broadening our understanding of resistance, using a more Foucauldian position. Resistance can be also be understood as a subjective response to any situation that compromises the individual’s subjectivity. This need not necessarily be a situation that the individual understands as one of domination, but one that disrupts or challenges the individual’s take up of positions in discourses that constitute an ‘autonomous’ or ‘creditable’ self (Foucault, 1990). Finally, the analyses and arguments presented here suggest that it is rather limiting to characterize any given status quo as unproblematically privileging one group and subordinating another. As I have shown, members of both groups resist such characterizations because they can disrupt self-constitution in dominant liberaldemocratic discourses that celebrate individual attainment. I have argued that this discourse is a major axis of identity for police managers who aspire to upward mobility. If this is the case, then the idea that policewomen will collectively resist their subordination seems unlikely. Policewomen who do attribute failed promotion attempts

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to sex discrimination can be successful in Industrial Tribunals, as evidenced by the Alison Halford case. In 1992, Alison Halford the Assistant Chief Constable of Merseyside won an Industrial Tribunal on the grounds that she was denied promotion nine times on the grounds of her sex (Guardian, 30 June 1992). But the cost can be high. Frequently such women do not remain in the organization and some of the participants in my study believed that women like her were ‘out for what they could get’ (Dick and Cassell, 2002). For many policewomen, their identities as competent officers are more salient than their identities as women, largely as a product of the social relations within the organization and of the power relations that characterize the institution of policing (Dick and Cassell, 2004). It is these sites that need to be opened up for scrutiny if we are to deepen our understanding of the dynamics of diversity management.

References Barry, B. and Bateman, T.S. (1996) A Social Trap Analysis of the Management of Diversity. Academy of Management Review, 21, 3, 757–791. Boxall, P. (1996) The Strategic HRM Debate and the Resource-based View of the Firm. Human Resource Management Journal, 6, 3, 59–75. Braverman, H. (1974) Labor and Monopoly Capital. New York: Monthly Review Press. Brown, J.M. (1998) Aspects of Discriminatory Treatment of Women Police Officers Serving in Forces in England and Wales. British Journal of Criminology, 38, 2, 265–282. Cavanaugh, J.M. (1997) (In)corporating the Other? Managing the Politics of Workplace Difference. In P.Prasad, A.J.Mills, M.Elmes and A.Prasad (eds) Managing the Organizational Melting Pot: Dilemmas of Workforce Diversity. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. Collinson, D. (1994) Strategies of Resistance: Power, Knowledge and Subjectivity in the Workplace. In J.M.Jermier, D.Knights and W.R.Nord Resistance and Power in Organizations. London: Routledge. Cox, T. (1993) Cultural Diversity in Organizations: Theory, Research and Practice. San Francisco, CA: Berrett-Koehler. Dick, P. (2003) Organizational Efforts to Manage Diversity: Do they Really Work? In M.J.Davidson, S.L.Fielden(eds) Individual Diversity in Organizations. Chichester: Wiley. Dick, P. and Cassell, C. (2002) Barriers to Managing Diversity in a UK Police Constabulary: The Role of Discourse. Journal of Management Studies, 39, 7, 953–976. Dick, P. and Cassell, C. (2004) The Position of Policewomen: A Discourse Analytic Study. Work, Employment & Society, 18, 1, 51–72. Ellis, C. and Sonnenfield, J.A. (1994) Diverse Approaches to Managing Diversity. Human Resource Management, 33, 1, 79–109. Fairclough, N. (1992) Discourse and Social Change. Cambridge: Polity Press. Fleming, P. and Spicer, A. (2003) Working at a Cynical Distance: Implications for Power, Subjectivity and Resistance. Organization, 10, 1, 157–179. Foucault, M. (1977) Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison. London: Allen Lane. Foucault, M. (1980) Power/Knowledge: Selected Interviews and Other Writings, 1972–77, ed. Colin Gordon. Brighton: Harvester Press. Foucault, M. (1990) The History of Sexuality. Volume 3: The Care of the Self. London: Penguin. Garfinkel, H. (1967) Studies in Ethnomethodology. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: PrenticeHall. Heidensohn, F. (1992) Women in Control? The Role of Women in Law Enforcement. Oxford: Clarendon Press.

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Henriques, J. (1998) Social Psychology and the Politics of Racism. In J.Henriques, W.Hollway, C.Urwin, C.Venn and V.Walkerdine Changing the Subject: Psychology, Social Regulation and Subjectivity. London: Routledge. Hollway, W. (1989) Subjectivity and Method in Psychology: Gender, Meaning and Science. London: Sage. Jaques, R. (1997) The Unbearable Whiteness of Being: Reflections of a Pale, Stale, Male. In P.Prasad, A.J.Mills, M.Elmes and A.Prasad(eds) Managing the Organizational Melting Pot: Dilemmas of Workforce Diversity. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. Jermier, J.M., Knights, D. and Nord, W.R. (eds) (1994) Resistance and Power in Organizations. London: Routledge. Kandola, R. and Fullerton. J. (1998) Managing the Mosaic: Diversity in Action. London: IPD. Knights, D. and Vurdubakis, T. (1994) Foucault, Power, Resistance and All That. In J.M.Jermier, D.Knights and W.R.Nord Resistance and Power in Organizations. London: Routledge. Knights, D. and Willmott, H.C. (1989) Power and Subjectivity at Work: From Degradation to Subjugation in Social Relations. Sociology, 23, 4, 1–24. Kondo, D.K. (1990) Crafting Selves: Power, Gender and Discourses of Identity in a Japanese Workplace. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Liff, S. (1996) Managing Diversity: New Opportunities for Women? Industrial Relations Unit, Warwick University. Lorbiecki, A. and Jack, G. (2000) Critical Turns in the Evolution of Diversity Management. British Journal of Management, 11, S17-S31. Mama, A. (1995) Beyond the Masks: Race, Gender and Subjectivity. London: Routledge. Marshall, J. (1984) Women Managers: Travellers in a Male World. Chichester: Wiley. Prasad, P. and Mills, A.J. (1997) From Showcase to Shadow: Understanding the Dilemmas of Managing Workplace Diversity. In P.Prasad, A.J.Mills, M.Elmes and A.Prasad(eds) Managing the Organizational Melting Pot: Dilemmas of Workforce Diversity. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. Prasad, P., Mills, A.J., Elmes, M. and Prasad, A. (1997) Managing the Organizational Melting Pot: Dilemmas of Workforce Diversity. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. Reed, M. (1998) Organizational Analysis as Discourse Analysis: A Critique. In D.Grant, T.Keenoy and C.Oswick (eds) Discourse and Organization. London: Sage. Rose, N. (1996) Inventing Ourselves: Psychology, Power and Personhood. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Sheppard, D. (1989) Organizations, Power and Sexuality: The Image and Self-image of Women Managers. In J.Hearn, D.Sheppard, P.Tancred-Sherrif and G.Burrell (eds) The Sexuality of Organization. London: Sage. Smart, B. (1985) Michel Foucault. London: Routledge. Tucker, J. (1992) Everyday Forms of Employee Resistance. Sociological Forum, 8, 25–45.

5 Gendering new managerialism Kirstie S.Ball

This chapter argues that ‘new managerial’ practices, despite their emphasis on aspects of work which have elsewhere been gendered as ‘feminine’ (for example, teamworking and empowerment, see Arthur and Rousseau 1996; Thomson 1998), do not do anything to disrupt or challenge traditional gender orders in the workplace. Instead they are merely ‘refined’ by the intersection of gender identities with age and skill profiles, constituting and reinforcing resistant identities among employees. More traditional forms of discrimination against women in the workplace, which interpellate the home/work relationship, and domestic roles for women are still relevant in this respect (see Wajcman and Martin 2002 for empirical examples). As such, the primary focus of the chapter concerns the masculinities constituted through new managerialism, the types of other masculinities and femininities it either accepts or rejects, and how resistance to it occurs. In this chapter I discuss, first, some previous research findings concerning new managerialism. Using a poststructuralist conception of power and resistance, I then review some of the recent developments in the literature concerning masculinity, to facilitate a comprehension of its dynamics within discourses of workplace identity. Then, the accounts of four individuals from one case organization illustrate relational dynamics between discourses of gender and new managerialism, with resistance occurring at the intersection of these two discourses. A subject-centred discourse analytic approach is used to analyse the gender positions expressed, both in terms of their own discursive frameworks and the frameworks of previous research concerning masculinity and organizations. Using a poststructural conception of resistance it is examined as part of the everyday social fabric of organizational life, accomplished through discursive (re)constructions of organizational actors.

The rise of new managerialism New managerialism is a recent development in twentieth-century capitalism, which attempts to specify the ways in which western industrial organizations should be managed. Associated with the ‘enterprise culture’ of the 1980s (Ackers et al. 1996), its uptake has largely been observed and investigated in the context of the public sector and newly privatized utilities across Australia, New Zealand, Canada, the UK, and the USA, and, embryonically, Hong Kong (Dixon et al. 1998; Whitehead 2001). It was often posed as a radical solution to outdated bureaucratic practices within these types of organization, but also within larger, older private sector firms in response to an espoused need to become more competitive, flexible and customer- and quality-focused (Gewirtz and Ball 2000).

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New managerialism exhibits a concern with the achievement of targets, goals and standards, alongside a concern for managed culture, delegated decision-making, individual empowerment, and innovation at every organizational level (Grey 1996; Grey and Mitev 1995). There are three identifiable elements to new managerial writing: the excellence genre (Peters and Waterman 1982; Kotter 1982; Hickman and Silva 1985); total quality management (Deming 1982; Juran 1979; Crosby 1979); and business process re-engineering (Hammer and Champy 1991). Carter (1998) identifies four common emphases between these three managerialist genres. The first concerns culture and its link with performance. Organizational culture is constructed in all three genres as proactive and customer focused, with committed, empowered employees and charismatic leaders. The second is the de-emphasis of hierarchy, with a flat, team-based structure depicted as the ideal. The third concerns the achievement of controlled performance through self-management and empowerment. The fourth emphasis is measurability. Continuous improvement of organizational performance and target achievement must be ‘proven’ and hence there is a common emphasis on accountability for one’s performance and resource use (Sewell and Wilkinson 1992). To summarize, new managerialism is underpinned by behavioural assumptions which dictate competitive, opportunistic and entrepreneurial self-interest, applicable at the level of the individual as well as the organization, and often accompanied with a high level of commitment and performance (Terry 1998; Whitehead 2001). New managerialist d/Discourse?1 This chapter is concerned with how new managerialism is gendered, and constitutes gendered resistance in specific organizational settings. In order to examine the intersection of new managerialism, gender and power/resistance, it is important to explore associated ontological issues. In this instance, this concerns how we might view new managerialism simultaneously as a set of grand ideas about management in general, and as a set of observable meanings and practices which shape everyday organizational life, and what resistance to it might comprise. Previous analyses of new managerialism (e.g. Ball and Carter 2002) have adopted Foucauldian arguments concerning power/knowledge discourses (Foucault 1972) and local power relations (Foucault 1990) to examine this point. First, the emergence of new managerialism is viewed as a shift in the development of modern management knowledge, acting as a ‘grand discourse’, or a ‘regime of truth’ (Foucault 1972) for what constitutes ‘good practice’. Large-scale movements in fields of knowledge emerge when grand discourses become strategically codified in key institutions (Foucault 1990). Indeed new institutional frameworks have emerged which support, reinforce and circulate the discourse of new managerialism: the business school, the management consultancy, the popular management text, the professionalized management body (e.g. the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development), newly privatized utility companies, demutualized building societies (or credit unions), the introduction of internal markets into the UK national health service, as well as private sector restructuring. Nevertheless, while it is recognized that new managerialism is a ‘Discourse’ (Hodgson and Ball, 2004; Alvesson and Kärreman 2000) in the archaeological sense (Foucault

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1972), delimiting a field of knowledge, it is also argued, using the genealogical method, that this will emerge and disperse locally, occurring in everyday talk and text, or ‘discourse’. Indeed Burrell (1998) argued that it is possible to view organizational life using both of these perspectives. Put briefly, the genealogical method is concerned with how broader movements in power/knowledge feature in local scenarios, with the analyst mapping the lineage of social relations at different nodes in the institutional and paninstitutional web of power. This assertion is based on Foucault’s observations that power/knowledge acts in a capillary-like fashion; in other words, it does not emanate from a central source, but rather is dispersed around the dense web of institutions and individuals which constitute society. Because of the dispersed, local and fluid nature of power, opposition and resistance is seen to occur at every instance in an equal and opposite relation. Hence Foucault refers to the capillary-like operation of power/resistance as a system of power relations, which can be constructed from individual instances, and reactions to local circumstances, that interconnect from the bottom up to form an ensemble of power relations in society. In this respect, the suggestion that new managerial practices apply at the level of the individual (Grey 1996) as well as the organization and institution is an interesting one. Previous analyses (Ball and Carter 2002) have identified this set of ideas as constituting the new manager at an intersubjective level and were reproduced in varying degrees by non-managers. It was its selective reproduction which was intrinsically fascinating, bringing to the fore the question about how resistance to dominant managerial ideas might be conceptualized. Resisting new managerialism The first step is to recognize organizations as sites of power and resistance. Then managerial ideas are to be viewed as one of a set of discourses to which individuals within the organization are subject. The extent to which individuals comply with or resist these ideas, according to Knights (1992:518), depends upon ‘those ways in which individuals objectify themselves so as to recognize, and become committed to, a particular sense of their own subjectivity’. The question as to whether that ‘sense’ concurs with that expressed in dominant ideas is central. Moreover, because of the varied and multiple ways in which individuals construct senses of themselves, or their subject positions through their social practice (Collinson 1994), some level of resistance to any managerial discourse at work is inevitable. Collinson (1994) argues that gender, as well as ethnicity, class, religion, body shape and size, family, and sexual orientation all have a strong role to play in the construction of one’s in-work subject position. This chapter conceptualizes resistance in a number of ways. The first point is that it is an inevitability and part of the more mundane social fabric of organizational life. In many ways, conceiving resistance as part of the ‘everyday’ reflects its changing nature in the face of more hegemonic forms of organizational control (Barker 1993; Sewell 1998), the erosion of long-term employment and the decline of trade unionism in concert with the rise of the tertiary sector (Prasad and Prasad 2001). The latter authors explore the dynamics of a poststructural conception of resistance, with the central problematic being its observation and analysis in the absence of large-scale formal protest and collective antagonism observed in the mid-twentieth century. The second point is that resistant subject positions and activities will be discursively achieved by organizational members

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(Prasad and Prasad 2001). This conceptual move is accomplished by problematizing the causal link made by labour process theorists between intentionality, consciousness and resistance (Braverman 1974; Jermier 1988; Clegg 1994), and assertions made as to the calculative, purposive and deliberate nature of worker participation therein. It is argued instead that everyday worker resistance is ‘a configuration of emotional responses, patterned behaviour, intellectual assertions and reasoned decisions—related to specific worker subjectivities’ (Prasad and Prasad 2001:110). The latter authors show how categories of resistant behaviour are jointly constructed by workers and managers out of the reinterpretation of particular actions by employees, and feature the attribution of resistant intentions to gendered employees. A fine-grained examination of local organizational scenarios is supported, therefore, which identifies how everyday actions are constructed as resistant, particularly when attributions become intertwined with other aspects of subjectivity, such as gender (Whitehead 2001).

Power, resistance, gender and new managerialism In contrast to some published works on gender which concentrate on the biological distinctions between men and women as a basis for examining difference (Bellizzi and Hasty 2002; Ergeneli and Arikan 2002), this chapter follows the work of McDowell (2001) and Collinson and Hearn (1994), among others, who argue for conceptions of gender which are ‘multiple, variable, context dependent and unstable in contemporary workplaces’ (McDowell 2001:183). In other words, it does not focus upon biological difference as an explanatory variable, but rather upon the socially constructed nature of gender practices, which can be performed by either men or women in a number of different ways. This is echoed by Cheng (1996) who notes that masculinities can be performed by women. Further, Messerschmidt’s (1993:80) notion that ‘masculinity is accomplished, it is not something done to men or something settled beforehand. And masculinity is never static, never a finished product’ resonates with these points. Collinson and Hearn’s (1994) observation that gender frequently intersects with other bases of identity, for example, body type, class, or ethnicity is also relevant here. Sayer’s (2000) arguments concerning the gendering of bureaucracy as coincidental with, and legitimating of, a number of identity categories, one of which is a particular kind of masculinity, are also noted. As such, particular configurations of organization present a hegemonic potential for particular gender positions (Kerfoot and Whitehead 1998). Thus, no masculinity can arise external to a conceptualized set of gender relations, and is therefore culturally and historically located too. Organizational masculinities are understood in this context to be produced and reproduced in the complexities of social practice within organizations through time: between managers and subordinates, managers and managers, supervisors, men and women of all levels and function within the organization. This position is counter to dominant gender-blind theories of organization that are the bread and butter of mainstream business studies (e.g. Mintzberg 1973; Lawrence and Lorsch 1967), and also counter to those who suggest that to speak and write about gender in organizations is to refer to women alone (Maier 1999; Collinson and Hearn 1994). Until recently studies of leadership were almost exclusively considered to be the domain of the male (for a critical

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review, see Due Billing and Alvesson 2000). Weber’s (1968) theory of authority would be one such example (see also Ball and Carter 1998). The central argument of this chapter is that new managerialism reinforces dominant organizational masculinities and does nothing to challenge traditional gender orders in the organization. Various studies of gender and management essentialize management as being imbued with a stereotypical masculinity of rationality, efficiency, ambition and superiority in decision-making at the expense of emotion (Kerfoot and Knights 1996; Marshall 1984, 1993; Kanter 1977). Cheng (1996) notes that hegemonic masculinity is the organizing principle for modern organizations—the so-called hegemonic potential identified by Kerfoot and Whitehead (1998). Roper (1995) emphasizes a further aspect of ‘women’s organizational roles’—those of support: the provision of emotional labour. Emotional labour is defined as ‘the manipulation of one’s own and others’ emotions in order to create an atmosphere of contentment’ (Hochschild 1983). Recent additions to this debate include Rutherford (2001) who argues that even when supposedly ‘feminine’ attributes are introduced into management (such as participative leadership, for example), with a strong basis in emotionality, the effect is to valorize men for their flexibility, rather than include any of these practices as explicitly feminine. However, McDowell (2001) argued that men frequently accomplish emotions in the workplace through ‘informalist’ strategies, such as use of humour. The plot thickens when relations between men are considered: a multiplicity of micro power relations concerning formal and informal hierarchy, idealized masculinity and patriarchal ideology emerge. Thus Collinson and Hearn’s (1994) contention that there are multiple masculinities and multiple managements is endorsed. Collinson (1992), for example, outlines a fascinating web of masculine subcultures and identities in a study of shop floor workers in Lancashire. Their self-identifying narratives are split into several sections: the importance of sexuality; being a breadwinner; being productive; being a working man; the rejection of promotion; the maintenance of shop floor divisions. Roper (1995) argues that between male managers angst and contradiction pervade their selfconstructions. Images of combat and struggle typify their language when they speak of their work experiences, promotions, youth and colleagues. Acting as a hard man was described by Roper as ‘the cult of toughness’ which was born as much out of fear of oppression as out of a need to dominate. This cult of toughness as a hegemonic masculinity and its organizational power is described in studies of the space shuttle Challenger disaster (Maier 1997; Messerschmidt 1996). It is also strongly aligned with notions of male embodiment (Monaghan 2002). More generally, Collinson and Hearn (1994:13–16) argue that relations between men at work are expressed through five different organizational discourses and practices of masculinity. Authoritarianism: ‘an intolerance of dissent or difference, a rejection of dialogue and debate and a preference for coercive power relations’; Paternalism: an emphasis on the ‘moral basis of co-operation, the protective nature of their authority, the importance of personal trust relations’; Entrepreneurialism: ‘a hard nosed and highly competitive approach to business’; Informalism: ‘informal workplace relationships with one another on the basis of shared masculine interests and common values’; and Careerism: ‘an excessive concern with impression management and the differentiation and elevation of the self’.

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These and other works (e.g. Connell 1995) present gender as a structure of social practice which (1) is used to construct multiple workplace identities within an organizational system (Roper 1995; Collinson 1992); (2) encompasses discourses of masculinity which are external to the workplace, yet are used to great effect therein (Edley and Wetherell 1995); (3) encompasses multiple forms of masculinity which are used to ends which can have very real outcomes for organizational performance (Maier 1997; Messerschmidt 1996). Furthermore, these discourses can be used by any organizational member to any end of social interaction. Indeed, as Collinson and Hearn assert: Men’s search to construct these identities often draws upon a whole variety of organizational resources, discourses and practices. This ‘identity work’ (Thompson and McHugh 1990) also appears to be an ongoing, never ending project which is frequently characterized by ambiguity, tension and uncertainty (Brittan 1989). Masculine identities constantly have to be constructed, negotiated and reconstructed in routine social interaction, both in the workplace and elsewhere. (1994:8) Whitehead (2001) suggested that moves towards more managerialist, entrepreneurial culture, which is sustained by new practices and knowledges, also have a gender ordering effect. It is on this note that the case and method of this chapter are discussed. In the following pages, data from a case study of a large financial organization will be examined to reveal, first, how masculinity is constituted in a new managerial climate; second, how the differences between male and female employees are achieved; and third, how a dominant masculinity is negotiated and resisted. Sample and method Data are drawn from the accounts of three individuals working in the debt collection department of a large building society in the north of England: Andy, the manager; Tony, the assistant manager; and Matt, a senior clerk. The accounts themselves were collected as part of a larger study investigating computer-based monitoring in service sector companies. A total of ten people were interviewed and respondents were chosen on the basis of a structured sample. At any one time six teams of six (comprising two senior clerks and four clerks) were at work, each with a supervisor. There were two assistant managers and one manager. Of the ten people interviewed, five were male and five female. At the time of the study, the department was about to begin a process of considerable change, as was the organization wherein it was located. The changes are significant in relation to earlier discussion of new managerialism, because the organization, a building society, was about to go through the early phases of demutualization.2 The method of analysis advocates a subject-centred approach to the accounts which encompasses both form and content, and centralizes the notion that talk acts as a form of social practice. This draws heavily upon work from social psychology which emphasizes the movement and problematizing of subject positions within conversation exchanges

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(see Wetherell 1998; Wetherell and Edley 1997; Edley and Wetherell 1998; Törrönen 2001), and the identification of ‘interpretive repertoires’ within and between accounts. Implicit in this approach is the assertion that accounts will sometimes be inherently discontinuous and perhaps even contradictory. Within one conversation (typically an interview), an individual may employ different repertoires, positioning themselves and others within them as they speak. Potential positions include the untroubled position (where the individual’s account remains comfortable within the orientation of the conversation), and the troubled position (indicating discomfort). It is postulated that subjects use repertoires in the construction of their own identity and the world around them. In this sense, Potter and Wetherell (1987) assert that talk is strongly reflective of context—of local and broader discursive systems. As such, this method will be used to analyse how compliant and resistant subject positions are created, and what discursive resources are used in the process. In the following pages, an introduction to the department and its culture will be followed by an examination of the specific accounts of employees. The department, its men, and its women The department had been in existence since 1990, with the launch of the company’s personal loans product. With the overall objective of collecting money from debtors, it was the task of each operator to telephone customers who had fallen into arrears on their personal loans, and arrange payment plans with them. Work in the department was entirely telephone and computer mediated, and performance, measured by the amount of money collected by each operator, was monitored via the computer. One year after its conception, the management of the department changed to the individual focused on in this study. This manager introduced ‘new managerialist’ conceptions of management into the department, which had hitherto been run using the ‘traditional’ building society management style. This traditional style was described as being rule-based, and the new manager acknowledged that the department he had created was radically different from the rest of the organization. While still adhering to rules, performance targets and conventions, the manager used an unusual form of empowerment which made his department a very different place to work. After spending some time there, the nature of this ‘empowerment’ began to become apparent. It concerned, first, the creative compliance with existing organizational ‘rules’, and second, the importance of participating in activities with one’s workmates outside work. The staff and management of the department had devised their own methods to ensure performance targets were met, and to ensure that operating procedures were adhered to. Underpinning this was the department’s own brand of humour, which involved (to put it mildly) poking fun at one’s colleagues, one’s management and the organization. Indeed, many of the staff interviewed reported that the department had a strong ‘work hard, play hard’ culture. To ensure compliance with performance targets, staff devised a number of ‘competitions’ to see who could collect the most money. Rather than working in their designated teams, staff joined with members of other teams and made informal debt collection groups to compete in self-styled ‘themed competitions’. One was named ‘beach party’, another ‘pub crawl’, and the ‘scoreboards’ were colourful hand-drawn

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murals depicting the score system, with each staff member having their own comedy ‘body’ and photo head. This was in stark contrast to the sterile performance tables in the corner. Prizes for the winners of the competition were items of junk found in various people’s old record collections, lofts and garages. Rule adherence was also ensured using humour. For example, at every coffee break operators were required to log out of the computer system. If an operator had forgotten to do this, a senior clerk (male) would pen a bawdy poem about the individual concerned and send it to everybody (including management) via email. The content of these poems is unrepeatable, but it essentially poked fun at the perpetrator, in a very sexual and misogynist way. The protagonist assumed the majority of staff would ‘see the funny side’ of this, and so the poems persisted indefinitely. A system of fines for rule-breaking was also in existence, the results of which were also broadcast via email. Moreover, every Wednesday evening, the ‘lads’, their assistant manager and their manager played football together and on a Friday evening many also went to the pub after work. It became evident that these practices were part of the social fabric of the department, and were endorsed, even participated in, by management. Although many of the informants enjoyed working in the department, there was a small group of people who were labelled as ‘resistant’, or non-compliant. These employees were older women, whose employment had preceded that of the manager, the computer system, and many of their younger colleagues. While they were included in the informal ‘competitions’, they did not participate in any of the after-work activities, nor were they included in the bawdy email poem circulation. In fact, they had formed their own group, known in the department as the ‘coffee group’ and they went on their breaks and lunches together. The group were labelled ‘resistant’ because of other employees’ perceptions that all they did on their coffee breaks was ‘moan’. This was, in fact, the actual extent of their resistance—expressing dissent to each other, and removing themselves from anything outside the task-related aspects of their work. There was no sabotage or collective withdrawal of physical or mental labour on their part. What is more interesting is the manner in which these resistant subjectivities were constructed by their fellow workers—the basis of their discursive accomplishments is of far greater concern. To this end, a finegrained analysis of their colleagues’ accounts will be conducted, beginning with that of Andy, the manager, and following with those of Tony, the assistant manager, and Matt, a senior clerk. The manager, Andy, saw his approach to management as something which was subversive to the organization, contrasting with its inhuman bureaucratic ethos. The department’s approach is instantly valorized in the following extract—indeed, many of the extracts from his account in this section problematize the organization as old and formal, and position the department and the manager’s personal style as preferred, up to date, and having an element of daring and risk: ‘we run with a different culture…I mean we’re empowering people… let people think, people do the job, designing their own jobs…and we run it with a sense of humour, whereas in other places it’s all about control…I mean stuff like the netmails and things. I mean we’d get murdered if anyone came across it.’

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Andy was a powerful figurehead for the department. He had been working as departmental manager for five years having previously worked in a similar role in another organization. He was employed to turn the department around from a loss of £35 million in its first year, to a profit of a quarter of a million in its fifth. His management style originally was autocratic and disciplinarian, to reinforce the importance of targets above all else. Once the initial problems had been overcome, his style had changed to a new managerialist approach, focusing on (in his words) empowerment, as well as performance. His account of the process appears to be gender neutral. However, it will be shown that other readings of his style are not, and this had repercussions within the department. He described his approach thus: ‘you could write a job description or job profile of somebody and then that sort of person fits in nicely and everybody’s happy, but I don’t like that. I’d rather have somebody who’s always trying to, not always trying to be one level above, but like to have a blend of people who do the job and are happy doing the job, but I like to see people trying to actually do outside of their job description, to try and impress. Those are the sort of people who impress me.’ Implicit in this extract is the overriding sense that this manager perceives himself to be in control: he ‘has’ staff and wants them to ‘impress’ him. His benevolence is conditional upon the individual demonstrating empowerment and innovation to him on his terms. He is also quick to admonish: ‘I tend to pull ’em up straight away—if they’ve done something wrong or if they’ve done something well then I tell ’em—they know straight away with me.’ Control and empowerment are thus interdependent, and the gendered nature of this approach is demonstrated next through Andy’s self-positioning as being ‘tough’ and ‘hard’ as a performance manager. This is something that he sees the broader organization as lacking. Again, problematizing the position of the organization, this time using its ‘soft’ as a contrast to his ‘hard’, he distinguishes himself as the only person who is ‘tough about firing people’. ‘I think the culture’s far too soft…far too easy, far too easy going. Not enough people are sacked for being incompetent. Poor performance isn’t penalized. I think at times the organization is very weak…I think the only person I know who’s fired anybody is me.’ This is further reinforced by his admission that he is not good at ‘personal stuff’ which he leaves to the assistant managers (one male and one female). This soft/hard dualism is echoed in a number of other accounts, facilitating a marginalization of the less/nonmasculine elements of the department. The manager has considerable influence over his subordinates (particularly in respect of this latter point). Tony, his male assistant manager, talks of Andy as someone who is to be admired and is maybe even charismatic,

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as he says ‘I try to follow a lot of the things [Andy] does because I think he’s an excellent manager…it’s the way he does things but it’s hard to describe’. Having risen through the ranks of the department, Tony is one of the manager’s empowered protégés. When Andy’s management style was discussed in detail with his subordinates, the gendered nature of his practice began to emerge: ‘it’s the way he susses people out…he may go up to one of the ladies in there and be all nicey nicey to them because they like that. Not saying specifically a lady, but maybe one of the men in the department. It’s the way he treats individuals differently. He knows that some people will respond if he goes over and takes the mickey out of one of the young lads who thinks ‘I’m going to be the best, I’m going to perform”, then they would respond to that and I pretty much try to follow that myself.’ (Tony) It is interesting that this gender-based difference emanates from the fact that women, according to this man, and his manager, like a ‘nicey nicey’ approach. It is as if the women in the department are being ‘sheltered’ by the males from male boisterousness, exhibited also in the self-regulating humour of email. Indeed, they are frequently positioned as ‘different’ or ‘other’ by the men, which lays the foundations upon which resistant subjectivities can be built. Matt, the perpetrator of the bawdy poems, elaborates further when he relates the tale of his and others’ promotions in the department. Andy had offered Matt his promotion six months earlier and then appeared to not follow it up. Six months later, Matt found himself sitting in Andy’s office enquiring as to the whereabouts of the promised promotion. Matt’s interpretation of this was that Andy, the manager, wanted ‘to see what I would do’. Having displayed the behaviour that Andy had wanted, Matt gained his reward. This controlling relationship, which only manifested itself through Matt’s self-empowerment, ensured a reward for Matt, and a confirmed sense of control for Andy. Matt constructed Andy as the benevolent but frightening authoritarian. ‘So some people [say] “I don’t trust him, he’s promised me this” but they won’t go and see him about it and in effect it’s their own problem, it’s their own fault—they should take it on yourselves, to do something. But that kind of thing won’t develop, they’re scared to approach him. Which I find difficult anyway.’ Matt positions himself as ‘empowered’ within this regime, since he differentiates himself from those who are ‘scared’ to approach Andy with requests or problems. For Matt, approaching management is a matter of ‘bravery’. Further on in the conversation, he admits that his privileged access to management as a departmental footballer is potentially discriminatory against female non-footballing members of the department. At first he notes the apparent dejection of the women who are faced with these exclusions, but he then justifies the current departmental positions of the football players. This makes the females’ protests seem irrational:

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‘for some it’s a case of “Well I won’t get anywhere in here”. It isn’t strictly that…it’s a case of he, the people who he plays football with, when they started they were…in the positions where they should be now anyway—because I play and I got promoted and it was a case of “You only got promoted ‘cos you play football” which to me it was “No I ain’t, honest”.’ Another male respondent, who was a clerk, further noted the dissent from female members of staff regarding football and drinking, remarking that some perceived it as unfair. Matt also asserted his identity as a young, technologically astute worker. Inspired by his boss’s management style, he is critical of the older workers (all female), using domestic discourses in a patronizing way to assert his own technological competency, again using references to being ‘frightened’ and ‘scared’ to distinguish himself from other workers: ‘Shall we say the more mature ladies of the section; shall we say the younger ones such as myself and those who have come in and know no different are fine. The others, well it used to be files and they preferred the files ‘cos it was easier. Maybe they’re scared of the technology—I don’t know if they use the remote controls at home.’ According to Matt’s account social divisions exist within the department between a ‘core’ group of young males and management, a first-order periphery of younger females and a second-order periphery of older females. Matt spoke of ‘technically fading out’ the older women, and many informal conversations with informants revealed their frustration at there even being contradictory or bad feelings in the department, despite the fact that there was no resistant action on the part of those concerned.

Discussion These data are rich in examples of how a text that was originally read as gender neutral could be analysed to take account of masculinist discourse and practice within the workplace. While the limitations of this study are acknowledged, particularly in relation to sample size, time-scale and the gender of the respondents, several conclusions can be drawn in relation to the three questions the chapter posed. The first question concerned how masculinity was constituted in a new managerial climate; the second concerned how male/female differences were achieved; and the third concerned how the dominant masculinity was negotiated and resisted. At the beginning of the chapter, the core characteristics of new managerialism were outlined: an emphasis on culture, empowerment and measured performance, and a deemphasis of bureaucracy. The new managerial approach taken in this department was evident by the way in which its manager adopted a strong performance orientation, augmented by the use of ‘empowerment’-based notions which emphasized employee choice, participation, rule-bending and extra-work activities. While the department had an underlying basis of target achievement, and measurement of that achievement, the

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manager was a self-professed user of empowerment tactics to get the best from his staff, and all acknowledged how a strong culture of ‘work hard, play hard’ had developed. Throughout his talk, the manager also positioned the department in opposition to the dominant approach in the organization, characterized as inter alia rule-bound, and slow to respond to any changes. It is fair to say that this manager characterized himself as a ‘new’ manager, whose avowed use of interpersonal motivational techniques set him apart from his peers within his organizational context. In terms of the question of gender, power and resistance, what is critical is the discursive basis of the manager’s positioning as a ‘new’ manager. Discursive moves which privileged ‘hard’ over ‘soft’, ‘brave’ over ‘scared’, ‘technology’ over ‘domestic’, ‘sporting’ over ‘non-sporting’, ‘gamesman-ship’ over ‘non-participation’ and ‘beer’ over ‘coffee’, formed the bases of the manager’s and his emulator’s secure positioning, as those who were in control, or in favour. Repertoires relating to toughness and gamesmanship are suggested by the analysis. While there is an obvious gendering of these words, their use to build discursive distance between what it was to be in an ‘in’ group, and in an ‘out’ group, accomplished the alienation of the coffee group. None of the employees actually knew what went on in the group, but their dis-identification with everything the department stood for meant their status as resistants was accomplished. The particular age, gender and skill characteristics of these workers were absolutely fundamental to this process. Moreover, even the younger females, and some males, were reported to have complained that they weren’t being given a fair chance at promotion, which was interpreted by one respondent (Matt) to reflect on their unwillingness to comply with the unwritten rules of the ‘promotion game’ set by Andy. In this sense, Matt constructs a sense of blame, to be levelled at the feet of those employees who are ‘scared’ to approach Andy—or are not, in the manager’s words, ‘empowered’. The tough basis of this ‘game’ may well be having subtle gender-ordering effects as the out-group of younger employees becomes identified as complaining, much like the older females were. A further distinction concerned the technological abilities of the older women—a point which resonates strongly with Prasad and Prasad’s (2001) observation concerning how new information technology becomes ‘masculinised’, and can alienate female employees. Domestic ideas were mobilized to this end, further demonstrating, first, the intersection of gender with other bases of identity, but, more importantly, that the traditional method of distinguishing between masculinities and femininities—by reference to women’s external roles in the home—is alive and well. Again this is a profound distinction within the case study, as the ability to participate in extra-work activities of sport and drinking, and one’s extra-work subjectivities, reflected on one’s position and status in the department. Overall, the dominant ideas expressed built a hegemonic masculinity based on informalism and ‘tough’ action oriented towards problem-solving and efficiency (Collinson and Hearn 1994; Roper 1995). This hegemonic potential also echoes various stereotypical organizational masculinities, discussed earlier (Kerfoot and Knights 1996; Marshall 1984, 1993; Kanter 1977), and discourse analysis revealed how these ideas were mobilized, and differentiated between employees—both male and female. The informalism within Andy’s management style was reproduced by his subordinates, and combined with paternalist notions where Andy became a pseudo father figure for the

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males who wanted to emulate and impress him and secure promotion and favour. The basis of participation was on extra-work activities, and in-work ‘joking practices’ which appealed to the younger male members of the department. Collinson and Hearn (1994:14) note that informalism rests upon the base of ‘shared masculine interests and common values’ and McDowell (2001:185) identifies ‘locker room attributes of sex, sport and drink that unite men and exclude women’ to be at its core. A mobilization of empowerment ideas using this discourse created a hegemonic potential which was exclusionary to those whose personal preferences did not match it. Furthermore, in contrast to previous research which has argued that new managerial and leadership practices actually embody more ‘feminine’ attributes, its basis in this case serves to reinforce the dominance of masculinities, particularly those that coincide with a particular age and skill profile. All of the accounts demonstrated that external biological and biographical discourses (Clegg 1994) affected the reproduction of management discourses, as did the discourses associated with one’s own role within the department. The findings of this chapter are thus in contrast to those of Whitehead (2001). He argued, in the context of further education, that new managerialism promotes shifts in gender orders, whereas here it has merely reinforced old ones, perhaps refining them where the gender order intersects with the age order. Incidentally, the extended experience and knowledge of the older women was not referred to at any point in the interviews. Above all this chapter confirms Prasad and Prasad’s (2001) findings that even when resistance is ambiguous, benign or non-existent, the discursive accomplishment of resistant subject positions by organizational members often affirms latent power relations. In the case study, it became clear that power relations were based upon traditional gender orders, mobilized into the language of new managerialism—with an emphasis on ‘hard’ measurements, ‘tough’ decisions, and ‘sportsmanlike’ rule-bending. Discourse analysis revealed that the intersection of new managerial ideas with informalist and paternalist masculinities distinguished powerful and resistant groups within an organizational context. Resistance to the informalism and paternalism that dominate this context is accomplished to a very limited extent. Ultimately, these older employees voted with their feet and left the department before its move to an office in a different city— even though it was within commuting distance of the old premises.

Conclusion In conclusion, while new managerialism is not presented as a concrete or finite set of principles, its common components across its many reincarnations, when subjected to a gender analysis, make interesting reading. Collinson and Hearn’s (1994:17) suggestion that ‘new managerial initiatives such as total quality management (TQM) and “empowerment” presuppose an entirely different way of managing that may be antithetical to the masculine and hierarchical identities and notions of authority of conventional management’ has been somewhat challenged. In this case, empowerment was constructed as being based on a patriarchal notion of benevolent control, and strong informalist practices which reinforced toughness, game-playing, sport and sexualized humour. Further, the individual who did not expressly reproduce new managerialist

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discourse still identified the manager as paternalistic and even authoritarian. The selfidentified ‘empowered’ staff were also participants in informalist practices, again a configuration of masculinity outlined in previous research. Therefore, while new managerialism has its own set of normalizing discourses, legitimizing principles and practices, its de-masculinization of management is not in evidence. Its principles of control still rest upon the more ‘traditional’ masculine workplace identities, which are still used (in this case) to legitimize gender-based discrimination and othering, and hence to reinforce the dominance of hegemonic masculinities at work.

Notes 1 Alvesson and Kärreman (2000) refer to the difference between ‘big D’ and ‘little d’ discourses to distinguish between grand and local levels of discursive analysis. 2 Mutual building societies were founded upon the Victorian ideal of self-help (Clarke 1998). Originally, individuals contributed their savings to the society so that it could buy property for contributing members. By the mid-1990s, it was widely believed that this form of capital ownership was flagging, and many societies de-mutualized, becoming public limited companies, with shareholders, rather than members. Arguments for de-mutualization reflected a more customer- and market-oriented ethos, stating that societies would have more freedom as to how they met customer needs. Many new customers were not members of building societies, opting instead for their bank-like products (e.g. credit cards, personal loans, etc.). In short, much as with newly privatized utilities, through de-mutualization, the mutuals were opening themselves up to a whole new level and intensity of competition. A rethinking of how the societies were managed in the light of these changes was expected by many commentators (Clarke 1998; Speed 1990; McGoldrick and Greenland 1992).

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6 Gendered identities and micro-political resistance in public service organizations Annette Davies and Robyn Thomas

Introduction Within the field of organization studies, resistance tends to be framed within a workermanagement dialectic, the outcome of structural relations of antagonism between capital and labour (Knights and McCabe 2000). Consequently, resistance is constructed within a negative paradigm as a worker corps kicking back against management control. However, within poststructuralist feminist theorizing emphasis has been placed on a ‘generative’, rather than a negative, paradigm of individual agency, moving from ‘resistance against’ to a reinscription of meanings (Butler 1990; Weedon 1987; McNay 2000). The ability of the agent to ‘make a difference’ emphasizes the individual’s role as a political player in (re)writing discourses. This focus at the micro-political level centres on forms of individual struggle over meanings and subjectivities, rather than on specific acts and behaviours. Resistance arises at points of contestation and contradiction within discursive fields, presenting spaces for alternative meanings and subjectivities, and new forms of practice. Ontologically, this presents the notion of the ‘antagonistic’ subject ‘waging a micro guerrilla war’ (Alvesson and Sköldberg 2000) against subjectivizing forces; subjects therefore with the will and capacity to seek alternatives. In practical terms this offers a conceptualization of resistance which focuses on how individuals, when faced with complexity and difference, respond in unanticipated and innovative ways that may hinder or reinforce social change. The focus of this chapter is to illustrate this process of resistance by drawing on two texts from a study examining the changing roles and professional identities in UK public service organizations. We explore how these two individuals come to know and challenge the ways in which their identities are constituted through prevailing organizational discourses. We focus on the multidirectional and generative nature of the process of identity construction as individuals exploit the looseness around meanings in a constant and simultaneous process of resistance, reproduction and reinscription. The texts illustrate the process of micro-political resistance in the form of critical reflection arising from a self-conscious relation with ‘self as other’ and the subject position offered in discourse. Starting with an overview of the long-debated issues of praxis, agency and resistance within feminist theory, the chapter then outlines the contributions of poststructuralist feminism (in particular, Foucauldian feminism) to our understanding of resistance. We draw on the texts of Kate, a civilian manager in the police service, and Susan, a head teacher, to illustrate the process of micro-political resistance in specific organizational

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settings. For feminists, there is much promise in a micro-political theorizing of resistance and the discussion section examines the implications of our theorizing of resistance for feminist praxis, questioning the political adequacy of resistance at the micro-political level. The chapter concludes by considering the contributions that a micro-political approach to resistance can offer in providing an active account of individual agency that is located within the social world of power relations.

Feminist politics The root of feminist theory is a practical politics and a commitment to justice, emancipation and progress. As Weedon (1987:1) argues, ‘Feminism is a politics’. The political agenda of feminism is about understanding and addressing women’s subordination and oppression. A feminist praxis is therefore focused on not only studying but also changing the world. Hence, resistance as a concept has a long pedigree in feminist theory. However, there is less agreement on the means for bringing about praxis. Feminism is not a unified approach and feminist theory has many fiercely debated positions. Claims and counter-claims, posturing and positioning are as much a feature between different feminists as between feminists and non-feminist critics. As Marshall (1995) observes, doing feminist research is like walking in a minefield, with plenty of places where it is dangerous to tread. This debate has its roots in early tensions arising between the two dominant voices in feminist politics, that of liberal feminism with the demand for individual rights, and the more collectivist approaches of socialist feminism where the focus is on class interests and the oppressive nature of capitalist systems. Within liberal feminism, the political agenda and strategies of change are based on the principle of ‘sameness’, treating men and women as the same and removing barriers from disadvantaged groups. Resistance is therefore directed at improving access and equality for women within existing structures so that they are able to compete with men. Liberal feminists are often criticized by their more ‘radical’ sisters for failing to tackle deep structures of inequality, asymmetrical power relations or values that are essentially male (Bryson 1999). While socialist feminists, in emphasizing the influence of social structures of power and domination, have attempted to utilize Marxism in feminist praxis, others are more critical of the relationship between Marxism and feminism. Hartman (1986), for example, refers to the relationship as an ‘unhappy marriage’, where feminism has a secondary status. The idea inherent within the socialist agenda was that ‘gender equality’ would be achieved ‘after the revolution’ when the development of a less exploitative system would be in the interest of both men and women. Socialist feminists were therefore urged to engage in class struggle alongside their male comrades to achieve a more equitable society. However, frustrated by the failure to prioritize the political imperatives of gender equality, many feminists in the 1960s turned away from socialism towards a different radical agenda. Radical feminism urges women, as an oppressed group, to struggle for their liberation, not only against capitalism but also, more importantly, against their oppressors who were men. The focus was on patriarchy as a system of oppression and on the way that male power and values permeate all areas of women’s lives. Underlying radical feminism is

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the concept of consciousness-raising as an arena where personal experiences of oppressions could be shared in a supportive context. According to Bryson (1999) this activity gave rise to the slogan—‘the personal is political’ (our emphasis) and to the idea that all women could unite and gain strength in a common ‘sisterhood’. Male oppression in the family and in personal relationships is therefore seen to be as significant a problem as gender inequality in legislation and capitalist economies. The political agenda that emerged privileged the ‘feminine’ and women as different and better than men. Women, in their struggle for equality, are encouraged to seek alternative ways of living and working. The rise in Black feminism and the influence of postmodernism since the late 1980s have resulted in a number of criticisms of this radical agenda. These more recent debates within feminist theory exposed the tensions between an approach that emphasizes women’s shared experiences and those feminists that highlight the importance of difference and diversity between women. As radical feminism penetrated into women’s personal lives and encouraged women to voice their unhappiness with men, any indication of positive male/female relationships were dismissed as ‘false consciousness’. The only feasible political strategy for women within this approach is lesbian separatism. Although there are other, less hardline forms of radical feminism and different types of radical strategies, the struggle for female equality or even ‘domination’ is viewed as a significant and difficult process in which women need to organize and struggle separately from men. These feminist standpoint theories, which include radical and socialist or materialist feminism, have been criticized by poststructuralist theorists for producing too limited a view of the power and ‘agency’ of women in transforming gender relations. McNay (2000), for example, in highlighting the difference between ‘material’ and ‘symbolic’ feminism, argues that material feminists, in emphasizing the persistence of gender inequality embedded within structures and systems, presents too cautious a view of the potential for a transformation of gender relations than certain work within symbolic feminism (McNay 2000:16). The emphasis has been placed on a determinist analysis of oppressive structures and therefore lacks any real understanding of the way that these structural forces are worked through at the level of subject formation and agency. The socialist and radical feminist agendas have both been accused of producing a view of women as helpless victims rather than celebrating their resistance and potential power. Whereas again this is not a criticism that can be levelled against all such feminists, tensions over resistance, female identity and power have a long history within feminist theorizing and current poststructuralist debates have heightened controversy within this area. While poststructural feminism incorporates a complex set of positions, the emphasis generally is on the diversity and variety in women’s lives and on the many ways in which women are different from men and also different from one another. As Sawicki (1991) argues, women are able to construct different ways for themselves to be women and can play different roles in challenging conventional ways of seeing the world. In direct conflict with a radical feminist agenda it questions the notion of a woman’s perspective and women’s distinct and unique experiences. Gender categories are rendered unstable and problematic, with gender no longer being viewed as a simple, natural fact (Flax 1987). In terms of feminist praxis, the emphasis is not focused on replacing one standpoint (masculine) with another (feminine) but on constructing a politics that avoids

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privileging any one standpoint as having access to something that is thought to be the truth. Given the focus on multiplicity and diversity and the critique of systems of truth, this presents a complex situation for the articulation of emancipatory practices. In the following section we will examine in detail the way that feminists have appropriated the poststructuralist writing of Foucault in writing an emancipatory politics and formulating political challenge.

Resistance and Foucauldian feminism The work of Foucault has been drawn on extensively by feminist theorists, notably his ideas on disciplinary power and resistance (Sawicki 1994). In relation to studies on organizations, Foucauldian feminists have examined questions of asymmetrical power relations and the relationship between power/knowledge and self-identity. The interest for Foucauldian feminists has been in the move away from ahistorical theories of patriarchy and female subordination to present a more ‘constructive’ notion of agency that recognizes gender identity as robust yet not immutable (McNay 2000). By questioning the notion of fixed and stable (gender) identities, and recognizing that identities are socially constructed rather than biologically determined, Foucauldian feminism has opened up new spaces fofr ‘alternative voices, new forms of subjectivity, previously marginalized narratives and new interpretations, meanings and values’ (Weedon 1999:4). The appropriation of Foucauldian concepts by feminists can be seen to fall roughly into two camps (Sawicki 1994). First, there has been considerable interest in Foucault’s analysis of disciplinary power. Here, feminist theorists have examined forms of disciplinary technologies that subjugate women as both subjects and objects of knowledge. Drawing on the strength of disciplinary power in contemporary society, Bordo (1993), for example, comments on the strength of normalizing discourses especially in relation to a politics of the body. To resist such norms she argues, means not only to go against what is culturally acceptable but is also extremely risky and difficult for the individual. As Bordo argues: The pleasure and power of ‘difference’ is hard-won; it does not freely bloom, insistently nudging its way through the cracks of dominant forms. Sexism, racism and ‘ageism’, while they do not determine human value and choices, while they do not deprive us of ‘agency’, remain strongly normalising within our culture. (1993:199) While the work of Bordo (1993) as well as, for example, Bartky (1990) has highlighted the gender-specific nature of certain forms of disciplinary power, the impression given is of a disciplinary power that is so strong and profound that resistance is not possible. However, this work has been criticized by a second group of Foucauldian feminist theorists who are critical of an over-deterministic view of the subject constituted by operations of power upon the body. These writers, in appropriating Foucault for feminist praxis, focus on the possibilities of resistance and struggle presented in his analysis, and

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on the ability to access power in order to challenge the socially constituted ‘truths’ within which sexual and other identities are constrained. The work of Foucault offers a productive release for these feminists in challenging taken-for-granted ways of being and knowing. McNay (2000) argues that it is necessary to explore forms of identity that escape the double bind of the individualizing and totalizing forces of modern power structures, arguing that the object of such exploration is not to discover ‘what we are, but to refuse what we are’. It is the immanent nature of power that offers a broad-based conceptualization of resistance: through language, individual subjectivity, social institutions and social processes are defined, constituted and contested. It is through language that the self becomes and it is through language that we can become who we want to be. Practices of the self can be identified through reflection, critique and problematization, to formulate tactics whereby we can live in the world. We can thus understand the individual as a: site for competing and often contradictory modes of subjectivity which together constitute a person. Modes of subjectivity are constituted within discursive practices and lived by the individual as if she or he were a fully coherent intentional subject. (Weedon 1999:104) Hekman (1990) argues that Foucault offers a different kind of politics that fosters resistance without reference to a constituting subject or absolute values. She supports the usefulness of Foucault for feminism in that it enables the confrontation of the particularity of women’s subordination, suggesting that we must oppose power/knowledge discourses that subordinate women everywhere throughout society. She argues that the result of such an approach is not political acquiescence, but rather a broad-based political resistance (Hekman 1990). For Butler (1990) this resistance, or subversion, of identity comes from ‘practices of repetitive signifying’ (e.g. the macho gay, lipstick lesbian, assertive female)—all representing subjugated experiences that lie outside the hegemonic gender norms, challenging its coherence and stability, and prefiguring other identities. Similarly, Kondo’s (1990) account of mundane interactions on the shop floor of a Japanese familyowned manufacturing plant points to the agency of human beings in the small everyday acts of resistance to hegemonic ideologies. She argues that practices which have usually been unnoticed or dismissed by grand theory as mere accommodations or false consciousness assume a new political weight, allowing us to find unlikely places of resistance and protest. Kondo, in analysing the stories of the female craft workers in her study, argues that resistance need not be seen as radical rupture or apocalyptic change in order to be effective. Through the stories she argues that we may see ‘creative possibilities for subversion amidst the ironic twists of meaning that complicate the crafting of gendered selves within fields of power’ (Kondo 1990:259). However, the Foucauldian notion of creative agency, by which the generative theorizing of resistance is influenced, lacks practical elaboration. Thus while theoretically there have been many discussions of resistance drawing from Foucault, there is a lack of detailed exploration on how individuals undertake critical reflection and action, such that their response, when confronted with discomfort, difference and paradox, may involve

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accommodation or adaptation as much as denial (McNay 2000). This is shown in the work of Holmer-Nadesan (1996) and her account of the agency and resistance of a group of female service workers when responding to patriarchal articulations of their identity. Holmer-Nadesan distinguishes between ‘counter-identification’ which is about rejection of formal designations of organizational identity, and ‘dis-identification’ which does not involve a rejection of managerial discourse but rather a replacement of it. She shows how her service workers are bound by the very discourse they reject and that simultaneous resistance and acquiescence mark the process of counter-identification.

Resisting and reinforcing identification: the cases of Kate and Susan In this section, we present the texts from two women, Kate and Susan.1 These texts are derived from semi-structured interviews, carried out in 2000 and 2001 as part of a twoyear project examining the differing effects of New Public Management (NPM) for public sector professional identities. In the main research project, 105 interviews were conducted, with male and female professional managers in seven case organizations, drawn from the three case sectors (three police constabularies, two social services departments and two local education authorities). The focus of the interviews was to explore issues of change, professional performance expectations, and feelings of ‘comfort’ and ‘fit’ with new managerial subjectivities promoted within the NPM discourse. The interviews were carried out by three different researchers (all female), lasting on average one and a half hours and were tape-recorded. Interviewees were selfselecting for interview, having already indicated a willingness to discuss issues of restructuring and change in their organizations when completing a questionnaire survey as part of pilot work in the study. The texts of Kate and Susan are taken from this larger study. However, these are not seen as being representative of the wider sample or in any way ‘ideal types’. Their selection was made on the basis that they provide clear illustrations of forms of micropolitical resistance that we wish to explore in this chapter. In the spirit of a social constructionist influenced methodology, these texts are seen as living and social, thus emphasizing the contemporary nature of meaning construction taking place in a codetermining manner by the researcher and the researched (Alvesson and Deetz 2000). We treat the interview setting, not as an arena for finding out facts, opinions and perceptions, more as a social event. This means that the interview is privileged as an empirical situation in itself (Alvesson 2003) rather than a medium to collect information on something beyond the interview. Thus we emphasize the situated, partial, localized and self-referential nature of knowledge (Foucault 1980) arising from these interviews. Our being public service professionals (academics located in a British university) influences the talk and social interaction that takes place, feeding into the type of questions we ask, the reactions we give, and the information given. We feel that this has perhaps resulted in greater empathy and mutual understanding in the interview encounter, with individuals assuming shared experiences, language and vocabulary, political and work orientation, and in the cases presented in this chapter, shared gender. We are socially constructed within the interview setting as ‘one of them’. Thus the generation of

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the social text is a shared and complicit task, coloured by the actors involved in the process (Thomas and Davies forthcoming). ‘Kate’: civilian manager, police Kate is a personnel manager in the police service. An experienced public service professional, Kate has spent six years as a civilian manager, having come from a personnel background within the health service. Kate’s text presents a highly positive self-identity: ‘work is an important part of me that makes me feel that I am somebody’. Kate feels very much in control of her own situation: ‘I am definitely manipulating my job to suit me’. When Kate first joined the police she was working at a very intensive pace, effectively doing two jobs (the outcome of stages of restructuring within the service). Increasingly, in the police, as in other parts of the public service, there is a general pressure to work harder and longer. Within the police case, the competitive subject is underpinned by a particular understanding of commitment. The need to demonstrate commitment has always been fundamental to the police ethic (Metcalf and Dick 2001). This is evidenced by visibility on the job, ‘being available’, working long hours as a ‘badge of pride’, and ‘living on the job’. Kate talks of the huge pressures but also of the ‘buzz’ she had from carrying out this dual role, made possible by the fact that she had no other demands on her time. Taking the pressure and proving to herself that she can cope feeds into Kate’s construction as an effective manager: ‘it made me a better personnel manager’. However, Kate explains how having a family has resulted in a fundamental rethinking of ‘self and organization’: ‘I’ve got two little girls and I’m fairly strong minded about it and I’ll not compromise my role as a parent’. For Kate, having a family has created tensions between the competitive masculine subject position within the organization and her own understandings of self as a parent, as well as a female, civilian personnel professional. In Kate’s text we see a challenging of the long hours culture, where understandings of commitment are based on time-space visibility and the privileging of work life over home (Collinson and Collinson 1997). Within the police this involves macho endurance tests of working gruelling hours together with unquestioning loyalty to your boss and the organization: ‘if you’re seen to be in the office late at night then you’re doing a good job and there is still that culture here that how late you’re here is a measure of how good you are’. We see how Kate draws on a discourse of parenting that constructs how a’good mother’ should be, emphasizing caring for her children and spending ‘quality time’ at home with them: ‘last year when they decided to start a meeting at three o’clock in the afternoon. I wasn’t scheduled to deliver my paper on it until half past five and this was with the senior, very senior people in the Force. And I thought this isn’t on! I’m quite happy to stay late if something urgent happens and it’s essential, you know I’ll say “OK, fine”. But this was planned, and there’s no reason for this, there’s just no reason for this at all and I’m just not doing it. And it was the first time anybody had turned

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round and basically told the senior management that they don’t do evenings, they have children to look after.’ Kate goes on to state that a senior uniformed officer had been ‘desperate to leave at five’ as his child was ill and he was a single parent, ‘but he didn’t have the guts to say “I’m not doing that” because he was part of the system’ and it was easier for a female and a civilian—an outsider—to challenge. Kate comments on the difficulties of male officers to speak out in the way that she does: ‘he didn’t quite have the nerve to say “I’m not doing that evening meeting because I’ve got childcare responsibilities.” He was relieved when I made the stance.’ Kate presents herself here as a champion of a better way of being, not only for her self but for others in the organization. In doing so, she constructs the image of the ‘trail blazer’, able to think and act differently because of her position as other: ‘if people like me don’t do it, then who will?’ Her motivation and ability to challenge comes from her marginalized status within the organization. This construction of ‘other’ is not, however, as a silenced and powerless individual but as someone who is epistemologically advantaged. Her ‘difference’ enables her to think, say and do what others cannot, she argues. Therefore, we can see that female managers, when facing the subjectivizing effects of a competitive masculine discourse, may choose to draw on some aspects as a ‘discursive resource’ (Parker 1997) while attempting to subvert and ‘wriggle out’ of the other ways that the discourse attempts to classify, determine and categorize them. We can see how this often results in individuals presenting their ‘self as maverick’, challenging the subject position offered: 1 mean, I am quite a strong character, I think other people find it more difficult [to be different]’. Likewise, she comments about having ‘broken the mould…in fact I think I’ve broken a lot of moulds in this place’. We can see in the text how Kate draws on a particular configuration of a feminized management self, which in the police emphasizes more tolerant, less autocratic subjectivity. This is seen to be an increasingly legitimate subject position within the police and an integral part of progressive policing. So while her challenging of the competitive masculine subjectivity comes from her ‘otherness’, at the same time, by emphasizing a more tolerant feminized subject position, Kate also emphasizes her ‘sameness’ as one of the ‘new policing professionals’ thereby securing a sense of self within the organization. Thus Kate is both resisting as well as locating herself within a dominant discourse within the police, illustrating one aspect of the ambiguity and contradictions surrounding resistance as individuals exploit the contradictions within and between discourses and subject positions. ‘I get the feeling from the top, the very top, that that’s how they want things to go. I feel more confident about doing it, a lot more confident about doing it. And also the Force has a statement on this, about valuing diversity and whether it’s ethnic or childcare or being homosexual, or whatever, that everybody contributes at work and if you value diversity you can allow everybody to contribute in the way that they can, rather than by trying to put round pegs in square holes.’ We see in Kate’s talk how challenging one subject position involves constructing alternatives and thus her resistance is not only ‘oppositional’ but also ‘generative’. In her

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construction of ‘self as other’, therefore, we see how Kate draws on a number of subject positions in the process of critical reflection on self. This presents a complex interweaving of self as other: as a parent and a mother, as a public service professional, as a personnel manager, as a woman in a macho masculine organization, as a female manager, and as a civilian. However, this positioning as ‘other’ also serves to heighten and emphasize her gendered status and thus contributes to, and reinforces, her marginalized position in the masculinist policing organization. Thus, for Kate, her gendered status presents the double bind of otherness. By drawing on certain feminine discourses emphasizing home/life balance, tolerance and diversity to present an epistemologically privileged position, Kate also confirms her female status as disempowered in the organization: ‘I think that for a lot of these men I work with, particularly the older ones, the longer in the tooth ones, having a female young civilian manager who’s in a position of authority, they do not like it at all.’ Thus emphasizing gendered status has implications, which may serve to reinforce the asymmetrical power relations within the organization. Similarly, Holmer-Nadesan (1996) argued that the service workers in her study, by drawing on a discourse of motherhood in constructions of self, largely reinforced unfair patriarchal managerial articulations of their identity. As Kondo observes: Invocations of gender [by women] inevitably occur within a field in which gender possesses a particular sedimented history, which presents possibilities for the construction of satisfying identities and for the subversion of those identities, just as it enforces and disciplines the production of gender. (1990:46) Kate’s challenging of the competitive masculine subject position within the organization also serves to reify it, reproducing and legitimizing it in the act of critical reflection. In Kate’s text there is a conscious effort to put boundaries around understandings of effective performance and we see her refusal to identify with the ‘ideal professional self’ embedded in this competitive masculine subject (Acker 1990; Meriläinen et al. 2004). In naming this ‘ideal’ she legitimizes and feeds the discourse even though she retains a positive sense of self in being ‘mediocre’ and in refusing to feel guilty concerning her neglect of certain performance tasks or her refusal to apply for promotion: ‘I think the biggest cost for me is accepting that I’m probably mediocre at my job and I’m mediocre as a parent…I think you can’t give it your all, I think you’ve got divided loyalties.’ To resist something therefore also means to reify it, privileging it as a meaningful area for political contest and legitimizing and reproducing the very subject position that is being denied. Thus both dominant discourses and the self work in a matrix of power relations (Foucault 1982) where meanings are highly contradictory and dynamic.

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Susan: head teacher, secondary education Susan is the head teacher of a small community college. She has been in her current post for three years during which time there have been significant changes in the professional role of head teachers. In education, as in the police, we can see an increased emphasis on competition and the expectation that professionals within this service will work longer hours, take less time off work, and work evenings, weekends, and during holidays. Again, the pressure of the ‘performance culture’ is seen to promote ‘excessive commitment’ to the job. Head teachers are expected to take on a more commercial identity to, as Susan suggests, ‘sell your school, to deliver a commodity and to meet demands’. While she states she is keen to maintain her values of ‘people before paper’, Susan draws attention to the tensions she experiences over a number of conflicting subject positions within secondary education. These tensions centre on what she terms ‘the dichotomy between the professional and the leader’. As Susan reflects on her ‘self’ within the interview we see a complex negotiation around discourses of gender, professionalism, and leadership. Susan draws on a managerial subject position as a discursive resource in constructing a positive and dynamic self, at the forefront of thinking in schools leadership: ‘you’ve got to know what trends in leadership there are …you must read at least one or two books per term on something or other on your subject matter’. We get the impression in Susan’s text of the entrepreneurial small business leader. She is keen to point out to us her financial and strategic prowess: ‘through this process of talking to the right people and being pro-active I’ve actually achieved £300,000 worth of new building work. I would never have done that if I’d just sat here and said “Gosh, I need some new buildings, hope somebody’s going to come along and do that very shortly”.’ Susan’s construction of self is a positive image of someone in control but not overly controlling, someone who cares but is also efficient, someone who is business-like but not at the expense of professional quality and pedagogy. While Susan draws on a managerial discourse in locating her ‘self’ as one of the new educational leaders, this subject position, especially in the way it is linked with a competitive masculine subject position within education, creates contradictions and discomfort. We see this in her talk as she describes the ‘repackaging’ of education as part of the market economy and how the effective head teacher is now someone who gets the best results and engages in ruthless competition for resources, pupils and the best public profile: ‘This is not about providing a service for the district, it’s not about the children and their educational needs, this is a market economy and they’re the commodity…and you want to grow bigger sunflowers than the man next door to you.’ In challenging and resisting this competitive masculine subjectivity, Susan positions herself as ‘other’ in the discourse. Susan constructs a professional subjectivity, emphasizing educational leadership and values. She talks of the importance of

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professional vision and strength of purpose. She draws on this professional discourse to challenge or ignore requests from the Education Authority or government. We can see this clearly when Susan says: ‘As an intelligent and caring person you make your decision on how far or not you are going to, how much lip service you’re going to give to it and whether you’re going to go in to it wholeheartedly…I understand the context within which my school works and therefore I understand the context in which I apply all the things that come down from above. I’m quite a good girl really but I am naughty at times!’ Government key performance indicators for measuring the effectiveness of the school and its leadership are thus reinscribed by Susan as ‘petty bureaucracy’. However, resisting the competitive masculine subject position presents tensions and ironies in Susan’s identity work. Constructing a managerial subjectivity also requires internalizing elements of competitive masculinity, as these two subject positions have a symbiotic relationship in the education context. How you know yourself as an effective educational leader is intricately bound up with quantitative performance indicators based on targets and competition: ‘Every head teacher knows that in the end unless they manage to move the exam results along they’re regarded as a poor head teacher.’ Susan’s construction of an effective professional leader is also bound up in discourses of femininity, being available to students, being caring and supportive. Work identities are infused with gendered meanings and part of an individual’s identity-work involves the act of becoming either a woman or a man. Susan’s own sense of self as a professional educator relates to being a woman, with gender providing a strong underpinning and differentiation between male and female professional career narratives. We see how Susan draws on gendered scripts of femininity in constructing herself as a professional educational leader. The weaving of these strands of otherness presents images of the feminized management subjectivity within Susan’s text. This she contrasts with her male colleagues: ‘Male heads are much more hard-headed. They have less emotion than I do. They are probably less caught up with the children than I am. And I doubt if there are many heads that teach as much as I do. And I doubt that there are as many heads who know their children as well as I do …They don’t see it as part of their role.’ As part of this gendered self, we see how Susan draws on the privileged position of being a mother. Thus we see how Susan invokes a gender-appropriate identity to claim status and legitimacy. She uses the discursive resource of motherhood in constructing herself as ‘naturally’ different, and better (Holmer-Nadesan 1996): ‘But there’s something about being a mum isn’t there and then relating to other mums it’s very sad they [male head teachers] can’t do that.’ However, privileging this gendered position also feeds into the pressures to overwork and further reinforces the competitive masculine position. As she comments, there is a pressure to be ‘the superwoman’ and to be constantly ‘juggling balls…in managing to do

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it all’. This again reveals the multidimensional nature of resistance as individuals critically engage with ‘self as other’. Within this text we can see Susan’s resistance arising from the construction of a gendered self. It is as a woman that she positions herself as different from the subject position offered within the NPM discourse. This gendered self has implications for her presentation as a female pedagogical professional and as a female leader, both presented by Susan as a positive and privileged position. However, these subject positions also place demands on Susan that increase her feelings of pressure and stress. For example, as a female pedagogical professional she cares about her pupils and perhaps, she suggests, spends more time and more emotional energy with them than her male colleagues. The ability to resist is shaped by ‘who you are’ at any one time and while her gender identity is the source of motivation to resist the normalizing discourse of competitive masculinity, it also constrains her resistance of other subjectivities that might create material problems of overworking and stress. Thus, as Kondo observes, an individual’s life is ‘shot thorough with contradictions and tensions’ and there is no ‘pristine space of authentic resistance’ (1990:224). Susan’s text thus emphasizes how resistance to the dominant discourses does not take place in any straightforward ‘cause and effect’ fashion.

Discussion Studies on resistance within the field of organization studies have tended to concentrate on overt, observable acts, largely by blue-collar male (or ‘genderless’) workers in factory settings (see, for example, Hyman 1972; Beynon 1973; Brown 1977; Edwards 1979; Knights and Collinson 1987). While such research has drawn attention to a myriad ways in which worker dissent is manifested in organizations, the definition of resistance used often overlooks and neglects more subtle, covert or hidden forms of disruption (Prasad and Prasad 2000). In particular, such studies fail to capture the complexities and nuances of resistance at the level of the individual, and the motivations of individuals to resist. Furthermore, workers are seen as being pitched against management and, inevitably, resistance is framed as oppositional. Studies that recognize the importance of identity in negotiating the effects of power fail to illustrate the processes of the micro-politics of resistance, thus necessitating an empirical and theoretical leap between the ‘being of difference’ and resistance behaviour. As Newton (1998) comments there is limited concern in the existing literature of the manoeuvring of social selves in relation to discursive practices. Our model of resistance, in drawing on a Foucauldian feminist framework, resides at the level of a ‘critical ontology of the self’. For feminist praxis this means challenging gendered subject positions offered by dominant discourses, constructing alternative or counter discourses. It is through identification of practices of the self and through reflection, critique and problematization that we formulate tactics whereby we can live in the world. Thus choices can be made through exploiting the polyvalence of discourses; the contradictions, weaknesses and spaces between alternative subject positions. In this chapter we focus on the ways that female public service professionals respond to pressures to display competitive masculinity within their organizations and examine the ways in which they struggle to appropriate and transform symbolic meanings to make a difference in their lives.

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Micro-politics of resistance With both cases the promotion of competitive presenteeism and the privileging of the public over the private suggests the construction of the selflessly dedicated organizational member. The creation of high-pressured managerial jobs linked to long working hours, greater individualism and competition sustains and promotes strong images of masculinity. For Kate and Susan, it can be seen how some new organizational discourses appeal to images of being a man, positioning ‘women’ as ‘the other’. However, the response of our female professionals cannot simply be explained as a ‘resistance to’ this masculinist ideal. The conceptualization of resistance presented here emphasizes the nonessentialized nature of identities, continuously constituted through the interplay of multiple discourses. When faced with the subjectivizing effects of specific discourses, individuals may draw on some aspects at some times as a ‘discursive resource’ (Parker 1997) in asserting an identity, while attempting to subvert and ‘wriggle out’ of other attempts to classify, determine and categorize them. This sometimes results in these women presenting a ‘self as maverick’ (Thomas and Davies forthcoming), offering themselves a position that is epistemologically privileged. Thus we see an active agent in the construction of identities. We are keen to move away from any simplistic notion of what it is to be a woman, emphasizing the importance of multiple voices and representing the multiplicity and complexity of individuals. The importance of these individual narratives is that they highlight the partiality of the dominant narrative and open up spaces for challenge and change, albeit at the level of the individual. In challenging competitive masculinity, Kate and Susan are seen to draw on alternative discourses of motherhood and work/life balance in constructing an alternative identity. However, invocations of ‘gendered scripts’ may serve to strengthen ‘gender-appropriate’ norms and expectations (West and Zimmerman 1987) that may reinforce discrimination in the context of asymmetrical gender power relations. Thus, challenge and denial at the individual level may result in the reification, legitimization and reproduction of the very subject positions being denied. This can be seen in the way that dominant patriarchal and masculinist discourses are reinforced and also in the way that legitimacy is accorded to competitive masculinity in the critical reflexive act. Micro-political resistance and feminist politics It may be suggested that our conceptualization of resistance, that reinforces as well as challenges meanings and subjectivities, is politically naïve and nihilistic. As Newton (1998:425) comments, this presents a ‘catch-22’ situation where the salience of particular discourses is revealed as much by their resistance/denial/non-establishment as by their acceptance and establishment. Furthermore, Newton highlights the problem of Foucauldian analyses in de-emphasizing the significance of socially constructed stabilities in power relations. Sawicki (1994) warns that feminists need to be wary of the tendency to reduce politics to personal transformation or to the formation of narrowly defined counter-cultural communities. Other authors, such as Bordo (1993), are also highly critical of the notion of creative agency, arguing that it leads to too facile a celebration of resistance. Dominant scripts are difficult to deviate from and this leads to an under appreciation of the struggle and pain of resistance. A further tension focuses on the need to conceptualize agency within power relations so to strengthen the link between

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micro-political resistance and the transformation of collective behaviour and norms (McNay 1992). It is argued that inequalities are deeply sedimented and there is a danger that political, economic and social dimensions of gender inequality all become subsumed under the ‘fetish of identity’ (Spivak 1993). However, in defence of our theoretical approach we would maintain that conceptualizations of resistance based on the meta-narratives of universal justice and freedom have often been revealed to be ineffective. In addition, as Newton (1998:432) suggests, a ‘“false dichotomy” may have been presented between individual “struggle” and collective workplace struggle’. He suggests that the extent to which gender relations have changed has largely not been as a result of collective struggle focused on the workplace but through an interweaving of individual consciousness-raising and group consciousness-raising. The effects of the resistance we describe in this chapter are low levels of disturbance, leading to the possible destabilizing, weakening and greater incoherence of dominant discourses, and in turn creating greater looseness and opportunities to exploit spaces. It is these spaces that enable the construction of alternative identities and meanings within forms of domination. In focusing on the discursive and multidirectional nature of resistance, this chapter provides empirical illustrations of identity struggles and tensions, and of the everyday forms of identity maintenance and control, without recourse to meta-narratives of emancipation. A micropolitics of resistance focuses on the small-scale changes that can have incremental effects, and that can make differences to how women live their lives, and live with themselves.

Notes We acknowledge the support of the Economic and Social Research Council for funding this research (award number: R000223078). 1 Arguments, based on this empirical material, are further developed in R.Thomas and A.Davies Theorising the micro-politics of resistance: New public management and managerial identities in the UK public services’ in Organization Studies (forthcoming).

References Acker, J. (1990) ‘Hierarchies, jobs, bodies: A theory of gendered organizations’, Gender and Society, 4:139–158. Alvesson, M. (2003) ‘Beyond neo-positivists, romantics and localists—a reflexive approach to interviews in organizational research’, Academy of Management Review, 28, 1:13–33. Alvesson, M. and Deetz, S. (2000) Doing Critical Management Research. London: Sage. Alvesson, M. and Sköldberg, K. (2000) Reflexive Methodology: New Vistas for Qualitative Research. London: Sage. Bartky, S.L. (1990) Femininity and Domination: Studies in the Phenomenology of Oppression. London: Routledge. Beynon, H. (1973) Working for Ford. Harmondsworth: Penguin. Brown, G. (1977) Sabotage: A Study in Industrial Conflict. Nottingham: Spokesman Books.

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Bordo, S. (1993) ‘Feminism, Foucault and the politics of the body’. In C. Ramazanoglu (ed.) Up Against Foucault: Explorations of Some Tensions Between Foucault and Feminism. London: Routledge. Bryson, V. (1999) Feminist Debates: Issues of Theory and Political Practice. Basingstoke: Palgrave. Butler, J. (1990) Gender Trouble. London: Routledge. Collinson, D. and Collinson, M. (1997) ‘Delayering managers: Time-space surveillance and its gendered effects’, Organization, 4, 3:375–407. Edwards, R. (1979) Contested Terrain: The Transformation of the Workplace in the Twentieth Century. New York: Basic Books. Flax, J. (1987) ‘Postmodernism and gender relations in feminist theory’, Signs, 12: 621–643. Foucault, M. (1980) Power and Knowledge. Brighton: Harvester. Foucault, M. (1982) ‘The subject and power’. In H.Drefus and P.Rabinow, Michel Foucault: Beyond Structuralism and Hermeneutics. New York: Harvester, pp. 208–226. Hartman, H. (1986) ‘The unhappy marriage of Marxism and feminism: Towards a more progressive union’. In L.Sargent (ed.) The Unhappy Marriage of Marxism and Feminism: A Debate on Class and Patriarchy. London: Pluto Press. Hekman, S. (1990) Gender and Knowledge: Elements of a Postmodern Feminism. Cambridge: Polity. Holmer-Nadesan, M. (1996) ‘Organizational identity and space of action’, Organization Studies, 17, 1:49–81. Hyman, R. (1972) Strikes. Glasgow: Fontana. Knights, D. and Collinson, D. (1987) ‘Disciplining the shopfloor: A comparison of the disciplinary effects of managerial psychology and financial accounting’. Accounting, Organization and Society, 12, 5:457–477. Knights, D. and McCabe, D. (2000) ‘Ain’t misbehavin? Opportunities for resistance under new forms of “quality” management’, Sociology, 34, 3:421–436. Kondo, D. (1990) Crafting Selves: Power, Gender and Discourses of Identity in a Japanese Workplace. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. McNay, L. (1992) Foucault and Feminism. Cambridge: Polity McNay, L. (2000) Gender and Agency: Reconfiguring the Subject in Feminist and Social Theory. Cambridge: Polity. Marshall, J. (1995) ‘Gender and management: A critical review of research’, British Journal of Management, 6, special issue: 53–62. Meriläinen, S., Tienari, J., Thomas, R. and Davies, A. (2004) ‘Management consultant talk: A cross-cultural comparison of normalising discourse and resistance’, Organization, 11, 4:539– 564. Metcalf, B. and Dick, G. (2001) ‘Exploring organisation commitment in the police: Implications for human resource strategy’, Policing: An International Journal of Police Strategies and Management, 24, 3:399–419. Newton, T. (1998) ‘Theorizing subjectivity in organizations: The failure of Foucauldian studies’, Organization Studies, 19, 3:415–447. Parker, M. (1997) ‘Dividing organizations and multiplying identities’. In Kevin Hetherington and Rolland Munro(eds) Ideas of Difference. Oxford: Blackwell, pp. 114–138. Prasad, P. and Prasad, A. (2000) ‘Stretching the iron cage: The constitution and implications of routine workplace resistance’, Organization Science, 11, 4: 387–403. Thomas, R. and Davies, A. (forthcoming) ‘Theorising the micro-politics of resistance: New public management and managerial identities in the UK public services’, Organization Studies.

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Sawicki, J. (1991) Disciplining Foucault: Feminism, Power, and the Body. London: Routledge. Sawicki, J. (1994) ‘Foucault, feminism, and questions of identity’. In Gary Gutting (ed.) The Cambridge Companion to Foucault. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 286–313. Spivak, G. (1993) Outside in the Teaching Machine. London: Routledge. Weedon, C. (1987) Feminist Practice and Poststructuralist Theory. Oxford: Blackwell. Weedon, C. (1999) Feminism, Theory and the Politics of Difference. Oxford: Blackwell. West, C. and Zimmerman, D. (1987) ‘Doing gender’, Gender and Society, 1, 2: 125–151.

7 Reforming managerialism? Gender and the navigation of change in higher education in Sweden and England John Chandler, Jim Barry and Elisabeth Berg

Introductory comments: contexts and issues In this chapter consideration is given to the reactions of academics to the passage of a series of reforms in the higher education systems of two European countries that have been at the forefront of change: Sweden and England. The reforms, which have affected these two countries, are known collectively as the New Public Management, or NPM, which has been described as a worldwide reform movement for change (Hood et al., 1999). At its extreme the NPM appears to have manifested itself through the imposition of major cutbacks in expenditure and attempts to introduce marketization and, in particular, private sector managerial control strategies. Mechanisms include disaggregation, greater ‘hands-on management’, emphasis on ‘discipline and parsimony’ in use of resources, increasing measurement of performance and use of ‘pre-set output measures’ (Hood, 1991; 1995, pp. 95–97). All in all a variety of techniques which draw on a multitude of differing approaches from scientific management to human relations (Pollitt, 1990, pp. 11–27), with elements of organization development and corporate culturism—and its emphasis on visions and missions—thrown in for good measure, alongside performance management (Barry, Berg and Elsmore, 2003). The intention has been to increase the work of public sector professionals and embed values of business, competition and the market place. Higher education in Sweden and England has not been immune from these wider developments (Pollitt and Bouckaert, 2000), with albeit some differences of emphasis and time lag. While academic commentators, for example, have noted a decline of trust in academe in England (Power, 1997; Trow, 1994), this has been less noticeable in Sweden (Askling, 1999, p. 205), where the ‘governing elite did not embrace fashionable management ideas such as marketization as enthusiastically as did their counterparts in some other countries’, though performance management and total quality management have been ‘more readily assimilated’ (Pollitt and Bouckaert, 2000, p. 262). There has also been a time difference, with NPM reforms in Sweden being adopted a few years later than was the case in England. The impact overall on teaching, research and the continual peer reviewing of quality, however, has been seen by some as quite severe, particularly in England (cf. Prichard and Willmott, 1997; and Davies and Holloway, 1995), leading to a ‘decline of donnish dominion’ (Halsey, 1995). And, as with the NPM more generally, a mixture of techniques has been in evidence. Some are designed to ratchet up academic output directly through the setting of student recruitment and other targets (Barry, Berg

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and Elsmore, 2003; see also Teelken and Braam, 2002). Others seek to instill a move away from professional to responsible autonomy (Dent, 1993), as lecturers are encouraged to set their own ‘targets’ for measurable performance through appraisal. In both Swedish and English universities, then, academics have noted the impact of a strong variant of the NPM (Parker and Jary, 1995; Prichard and Willmott, 1997; Askling, 1999) and the growth in England of what has, disapprovingly, been dubbed the ‘McUniversity’ (Parker and Jary, 1995). It is academic reaction to these pressures that we explore here. Research on this issue in respect of academia is beginning to grow. What has been published thus far has been focused on different groups, including senior male post-holders (Prichard and Willmott, 1997), women academics (Thomas and Davies, 2002), and female and male manager academics from head of department to vicechancellor level (Deem, 2003). The literature has also focused on different themes, with acknowledgement of the growing role of hard work in the academy (Fogelberg et al., 1999); stress (Doyle and Hind, 1998); and a special issue of the journal Gender, Work and Organization (Finch, 2003) devoted to ‘Gender and Academe’. Of course there is nothing particularly new about examining the role of gender and academic life (e.g. see Rossiter, 1982) and a number of studies have shown that gender inequality and discrimination remain in universities throughout the world (on this see the special issue of Gender, Work and Organization, 2003, volume 10, number 2). It is appropriate to acknowledge, therefore, that the present focus on managerialism in universities needs to be set in the context of wider gendered practices and relations. It would seem that universities, as organizations, and the academic ‘profession’ as an occupational category, are deeply gendered (Knights and Richards, 2003) and that what needs to be considered is how far the introduction of the NPM reproduces or disrupts existing gender relations within universities. This, however, is insufficient, for it is also necessary to examine accommodation and resistance to the NPM and to consider whether these, too, are gendered. We recognize that resistance can be viewed in many different ways (Jermier et al., 1994), with one dictionary definition having it as ‘to withstand, to prevent, to repel, to stand against, to stop’ (Oxford English Dictionary). However, such a definition immediately raises difficulties concerning subjectivity and agency; of who is resisting what and why? Here we explore such questions, not through a rigid a priori definition of resistance, but through seeking an understanding of a variety of reactions to managerialism. Having explored a range of responses (some of which do not easily fit the dictionary definition of resistance) we then move on to the question of why people respond in these different ways. In doing so we are less concerned with locating the precise boundaries of resistance than with exploring the reasons for the different responses. We are also interested in the ambiguity of resistance, with the understanding of resistance from different viewpoints and judged according to different criteria. In looking at responses to managerialism in this way we draw upon theoretical insights from scholarship that examines the dynamic inter-relations of subjectivity (Melucci, 1997, 1995; and Alcoff, 1988) and explore the gendered implications of the changing character of intellectual labour. In particular we concentrate on the processes of interaction and identity-work as those involved navigate and seek to shape the direction of change. We show how female and male academics engage in the continual (re)configuration of identities as they ‘shift among the regions of experience’ (Melucci,

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1997, p. 62). It is argued that the recent changes occur in a context that offers ‘both freedoms and constraints’ (ibid., pp. 62–63), where individuals are confronted with choices. It is further contended that gender is an important feature in the (re)shaping of identities, in (re)constructing managerialism and in influencing the trajectories of change within universities. In drawing on already published sources, including our own, we examine responses to the recent pressures for change. In this we focus in particular on the implications for gendered academic identities in university life. We begin with a consideration of the idea of the academy, and a discussion of academic identities.

The idea of the academy and academic identities The view of the university as an ivory tower, with academics having a secure and stable identity, is something of a myth, underscored by C.Wright Mills’ (1959, pp. 117–126) concerns about vested interest in American university life and Woolf’s recognition of the elitism of universities that were ‘in part about maintaining the power of the military, the established church and paternalistic figures of authority in the culture and the community’ (Evans, 1997, p. 49). The notion of a community of scholars at liberty to pursue knowledge in a way somehow distanced from the difficulties and compromises of everyday life is thus at best mistaken, at worst misleading. Universities are not separate from or outside of society and identities stratified, not least by class, gender and ethnicity, would appear to have been reproduced from the so-called real world into the hallowed halls of academe. The practice of scholarship is also characterized by significant schisms which arise, as it were, from within. In particular the division of the academic community into separate ‘disciplines’ is a notable feature of academic life and one that renders the notion of a single ‘academic identity’ questionable (Becher, 1989, p. 170). So too does the proliferation of different and ‘marginal’ forms of academic labour (part-time, hourly paid, fixed-term contract and so on), as well as traditional hierarchical divisions and those based on age or life-cycle/career stage which have led one writer to comment, in respect of academics in a number of European countries, that ‘one would hesitate to consider them as part of the same professional group’ (Enders, 1999, p. 77). If the character of the university has reflected the social context in which it finds itself, it seems likely that the identities of academics has followed suit with academic profiles reflecting, as well as helping to (re)create, more widely established patterns of inequality. This is clearly the case in respect of gender (Finch, 2003), with women’s entry into academia occurring only slowly in the modern period and increasing with the growth of the Swedish and English educational system in the 1960s and 1970s. Even recently, following the emergence of a system of mass higher education in both these countries, women have been under-represented in higher education, especially in senior and fully tenured secure positions and in the older universities. This is the case for Sweden (Elg and Jonnergård, 2003; Berg, 2001) and England (Evans, 1997, pp. 47–49; West and Lyon, 1995, pp. 52–55; Davies and Holloway, 1995, p. 15; and Sutherland, 1994, p. 177). From within these sets of criss-crossing differences, it is of course possible to identify an academic identity of sorts. But what is of interest to us here is the extent to which gendered identities, refracted by differences of class, ethnicity, discipline and tenure, are

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being posited and the ways in which different strands are woven together in academe. We do not assume there is one fixed and stable identity emerging to replace another, but that identities are in dynamic interaction, forever in flux. Neither do we assume that gender identities are embodied in or tied unambiguously to the social players involved, or linked simplistically to their feminine and masculine shadows in yet another unhelpful dichotomy. Instead, while mindful of structured inequality which constrains those involved, we recognize that there are spaces for action and agency. The idea of identity has a long history, much of which can be located in modernist debates concerning notions of the self. Recent debates resonate with feminist concerns about the role of gender identity in the 1980s and 1990s (cf. Carby, 1982; and Ware, 1992), which questioned essentialism and pointed to the multiplicity of gendered and ethnic identities present in social interaction. In this debate the merits of poststructuralist approaches to the study of gender (Ramazanoglu, 1993) were considered, with some authors seeking to develop the insights of Foucault, as well as postmodernist perspectives drawn from Derrida and others. Alcoff’s (1988) third way, steered between what she characterized as cultural feminism and the cultural turn, argued for a middle ground that retained a degree of agency in the tangle of constraint. Her own position in this respect is quite understandable, given feminist concern to retain a female subject in the face of deconstruction (Hartsock, 1990, pp. 163–164; Sum, 2000). But it is her desire to locate agency within the field of experience, with social individuals conceptualized as drawing on a range of identities in their interaction with others, which is of interest for the purposes of this chapter. Also of relevance here is the work of Melucci (1997, pp. 64–65), a respected scholar of social movement theory, who seeks to conceptualize the shifting collective orientation of social individuals. Drawing on movements such as environmentalism and the women’s movement, Melucci conceptualizes identities as operating within ‘a field comprising both freedoms and constraints’ and thereby negotiable. They can be affirmed, denied, changed or altered over time depending on the situation; and it is a processual analysis, which seeks to analyse ‘social relationships’ within this field and that enables an examination of the opportunities and constraints at work (Melucci, 1995, p. 43). The implications of this particular reading of identity, which draws on the work of Alcoff and Melucci from differing intellectual milieux as far apart as America and Italy, and aimed at feminist scholarship and a social movement audience respectively, are far reaching. While offering choice for the construction of meaning at the level of the social individual, it is the transformative potential of identity-work, not least through collective action, that is significant, especially for our analysis. By drawing upon their work, in considering academic identities, we are able to characterize identities as socially contingent and processual, as well as contestable and negotiable, thereby facilitating a consideration of the dynamics of identity. Our approach to this has some similarities with the work of Bradley who talks of fractured social identities relating to class, gender, ‘race and ethnicity’ and age. She notes that ‘as individuals we stand at the points of intersection between all these processes of fragmentation and polarization’ (Bradley, 1996, p. 211). Bradley’s categorization of passive, active and political identities helps us to see how this might operate in practice. Here passive identities reflect lived experience, which provide a basis for action when those concerned become aware of them, and a platform for collective mobilization when engaged with politically, as for example in gay and lesbian

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movements for change. But if Bradley is largely concerned with issues of fragmentation (see Barry, Honour and Palnitkar (2004) for theories of social movements) our concern here is as much with the way identity-work weaves together various strands. Our concern, in other words, is as much about integration as fragmentation, as social individuals ‘participate in an infinity of of worlds…[and]…shift among the regions of experience’ (Melucci, 1997, pp. 61–62), with some identities seen as more important than others and more or less attractive to the social players involved. So, what of the impact of the NPM and the pressures to adopt a managerial identity in academe? Various sources, as we have seen, talk of severe financial cutbacks, deteriorating staff-student ratios, an emphasis on the monitoring of quality in teaching and learning strategies and pressures to produce research in ever-decreasing lead-times.

Negotiating academic identities: (en)gendering resistance and accommodation to the NPM Given the variety of personal and social identities that can emerge in universities it is not surprising that studies of managerialism in academe have identified a variety of responses to the NPM. In this section of the chapter this variety is briefly explored with reference to several published studies of the impact of managerialism before moving on to discuss explanations for such adaptations, with particular reference to gender. The studies we have drawn upon here are principally those of Parker and Jary (1995), Prichard and Willmott (1997), Goode and Bagilhole (1998), Barry et al. (2001), Barry, Berg and Chandler (2003), Berg (2001), Thomas and Davies (2002), and Deem (2003) (see also Deem, 1999; and Morley, 1999). In doing so, we wish to consider the ‘how’ of resistance and accommodation, before moving to engagement with the ‘why’, our principal concern in this chapter. Researchers on the impact of NPM in universities do seem agreed that there is evidence of some actors embracing the new approach—albeit with greater or lesser degrees of enthusiasm. This is illustrated in the words of a Dean of School reported by Prichard and Willmott (1997, pp. 304–305) as saying: I had long felt for years before taking on this role that things were too loose, that things were under-managed, and things were not properly evaluated. X said he was doing his research even if the annual list of publications didn’t seem to show any output. So what I was doing was picking up a School where its old residual staff were under-performing in terms of research, with a lot of new people being brought in…. So in order to take us up in terms of research I had to set the kind of level that would be reasonable. One of the approaches was to set clear targets for performance. We set a very modest one. The normal expectation was that each member of staff should produce at least one article in a refereed journal each year, and people who were not producing that were seen to be underperforming and were diagnosed for positive help.

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Some degree of conformity towards the values, aims and practices associated with NPM was found in all the studies of its impact referred to above (cf. Deem, 2003, pp. 245 for an interesting example). Its existence is hardly surprising, since it would be difficult to imagine it taking hold without some academics being willing to embrace it. However, if conformity is in evidence, there are also indications that academics are sometimes ‘going through the motions’, while distancing themselves from the values and aims they see as associated with the new managerialism. Thus Goode and Bagilhole (1998, p. 156) report one senior male academic as saying: I have to manage exercises like Teaching Quality Assessment in which I have no belief whatsoever and which I believe to be utterly punitive and destructive and demoralizing for staff, but it’s no good me sitting back and saying ‘so we won’t do it’ because we have no choice…I see it as partly my job as HoD [Head of Department] to engineer that as productively as possible…it is about knowing that you’re doing it, and being aware that in playing the game by someone else’s rules there are constant dangers. And that’s what creating space is about. Again, we find evidence of similar responses in some of the other studies (cf. Barry et al., 2001; Thomas and Davies, 2002). It is arguable, perhaps, whether such adaptations are a form of resistance but at the subjective level they would certainly seem to be—they are a way of distancing individuals from their actions and thus resisting the constructions of the self (Jenkins, 1996) suggested by the NPM. But to the extent that such distancing might lead to actions that only nominally ‘conform’ to requirements they can amount to sabotage (Taylor and Walton, 1971), a way of doing just enough to avoid disciplinary consequences while failing to bring about the change or effects intended. Moreover, a number of studies in both Sweden and England point to the existence of the ultimate form of ‘distancing’ the self from the new working practices in universities—wanting to leave academia altogether (e.g. Berg, 2001; Thomas and Davies, 2002; and Goode and Bagilhole, 1998). If various forms of distancing are in evidence, so too is a thorough-going rejection of some aspects of managerialism. Thus in our study of two universities we found some heads of department refusing to implement appraisals of staff, even though university policy required them (Barry et al., 2001). Another example in Goode and Bagilhole’s study (1998, p. 160), from a senior female academic, is as follows: Some staff are not regarded as research active. I think this can be managed informally. I think people’s patterns are phasic. Sometimes people have a tremendous research output and then they’ll go into a bit of a fallow period. And I think to categorize one person as forever non-researchactive, and always going to be doing more teaching, or vice versa, is wrong. So I try to resist this…I think it’s in danger of becoming punitive and I don’t want this. In our reading of the literature on the consequences of managerialism we have not found much evidence of what might be described as direct sabotage, but that does not

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necessarily mean it does not exist. The studies we are relying on for information here are all based on interviews and one might speculate that staff may be unwilling to incriminate themselves by admitting to such forms of behaviour. However, Barry et al. (2001, p. 92) report one case of an admissions tutor who deliberately undershot his student recruitment target in order to ease the workloads of his colleagues. If academics rarely admit to this sort of behaviour, this does not mean it does not happen. In so far as such things do happen, and are understood to happen, they may undermine the legitimacy of the NPM, just as recent discoveries of apparently falsified performance figures in the UK’s NHS (Audit Commission, 2003) and reports of teacher’s altering student papers to improve test scores in schools would seem to have prompted some soulsearching about the ‘performance culture’ in the UK’s public services (Smithers, 2001; O’Neill, 2002). However, the robustness of managerialism in the face of such onslaughts should be noted. It is easy to dismiss such behaviour as indiscipline that justifies greater ‘surveillance’. Yet another kind of adaptation found in universities is described by Goode and Bagilhole (1998) as ‘transformation’. This is more than a ‘response’ to the NPM and can be seen as an attempt to construct an alternative. It involves an attempt to ‘examine and problematize the ways in which knowledge is produced and legitimated, to create “umbrellas” to bring together staff from across and outside the university to engage in that process, and to enhance access to “non-traditional” students’ (ibid., p. 157). They go on to describe attempts at transformative managerial practices as including the addressing of issues such as job-sharing and flexible work patterns, ‘managing staff in a way which is more supportive of their work abilities and ambitions; and attempts to introduce new kinds of management practices and relationships in decision-making arenas’ (ibid: 157). There is, perhaps, less evidence of the existence of such a stance in other studies, indicating that it may be relatively rare, although there are some echoes of it in the work of Thomas and Davies (2002) and Deem (2003). Even Goode and Bagilhole suggest that those adopting such a stance were finding it hard going, perhaps indicating that this—the most radical adaptation in relation to the NPM—is difficult to adopt and maintain in the present climate. The range of responses to managerialism described above might be seen as reminiscent of Merton’s (1968) categories of conformity, retreatism, ritualism, innovation and rebellion (cf. Parker and Jary, 1995; and Prasad and Prasad, 1998, 2000). There is, however, no suggestion that individual academics fit neatly into one or other category. Such varied forms of resistance and adaptation are best seen as socially constructed, fluid and contingent; as emerging out of, as Prasad and Prasad (2000, p. 402) put it, ‘a complex constitution of both planned and non-calculative actions’. Moreover, in relation to gender there is no claim that such responses are gender specific—but gender is relevant, we would argue, in explaining why such responses emerge, and it is to the ‘why’ of resistance and its relation to gender that we now turn.

The ‘why’ of resistance and accommodation The various kinds of response to managerialism delineated above can be explained in different ways. We seek here to show the relevance of a gender perspective in explaining

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particular responses. We do so with illustrations of contrasting and complementary approaches that help to explain resistance to the NPM. One explanation of resistance argues that NPM is a masculinist discourse, but that it is resisted because of the presence of alternative discourses that contradict these assumptions. This explanation rests on there being a multiplicity of socially available discourses and masculinities so that there is always the possibility of resistance. The association of NPM with a particular form of hegemonic masculinity is, on this argument, related to its claims to rationality and its ‘performativity’ (Whitehead, 2003; Kerfoot and Knights, 1998) and to (the mostly male) managers’ attempts to secure ontological security by drawing upon masculine cultural scripts of ‘rationality’, competitiveness, and instrumental control of social relations. Among the alternative discourses that can be drawn upon to resist managerialism is the powerful discourse of professionalism with its claims to autonomy legitimated on competence. But such a strategy is not gender neutral because professionalism is also deeply gendered (Davies, 1996). A further discourse is that relating to the ‘family’, illustrated by one of the male managers in Whitehead’s (1999, p. 124) study of further education and echoed by some of the academics we interviewed: Since Joanna was born my attitude to work has changed. I am much less ambitious. We weren’t expecting a child, it all came as a tremendous shock. Work is of less importance now…There is an unhealthy work culture in FE now. It is somehow macho to be here until 7.30/8.00 p.m., but I won’t join in…I leave at 5.30 p.m., sometimes in the middle of meetings. I don’t find it a problem, in fact I find it a tremendous discipline. But this, too, is hardly gender neutral, given continued differences in male and female positions in relation to the care of children (Berg, 2001). There are of course many other discourses that may present a challenge to managerialism in its masculinist form, and we might, therefore, expect managerialism to encounter resistance. While such explanations have merit they raise the issue of how far resistance is a strategic act of academics imbued with agency. For Whitehead (1999, p. 128): the subject’s resistance to, and/or tension with, dominant discourses should not be read as the strategic acts of rational individuals. Rather, these narrative accounts reveal the moments wherein subjects reconstitute and become reconstituted in discourse, not in any strategic fashion, but as a result of the very contingency of identity; the fragility and unpredictability of being. Similarly, for Rose (1998, p. 35), explaining resistance requires ‘no theory of agency’ because [h]uman beings are not the unified subjects of some coherent regime of government that produces persons in the form in which it dreams. On the

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contrary, they live their lives in a constant movement across different practices that subjectify them in different ways. Viewed from this perspective resistance is the inevitable consequence of the lack of the NPM’s totalizing power, because it cannot help but encounter other priorities, ways of thinking, and ways of being. It cannot help but cut across professionalism, feminism, the discourse of the ‘good mother’ (Raddon, 2002) or ‘good father’, etc., and therein lie the origins and meanings of resistance. What this suggests, then, is a need to explore the contradictions and inconsistencies between different discursive practices and the way in which alternative selves become a possibility through the weaving together of discursive practices. There is not space here for a discussion of the relative strengths of recent poststructuralist, postmodernist and alternative views. However, it does seem worth exploring the value of an approach that retains a role for agency and sees discourse as one among a range of factors that may be significant in engendering resistance (cf. Hekman, 1999, p. 23). An alternative that might still place gender at the centre of the analysis seeks to present resistance as a response of embodied actors, acting within particular fields of experience and structural positions (Alcoff, 1988; Melucci, 1996 and 1997). From this vantage point we might see individual academics as social actors making commitments as they engage, over time, with their experience of organizational and extra-organizational life. Such a perspective is not a return to the rational individual of the Enlightenment, pursuing her own interests, but instead sees the responses of men and women as rooted in their life histories and social locations. This in turn might suggest a variety of reasons for embracing or resisting the New Public Management in various ways. Perhaps such an approach has much in common with the recent contribution of Thomas and Davies (2002, pp. 392 and 389), which maintains the concept of ‘women’ and agency, and presents the new NPM masculinist discourses as reinforcing what Acker (1990, 1998) has called the gendered organizational substructure. Their study goes some way towards explaining why it is that women, as agents, resist NPM’s masculinist discourse, with some of the women they studied presenting ‘alternative selves’ to those offered by the NPM discourse. But this still leaves us to explain where these ‘alternative selves’ come from. Equally, we need to ask why some women (and men), some of the time, do not seem to resist NPM’s embrace but instead would appear to conform, on some level, to the identity it offers. Conformity would certainly seem to have been found among both male and female staff, with studies by Goode and Bagilhole (1998), Deem (2003) and our own research all attesting to its presence among men and women. But the fact that the response is found among men and women does not mean that gender is not significant. Where women adopt this stance they seem to be ‘managing like a man’ (Wajcman, 1998) and often seem to take great pains to appear to conform to the managerial stereotype by wearing suits, for example (Goode and Bagilhole, 1998, p. 159), in very similar ways to the managers in Wajcman’s study of women managers in private sector commercial organizations. Yet this would sometimes seem to be at a considerable personal cost; as one of the women in Goode and Bagilhole’s (ibid.) study put it, ‘[w]hat I need is a good wife…husbands are no substitute for wives’—and she was questioning how long she could keep up the struggle to climb the organizational ladder, echoing the sentiments of Marshall’s (1995)

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women who were ‘moving on’, often because, as women, they found managerial life uncomfortable. From a gender perspective conformity would seem to imply conformity to hegemonic masculinity in an attempt to approximate to the ‘abstract worker’ who, while at work (which increasingly takes up a greater period of time), distances themselves from domestic life and caring for others outside the organization. Little wonder, perhaps, that senior management in universities is still largely peopled by men. Nevertheless, those women who do adopt a conformist approach are not necessarily simply reproducing gender inequality—some would seem to be challenging it (Finch, 2003; and Deem, 1999). Indeed, in entering the ‘masculine’ world of management they are beginning to challenge stereotypes of what women ‘are’ and can do, and for some women ‘conformists’ their very conformity is a rebellious act in relation to the sexual division of labour. While conformity would seem to be found among both women and men, Goode and Bagilhole’s study found that all those who they saw as taking up a transformative stance were women. However, in their discussion of this (1998, p. 158), they argue that: [a]lthough it was women who exemplified transformation, transformation is not gender specific per se. It was gendered in so far as gender was institutionally embedded in the structures and practices through which the NHE [new higher education] was being enacted and in so far as women found themselves in particular locations and engaged in particular activities with the colleagues they worked with in those locations. This is consistent with the approach we have adopted in stressing the ‘embedded’ nature of the response. There is a particular context in which gendered identities exist—that of inequality. Women, for example, are less likely to be found in senior posts and more likely to be located in intermediate and, especially, junior positions. This tends to give women more teaching, pastoral care and administration (Berg et al., 2003; Deem, 2003), with consequences for undertaking research and career advancement. However, we would question whether transformative stances can be explained entirely in relation to institutionally embedded structures and practices that exist in the organization, as implied by Goode and Bagilhole in the above quotation. Rather, it seems likely that institutional and social processes external to the organization are also important—including those in the ‘domestic’ field (Berg, 2001) and also, for example, in engagement with a wider women’s movement (Melucci, 1995). Thus, in refusing to become the abstract worker demanded by the NPM—the externally imposed identity on offer—some academics draw upon other conceptions of themselves, derived from different experiences, engagements and commitments. In considering the micro-politics of the academy, Morley (1999, p. 1174) quotes a Swedish female associate professor who, in answering a question about her involvement in ‘academic feminism’, explained how she used her seniority to raise issues of equality: I’m tougher, I dare to stand up for my opinions and to take it through and to go against the mainstream opinions, and when I sit on these boards for

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the appointment committee at the university, I just try to raise equality questions all the time and they listen to me now, so I dare. Morley (1999, p. 157) also cites a young female British academic who reflected on how she had secured her women’s studies post, another reservoir of ideas linked to women’s movement aspirations: It almost wasn’t really a conscious decision, an active decision on my part, it was almost by default because, going back to my under-graduate career in my third year I took a course on gender and politics for the first time, and it was the first time I had ever thought about gender as politics and sexuality and distribution of resources as having a gendered and political dimension. It also seems apparent that, for similar reasons, gender shapes other responses. Thus women are more likely to be critical of the values associated with the NPM in so far as they are masculinist and this would be one reason for resistance. They may become adept at ‘going through the motions’ and playing the game, while retaining a psychological distance, or even a sense of alienation from it. Outright opposition is also likely, related to gender-based differences in evaluation of the values underpinning NPM, and of the practice too. Thus Thomas and Davies (2002, p. 389) report one woman as saying: our HOD [head of department] has actually said in a meeting that we have to accept that undergraduate teaching is something we should give as little attention to as possible. And I said I’m not prepared to treat my teaching in that way. So far we have suggested that, as social actors, individual academics might have a variety of reasons for responding to the NPM in different ways and that these are gendered, but what about collective action? We have noted already that the diversity among academics makes their identification as one occupation problematic. Moreover, we noted the pronounced gender differences in the composition of academic labour that may make the idea of an academic identity problematic. However, we would want to follow European social movement theory and examine how different collective identities are formulated (Melucci 1995, 1996). Viewed in this way we would argue that the women’s movement provides a set of challenges and ‘alternative selves’ to the NPM, and that it is this that we see as underpinning the ‘transformative’ approach identified by Goode and Bagilhole (see also Deem and Ozga, 2000). Of course it is in the nature of a social movement to be fluid and diverse and we are not suggesting that the women’s movement creates a fixed feminist identity. Nevertheless, as a source of resistance to NPM, it is profound since the women’s movement undoubtedly provides subjects with a challenge to the values underpinning the NPM—especially its performativity and abstractness—and to its inhumanity as well as to its methods (seen in the preoccupation with measurement, control and hierarchy). This is not to suggest that some feminists might not embrace some aspects of the NPM, as levers for change to bring about greater equality—not least because there are differences over tactics and different currents within the women’s

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movement. This in turn raises the question of what exactly is being resisted. In so far as it is the ‘masculinist’ tendencies that go with the NPM then the women’s movement may provide a fundamental challenge to the NPM. If, however, the resistance is to gender inequality within academia, then resistance to the NPM might be more contingent and circumscribed—indeed, the NPM might even be seen as providing levers for advantageous change. In so far as some male and female academics transform themselves in the direction of managerialism this may better serve their material interests. It can certainly shore up their legitimacy. What it does not do, however, is transform the academic identity in ways that prefigure radical democracy (Habermas, 1971; Laclau and Mouffe, 1985), or challenge social inequality in any serious way. But then this process of constructing an academic identity is ongoing, and inherently uncertain. Those who might be happy with managerialism are likely to find that this is not so easy to achieve or maintain as a solid academic identity. It is apt to fray, particularly in a context where there are tensions between elitism and massification, between instrumentalism and ‘pure’ reason, between ‘needs’ and available resources and between self-definition and the (external) definitions of oneself offered by others (cf. Jenkins, 1996).

Concluding thoughts In exploring how academic identities are both multiple and embedded in complex social structures, social movements and patterns of experience, this chapter is part of a reflexive process. Social identities, including academic identities, are always becoming, never fixed. However uncomfortable this may make us feel, collectively as well as individually, all sorts of possibilities remain. In the interface between the variety of identities held by academics and new managerial identities, it should be no surprise that we find a complex interplay of subjectivity. In each case the prior disposition of the academic concerned is likely to influence their view of the NPM, itself a mix of approaches and techniques. It is accordingly contended that the navigation of identity in the managing of academe is likely to remain at the heart of the struggle for the soul of the university as institution and its intellectual workers in years ahead. But while engaging in identity-work in particular sets of organizational circumstances and institutional contexts social individuals also have a measure of agency, of opportunity in the field of freedoms and constraints as Melucci so trenchantly observes. This is apparent in their construing of these contexts, in their differential drawing upon and weaving together of the different identities in play and in the enactment of their work, as academics draw upon their experience in the workplace and outside, as Alcoff suggests. In this, female academics, and some male, may draw on the values of women’s movements, forged through a variety of informal networks which have drawn oppositional strength from collective and individual experience of socially structured disadvantage, sustained through time. As social movements for change, women’s movements cover a wide spectrum of views and interests, from right wing to Marxist and from liberal to radical, from essentialist to poststructuralist. It is this that helps to explain the variegated response to the NPM evidenced in the literature, the resistance of some to its predominantly masculinist

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character while others calculate advantage in playing the game. And it is the collectively shared, yet individualized, experience of gender disadvantage that keeps alive the notion of ‘woman’ as enduring category, sustained through embodied experience.

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8 When plausibility fails Towards a critical sensemaking approach to resistance Albert J.Mills and Jean Helms Mills

This chapter explores the issue of gender, resistance, and organizational change through a critical sensemaking lens. Resistance is explored as part of a long-term study of the gendering of organizational culture, in which we attempt to identify how discriminatory processes develop, are sustained, and change over time. The first phase of the project involved study of a single organization—British Airways (BA)—over time. The current phase is centred on Air Canada (AC) and further study, of Pan American Airways (PanAm) and United Air Lines (UAL), is planned. In this chapter we focus on the early years of AC, which was called Trans-Canada Air Lines (TCA) at its founding in 1937. Resistance has long been viewed as an important feminist strategy for withstanding discrimination (e.g. Pollert, 1981) and effecting change (e.g. Ferguson, 1984) but there has been considerable debate about what constitutes resistance (cf. Burrell, 1984). At the risk of oversimplification, we can say that there are two main feminist characterizations of resistance—structural and poststructural (including Foucauldian). Structural accounts tend to see power as something embodied in the position of the power holder (e.g. owners and managers in organizational arrangements, police officers and judges in judicial arrangements, and men in patriarchal arrangements). Here power is viewed as a dualistic, and top-down force that constitutes a system of domination and subordination. From this perspective resistance is characterized as a reaction against discriminatory behaviour that, in the process, can be empowering (e.g. from a socialist feminist perspective) and lead, ultimately to some form of power sharing (e.g. liberal feminist perspective) or restructuring (e.g. Marxian feminist perspective). Here the focus is on collectivist action designed to encourage women to engage in joint acts of resistance. Poststructuralist feminism, on the other hand, views power as exercised rather than possessed, closely bound to resistance through multiple power relations, and productive or constitutive rather than simply oppressive. As Rouse explains it, Power is exercised through an agent’s actions only to the extent that other agents’ actions remain appropriately aligned with them. The actions of dominant agents are therefore constrained by the need to sustain that alignment in the future; but, simultaneously, subordinate agents may seek ways of challenging or evading that alignment. (1996:108) For some, this helps to move the feminist notion of resistance away ‘from a “state of subordination” explanation of gender relations, which emphasizes domination and victimization, to a more textured understanding of the role of power in women’s lives’ (Deveaux, 1996:220). It is this emphasis on ‘the possibilities of resistance over the fact of

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domination’ (ibid.) that has encouraged poststructuralist feminists to focus on the micropolitics of resistance: arguably, ‘viewing power as constitutive has helped many [feminists] to grasp the interweaving nature of our social, political, and personal relationships’ (ibid.; original emphasis). Ranging across the different feminist perspectives are questions of agency and resistance. Feminists are divided, for example, on the issue of whether Foucauldian analysis adequately accounts for agency. Hartsock (1996) argues that Foucault’s work is incapable of providing normative grounding for feminist theories and therefore ‘undermines attempts at social change by obscuring the systematic nature of gender oppression’ (see Deveaux, 1996:221). Similarly, Ashcraft and Mumby (2004:69–70) contend that Foucault’s ‘refusal to root his analytics of power in a normative foundation seems to undercut any rationale for one course of critique of action or another’. Deveaux (1996:221–222) attempts a ‘middle’ position, arguing that Foucault’s model of power ‘is useful for feminists to the extent that it disengages us from simplistic, dualistic accounts of power; at the same time, however, it obscures many important experiences of power specific to women and fails to provide a sustainable notion of agency’. Similar criticisms have been levelled at structuralist feminism, which has been accused of adopting ‘a “reproduction” approach to exploring the relationship between domination and resistance’ (Ashcraft and Mumby, 2004:51–52). Here the ‘dominant, institutionalized relations of power’ is viewed as being ‘produced and reproduced on a daily basis, with little possibility for resistance or transformation by the everyday social actor’ (ibid.). Social actors are depicted as ‘meaning-makers who nonetheless tend to make sense of the world in ways that reproduce capitalist relations of power and production’ (ibid.). In the debate between structuralist and poststructuralist feminist accounts of power, resistance and agency there has been some call for theorizing work that bridges the divide (Ashcraft and Mumby, 2004; Best and Kellner, 1991). That is the starting point of our approach. In the next section we delineate the elements of a critical sensemaking approach, which attempts to simultaneously account for the structural and discursive aspects of gendering. In the second section we develop the approach through a critical exploration of Weick’s (1995, 2001) work on organizational sensemaking and resistance. In the third section we use a critical sensemaking approach to analyse the introduction and development of the female flight attendant role in Trans-Canada Air Lines (TCA) in 1938. The final section is a reflection on some of the insights on resistance gained from a critical sensemaking approach.

Towards a critical sensemaking approach Critical sensemaking arises out of a fusion of our separate work on organizational rules (Mills and Murgatroyd, 1991) and sensemaking (Helms Mills, 2003), and consists of four major elements—formative contexts (Unger, 1987), organizational rules (Mills, 1988), discourse (Foucault, 1979), and sensemaking (Weick, 1995, 2001).

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Formative contexts Unger (1987) argues, ‘The origins of social arrangements lie in past social conflicts and the institutional and imaginative arrangements that followed their resolution.’ These ‘formative contexts’, as he calls them, ‘are deep seated and pragmatic in their effects on everyday life [and] provide an implicit model of how social life should be led’ (quoted in Blackler, 1992:283). The notion of formative contexts links activity at the local level with dominant social assumptions about the character of social life, explaining how people come to reproduce existing practices. Unger contends that certain groups and traditions have a privileged hold upon the mass culture and exert ‘a unifying influence over expectations and ideals’ (quoted in Blackler, 1992:280). This draws attention to the fact that resistance should take into account the widespread social character of discriminatory practices. None the less, on its own the notion of formative context has little to say about agency or how generalized notions are translated into local practices. Organizational rules The notion of organizational rules moves us some way towards understanding how discriminatory practices are both reproduced and produced at a local—or organizational—level. Rules are defined as ‘phenomena whose basic characteristic is that of generally controlling, constraining, guiding and defining social action’, and which ‘exist in written and unwritten, formal and informal, legalistic, normative, and moralistic forms’ (Helms Mills and Mills, 2000:59). Following Clegg (1981), the starting point for organizational rules is focused on organizational control and the types of rules organizations use to control and co-ordinate members’ activities. This speaks to formal rules which are defined as ‘those expectations and requirements, either written or unwritten, that are routinely associated with the pursuit of organizational purposes, activities, or goals that are perceived as legitimate or “normal”’ and informal rules, which are ‘norms of behaviour that arise within [an organization] but do not directly develop to meet the defined goals of [that] organization’ (Helms Mills and Mills, 2000:59–60). Although we recognize that these are not the only form of rules we argue that they come to dominate organizational activities, especially ‘the ways things are done’ in a particular organization. Agency is recognized in a number of ways: in the development of formal rules it is recognized that rule expectations are the outcome of various activities that include the personalities of those involved, the intentional and unintentional designs of the rule makers, rule interpretation and enactment, and resistance. In combination organizational rules can be seen as constituting the culture of an organization, the unique configuration of expectations that dominate the way that things are done in a given organization (Mills, 1988). As such, this framework helps us to explore the ways in which gendered notions through the development of a configuration of formal and informal rules are solidified. Organizational rules provide a heuristic for understanding how people—however well intentioned—come to engage in discriminatory practices. In terms of resistance, a focus

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on organizational rules helps to empower those involved by revealing the socially constructed character of taken-for-granted sets of expectations and their instability as people attempt to interpret and apply rules. Despite these insights it can be argued that the notion of agency in organizational rules comes close to the depiction of social actors as reactive ‘meaning-makers’ so decried by Ashcraft and Mumby (2004). We would strongly argue that this was not the intention. In fact, we attempt at several points to cast the problem of agency as dialectic—viewing actors as both creating and being shaped by organizational rules. None the less, and somewhat ironically, part of the problem lies in the fact that a rules focus fails to ‘explain the processes through which actors come to develop and make sense of organizational rules’ (Helms Mills, 2003:195), or how ‘expectations cohere into a way of thinking and behaving, or how coherence is contested and rule-bound behaviour changed’ (Helms Mills and Mills, 2000:65). This problem of coherence and agency has led us, respectively, to the work of Foucault and Weick. Discourse Foucault’s notion of discourse helps to clarify the power of organizational rules and why they appear to take on such force when confronted by multiple agents. Simply put, a discourse is ‘a historically evolved set of interlocking and mutually supporting statements, which are used to define and describe a subject matter’ (Butler, 2002:44). But the reference here is not simply to language but also to interrelated practice which constitutes a ‘preconceptual, anonymous, socially sanctioned body of rules that govern one’s manner of perceiving, judging, imagining and acting’ (Flynn, 1996:30). This, according to Foucault, has profound implications for our understanding of power, knowledge, and subjectivity. Through a multiplicity of discursive practices certain ideas become normalized, they are no longer a set of ideas as much as a way of thinking and believing. They are received knowledge. For example, in terms of discourses of gender, femininity and masculinity can be characterized as ‘fictions linked to fantasies deeply embedded in the social world that can take on the status of fact when inscribed with the powerful practices…through which we are regulated’ (Walkerdine, 1990, quoted in Ussher, 1991:13). Discourses contribute to power in two important ways: first, they ‘are a means by which a certain power (of theorizing: a theorizing power) is itself constituted’ (Clegg, 1998:31); second, this form of power ‘“reaches into the very grain of individuals”…a regime of its exercise within the social body, rather than from above it’ (Foucault, 1980, quoted in Clegg, 1998:31: original emphasis). In this latter regard, Foucault sees what he calls subjectivity as an outcome of discursive practices: ‘Thus, identity is a partial, unstable discursive effect. Discourse becomes constitutive or productive, and gender identity a product always in progress’ (Ashcraft and Mumby, 2004:9). Or, as Sawicki (1996:300) puts it, ‘Discursive practices that construct gender are rule-governed structures of intelligibility that both constrain and enable identity formations.’ The notion of discourse—as the empowering of certain ideas through their appearance as knowledge—helps to explain how certain rules become accepted. Through focus on the instability of power/knowledge and identity it also goes some way to providing insights into resistance. Conceivably, unease with aspects of identity construction may

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encourage certain actors to resist aspects of received wisdom (and associated practices) that can ultimately shift power relations. None the less, Foucault’s notion of subjectivity simultaneously opens up the possibilities of resistance, while undercutting the potential for agency required to engage in resistance. This problematic led us to the work of Weick (1995) and sensemaking. Sensemaking Weick’s (1995, 2001) notion of sensemaking provides a useful way of framing the problem of agency and resistance in organizations through a detailed set of social psychological ‘properties’, which serve as a heuristic for studying how people make sense of themselves and organizational life. Although not entirely unproblematic, Weick’s notion of the individual avoids an essentializing view of the actor by arguing that the individual’s most salient features [are] not the traditional ones that helped the person know his/her environment objectively. Rather, a person acts and then responds to and attempts to make sense of what he/she has done. Through this process individuals are active in creating the environments to which they respond. (Nord and Fox, 1996:157) According to Weick (1995, 2001), the process of acting, responding, and sensemaking involves seven interrelated ‘properties’—retrospective, ongoing, and social sensemaking, cues, enactment, identity construction, and plausibility. These properties, individually and in concert, provide a useful heuristic for understanding resistance by revealing the instabilities in the sensemaking process and their impact on sensemakers. None the less, one of the main strengths of Weick’s sensemaking approach is also one of its greatest weaknesses. In its ability to conceive of organizations as processes rather than outcomes (Colville, 1994; Nord and Fox 1996), sensemaking tends to underplay the enduring structural contexts that characterize organizations. As we have argued elsewhere (Helms Mills and Mills, 2000), enduring forms of sensemaking become embedded in configurations of organizational rules that serve to inform subsequent sensemaking activities. The apparent neutrality of the sensemaking approach is also problematic. We contend that neutrality is achieved only if such issues as structure, power, gender, class, and race are ignored in the process of sensemaking. By including those elements within an expanded sensemaking model, we propose a critical sensemaking approach focused on understanding how discriminatory practices develop and are resisted.

Critical sensemaking, gender and resistance In explicating a critical sensemaking approach we draw on Weick’s (2001) recent analysis of the Polish Workers’ Defence Committee (KOR), which illuminates how sensemaking properties serve to inform acts of resistance. Strictly speaking the case focuses on ‘democracy’ and ‘successful sensemaking’ rather than resistance per se. None

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the less, it provides valuable insights into the uses of sensemaking to understand acts of resistance. Identity construction is a critical, if not the crucial, connection between resistance and sensemaking. According to Weick (1995:18, 20), not only does ‘sensemaking [begin] with a sensemaker’ but the ‘establishment and maintenance of identity is a core preoccupation in sensemaking’. The individual sensemaker, for instance, is concerned to promote self-enhancement, efficacy and consistency [which] acts as a trigger for sensemaking activity. Sensemaking can be triggered by a failure to confirm one’s self, or in the service of maintaining a consistent, positive, self-conception because people learn about their identities by projecting them into an environment and observing the consequences. (Weick, 1995, quoted in Helms Mills, 2003:55) This suggests that resistance may depend in large part on whether the individual actor is able to link her behaviour to a particular sense of identity, which in turn may depend on the praxis of social, ongoing, and enactive sense of a given set of actions. In a poststructuralist sense we can conceive of resistance being triggered where a person feels some kind of disconnection between her sense of self and the environment in which she is operating. While in a structuralist sense we can think of resistance being triggered where that person identifies the sensemaking disconnection as not confirming her understanding of womanhood. As the sensemaker attempts to make sense of her environment she is influenced by a number of social psychological factors, each of which carries the potential to encourage resistance. To begin with, the potential for resistance is opened up each time a sensemaker attempts to make retrospective sense of a situation. According to Weick, we tend to act first and make sense of what we have done after the event. Thus, ‘people know what they have done only after they do it’ (Weick, 2001:462). This relates to resistance in two important ways. First, sensemaking can be seen as a processual outcome that is always changing and subject to post hoc sensemaking. This suggests that any ongoing sense of a situation is prone to instability and challenge. Second, whether an individual contributes to the reproduction of the ongoing sense of a situation will depend on the extent to which it gels with her sense of self, which is rooted in her past experience. An ongoing sense of a situation influences what people notice. As we attempt to make sense of an organization we look around for familiar cues and also a dominant sense of the way things are done around the place. As a form of received knowledge, an ongoing sense of organizational life can have a powerful influence on a person’s sense of ‘ontological security’ (Giddens, 1976), encouraging some level of conformity as the person tries to ‘fit in’. None the less, there are possibilities for resistance ‘when efforts are made to put boundaries around some portion of the [continuous] flow [of experience], or when some interruption [or shock] occurs’ (Weick, 2001:462). However, resistance can also be engendered where the ongoing sense is disconfirming of a person’s sense of self.

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The enactment of sensemaking is also a powerful influence on how sense is made of an organization. Thus, ‘as people act they think about their action and, in the process, make sense of it’ (Helms Mills, 2003:69). In particular, people select elements to focus on. It is through a multitude of acts and, equally important, how sense is made of those acts that reality is enacted. However, not all sensemakers are equal. While all sensemakers engage in enactment, competing enactments may lead to some form of negotiated reality (Strauss et al., 1963) or to discord as people vie for their enactment to be accepted. An enacted sense of an organization is a powerful influence on sensemaking as it takes the thinking out of the process and provides a heuristic for action. Yet the process of enactment has a number of psychologically weak points that can lend themselves to resistance. Enactments are never fully stable. They serve as a read on a given set of actions in time and are linked to other sets of enactments that may or may not be mutually supportive. As enactments change they open the opportunity for sensemaking activities and challenge. Sensemaking, of course, is not a purely individual activity. Discursive practices and language ensure that understandings are inter-subjective, that individual sensemaking is integrally linked to social sensemaking. Thus, sensemaking ‘is influenced by the actual, implied, or imagined presence of others’ (Weick, 2001:460). This can encourage conformity behaviour, where the sensemaker is encouraged to select cues that confirm a generally held view while downplaying those which seem to run counter to the ongoing sense. But it can also encourage resistance where a discordant viewpoint appears to be reinforced by the enactment of others. Sensemaking is about cues but it is also very much about plausibility. Cues refer to elements in a social environment that become selected in the process of sensemaking. Weick contends that ‘if sensemaking is nothing else, it is about the resourcefulness with which people elaborate tiny indicators into full-blown stories, typically in ways that selectively shore up an initial hunch’ (Weick, 2001:462). Here cues are both ‘indicators’ and ‘selected’ aspects of sensemaking. It is often through the use of cues (e.g. symbols, imagery) that organizational managers have attempted to manipulate the culture of an organization (cf. Wilson, 2002) and managed the meaning or sense of the organization. This suggests that cues may also play an important role in resistance by influencing people’s sense of what is happening. Plausibility is the crux of sensemaking formation. Simply put, we are more likely to reject things that do not appear plausible to us. In a word, sensemaking is about plausibility. Mining the work of Weick, we can define plausibility as ‘a feeling that something makes sense, feels right, is somehow sensible, and fits with what you know’ (Helms Mills, 2003:67). Plausibility influences an enduring sense of something through interaction with the other six properties (see p. 144), which suggests that plausibility may be a crucial socio-psychological aspect of resistance. Thus, the sense of a situation is arguably more likely to be resisted where it is pursued beyond the point of plausibility, or resistance may be engaged where an aspect of organizational life is no longer consistent with other aspects of plausibility.

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Gender and the micro-politics of resistance in the Canadian airline industry Gendering refers to the processes whereby certain workplace practices, symbols, and artifacts become regularly associated with forms of masculinity or femininity. Such recurring associations may not, at least in any direct or apparent way, lead to discriminatory outcomes (e.g. the provision of separate toilet facilities labelled ‘Men’ and ‘Women’) but for the most part they have constituted discriminatory practices (e.g. the development of ‘women only’ and ‘men only’ tasks). Air Canada Air Canada began life as Trans-Canada Air Lines (TCA) in April 1937. If we examine the hiring practices of the company over time several discrete periods are indicated. We refer to these periods as ‘junctures’, or ‘a concurrence of events which create a moment in time—a series of images, impressions, and experiences which act to give the appearance of a coherent whole and which influence how [an] organization is understood’ (Mills and Ryan, 2001:64). From a focus on hiring practices (i.e., the comparative difference between female and male hiring and corporate imaging) several junctures are evident. In its first fifteen months of existence (1937–1938) TCA only employed men. In July 1938 the airline hired the first of several female flight attendants and, with only a handful of exceptions (including a housekeeper and a stenographer), this group of women constituted the female labour force at TCA. During the war years, from around the middle of 1940 onwards, the company hired a large number of women to a range of jobs vacated by men who had joined the armed forces. None the less, women were viewed as ‘temporary’ members of the company. In the immediate post-war era the percentage of female employees fell dramatically as returning servicemen were offered a range of airline jobs. Women were, however, now viewed as a ‘normal’ part of TCA and remained in the company in large numbers, continuing to be employed in a narrow but expanded range of jobs (compared to the pre-war era). The 1960s and early 1970s saw the eroticization of womanhood as the airline, now renamed Air Canada, marketed its product through the selling of female sexuality. From the mid-1970s to the 1990s the airline underwent a period of professionalization, with a number of women moving up into the ranks of middle management. These different eras are marked by distinct hiring practices that, we contend, provide the structural contexts in which sensemaking occurred. Below we will look at events in the first two junctures (from 1937 to 1940) to examine the problem of resistance from a critical sensemaking perspective. Boys to men When TCA was formed in 1937 it was constituted by at least three masculine archetypes—the entrepreneur, the bush airman, and the military aviator. The entrepreneurs dominated the board and the senior management group. The employees

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were roughly divided between those with bush experience, those with military experience, and some with a combination of the two. In some ways these different masculine experiences diverged as the new company began to take shape (Mills and Helms Mills, 2002). In particular, there were often sharp exchanges as management sought to impose ‘their own strict standards’ (Smith, 1986:59) on employees, many of whom were schooled in bush flying. Management consisted of men who were ‘tough and at the top of their field [who] quickly set the pattern for the new TCA and established [exacting] standards of performance and reliability’ (ibid.). They emphasized ‘discipline and the over-riding importance of safety—a lesson they drilled into everyone down the line, not merely the pilots’ (ibid.). The emerging culture of strict adherence to the rules was at various times resisted by the engineers and pilots, ‘a diverse and enthusiastic group of rugged individualists’ (Lothian, 1979:46), who were ‘accustomed to pretty much doing as they wished in the bush [and] did not easily fit into the corporate structure’ (Smith, 1970:26). In part, the outcome was an organizational culture based on the ‘rugged’ imposition of rules and, at times, an equally ‘rugged’ resistance to management style. In the process ‘toughness’ and ‘ruggedness’ became privileged forms of masculinity and expected behaviour. Fairly quickly the culture became characterized by a ‘solid esprit de corps, a mystique almost, that persisted’ well into the future (Smith, 1986:59). Double indemnity: from Florence Nightingale to Venus di Milo In July 1938 TCA hired Lucille Garner as its first female employee—a ‘stewardess’. The hiring appears to have been unremarkable at the time and engendered little if any resistance. In a number of ways the lack of resistance is surprising; in the words of a newspaper of the time, the female flight attendant ‘represents a relatively new and rapidly growing profession for women [that earlier may] have seemed as strange as some visitor from Mars’ (Rummel, 1940). The formative context of Canadian aviation was highly masculinist and unsympathetic to the employment of women. Much of Canada’s aviation projects and personnel were rooted in bush flying that involved operations that took pilots deep into the northern regions of the country to survey mining areas, fight forest fires, transport men (sic) and equipment to mining and exploration sites, map uncharted territory, engage in search and rescue work, and fly medical supplies to isolated communities (cf. Shaw, 1964). The work was competitive and ‘cut throat’ (Milberry, 1979), in social conditions of danger, isolation, and uncharted and often harsh territory. In this context certain images of men and women came to dominate bush piloting and the associated communities. The archetypal bush flyer was portrayed as daring, heroic, tough, rugged, womanizing, and self-reliant (Henry and Project, 1983). Women were viewed as second-class citizens whose involvement in bush flying was, at best, as cleaners, cooks, and sexual partners. These narrow images of women were evident in the early days of TCA, from the President down. The airline’s first President, Sam Hungerford, publicly stated that a ‘devoted wife [is a woman who is] always ambitious for her husband’s career’ (Knowles, 1932). At the employee level public references to women almost always focused on their sexual potential. For example, one man is reported as ‘looking around for a comfortable

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haven for the long winter evenings, preferably blonde, about 5'4" with a good library—in case there isn’t anything left to do’ (Trans-Canada Air Lines, 1939b). When Lucille Garner was hired the sex division of labour at TCA was totally onesided, with men employed in all other work, including stenographic and typing tasks. Although it was not unusual to find female flight attendants in the airline business, a number of airlines, including Pan American Airways and Imperial Airways—both of which flew into Canada—steadfastly refused to hire female flight crew. Yet, in 1938, TCA’s hiring of female flight attendants seemed plausible to those involved. This was due to a number of factors, including mimetic isomorphic influences (DiMaggio and Powell, 1983), and the company’s enactment of the changing situational sense through use of cues that stressed the continuity of extant notions of masculine and feminine identities. Evidence of mimetic isomorphic influences lies with the fact that TCA’s VicePresident of Operations, Philip Johnson—the man effectively in charge of the running of the airline—had been the President of United Air Lines (UAL) in 1930 when it became the first commercial airline to hire female flight attendants. When he took over TCA Johnson brought with him a management team from UAL, Eastern Airlines, and North West Airlines—airlines with an established record of employing female flight attendants. Lucille Garner was sent to UAL for stewardess training and adapted UAL manuals to assist her to recruit and train future TCA stewardesses. Following the practice established by UAL, and reproduced by other North American airlines, TCA only hired women with Registered Nursing (RN) qualifications. Reporting the hiring of stewardesses the company constructed a sense of plausibility through: (a) a claim that they were following established airline practice (retrospective sensemaking); (b) reference to the caring role of the hires (sensemaking cues), (c) contrast with the strength, education and experience of male employees (appeal to existing sense of masculine identities); and (d) the fact that stewarding constituted a new position within TCA (social sensemaking): Employees of the permanent staff are required to meet high physical and educational standards and in the case of technical positions to have had previous experience. It has become the recognized practice of air transport companies on this continent to employ stewardesses to care for the comfort of passengers. In the month of July stewardesses were engaged for the Vancouver-Seattle service and will be employed on other runs when passenger service is inaugurated. (Trans-Canada Air Lines, 1938a:6–7) When Lucille Garner began working for TCA she was soon confronted by a number of developing rules that owed much to gendered sensemaking. For instance, recruitment of stewardesses was restricted to women who: were between 5 feet and 5 feet, 5 inches tall; were no less than 95 pounds in weight but no more than 125 pounds; were between the ages of 21 and 26 years; were registered nurses, with some nursing experience; did not wear eye glasses; had a pleasing personality and appearance; were Canadian citizens; were unmarried and had no plans to marry in the foreseeable future (Buchanan, 1980;

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Rummel, 1940). How these rules were made sense of had much to do with the mostly male organizational audiences (employees and passengers), and a discourse of glamour. From the beginning the hiring of TCA stewardesses was associated with a discourse of glamour, which served as retrospective sensemaking. Flight attending, formerly a male profession, had been steadily developing into a female-typed job since 1930 and had rapidly become associated with glamour (Mills, 1997). In the United States towards the end of the 1930s flight attending was generally viewed as a job for ‘attractive’ young women (ibid.). From the earliest days of in-flight service height and weight, but not age, had been an issue in the hiring of flight attendants. This was linked to the size of the aircraft, its weight and balance in flight, and fuel consumption. With the advent of female flight attendants height and weight concerns became linked to the woman’s appearance, as airline executives insisted that a stewardess’s weight should be proportional to her height, and that she should be ‘young’ and unmarried (Hochschild, 1983). The practice of hiring younger women, who were nurses, initiated by United Air Lines, was mimicked by other airlines. But as the flying public grew used to female flight attendants, airlines became more insistent on attractiveness as a job requirement (Hochschild, 1983). Increasingly, the attractiveness of the stewardesses was reinforced through the use of uniforms. When Lucille Garner set out to recruit stewardesses she had to contend with a discourse of glamour that emphasized the nurturing role of the job, the attractiveness of the job holder, and opportunities for travel and adventure. In one of its earliest information brochures, for example, the airline refers to its ‘stewardesses [as] a credit to Canadian womanhood both in efficiency and charm’ (Trans-Canada Air Lines, 1938b). In another brochure the stewardess is characterized as ‘a Registered Nurse and skilled in the little attentions that make travel a pleasure. Children are her special care’ (Trans-Canada Air Lines, 1939a). Male employees seem to have shared this idealized view of the stewardess. George Lothian (1979:57), one of the airline’s first pilots, described the stewardesses as creating the ‘atmosphere of a family picnic’, with the pilots learning to rely on ‘the girls to look after the passengers [which] their nurses training ideally suited them’ to do. In a similar vein, Tommy Kirkham, who trained many of the early stewardesses ‘fell in love with every new stewardess that showed up on the scene’ (Kirkham, 1978). Whatever the underlying reality of these various sensemaking activities, over 1,000 women applied for the first six advertised stewardess positions (McEachern, 1938). Capturing the essence of the surrounding discourse, a newspaper headline writer suggested that successful applicants would have to ‘combine the comeliness of Venus with the capabilities of Florence Nightingale’ (Perth, 1938). Lucille Garner toured Canada interviewing many of the 1,000 hopefuls and in the process both reinforced and undermined aspects of the job requirements. One of the first questions Garner asked a candidate was why she was interested in aviation. She used the answers to this question to stress the less than glamorous nature of the job, warning candidates not to ‘think that being an air hostess will be thrilling and adventurous’ (Garner, quoted in McEachern, 1938). She would then point out the ‘routine’ nature of the work, arguing that the airline stays clear of women looking for thrills: ‘They will soon find out that it isn’t all excitement and they may leave the service. We want to protect ourselves against that’ (ibid.). Garner also stressed that a candidate would not receive further consideration where it was felt that she showed an undue interest in the salary or

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the ‘prospects of air hosting’ (ibid.). Instead the company was looking for women who appeared to be primarily interested in the work of looking after the passengers (ibid.). What is interesting here is Garner’s resistance to TCA’s overly romanticized notion of the glamour of flying. She deals with the issue by developing a different sense of the role, as one that is in many ways routine but none the less important in its focus on passenger comfort. She also goes on to broaden the notion of passenger service, beyond that of ministering angel. Outlining the duties, Garner told applicants that they were ‘responsible to the captain and the first officer for all the passengers on the aeroplane’ (ibid.), that they had to be a sort of walking encyclopedia, able to answer the questions of passengers regarding both the aircraft and the route over which it flies. She must know what a variable pitch propeller is, what ailerons are and how they work, all about wing flaps, tail fins, de-icers, heating systems, engines, speeds and altitudes, and so on. She must know her geography and be able to name towns and point out other places of interest, and she must have some knowledge of local history. (Lucille Garner files, 1938b) Applicants were also required to have ‘ingenuity, tact, diplomacy’ (quoted in McEachern, 1938), a concern with putting passenger comfort first, and the ability to reassure passengers of the safety of the aeroplane. In the last regard Garner contended that a ‘sense of humour is essential because if a girl is too serious she is apt to betray trouble in her face and upset the passengers’ (ibid.). The themes of professionalism, efficiency, routine, aviation knowledge, and hard work were constantly stressed by Garner and by her female staff. Charged with recruiting the new intakes of TCA stewardesses, Garner also did much to resist the company’s overly glamorized view of the women themselves. She set out to recruit ‘home town girls’ (Lucille Garner files, 1939) or ‘typical Canadian girls, not the glamour type’ (uncredited, 1940). Garner introduced her own notion of glamour. Her sense of attractiveness and appearance drew to some extent on the existing discourse but also added elements that spoke more to a female audience. For instance, she lent support to the age and no eyeglasses requirements, arguing, respectively, that the ‘job was rigorous—flights from Montreal to Vancouver lasted 11 hours when the weather was favorable—so the girls had to be young’, and ‘eyeglasses were considered unattractive’ (quoted in Lowe, 1979). During interviews Garner made a mental note of an applicant’s appearance because she believed that ‘an air hostess must look smart in the tailored navy uniform of T.C.A.’ (McEachern, 1938). In fact, it was Garner who designed the uniform, which was described as a ‘chic ensemble…that [gave] the TCA stewardess the feeling that she is one of the best dressed women of the age’ (Lucille Garner files, 1944). Garner also introduced rules that required that ‘An air hostess should smile, particularly during bad weather as this reassures passengers’ (McEachern, 1938). The rules also prohibited stewardesses from smoking and chewing gum, and required that they use only natural or medium shades of nail polish (if any) when on duty. On the question of marriage, Garner insisted not only that recruits be unmarried at the time of application but also that they pledge that they had no plans to marry in the

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foreseeable future. This was justified in terms of the needs of the company to retain stewardesses: typically, North American airlines experienced a high turnover rate of stewardesses who, in line with broad workplace practice, resigned once they married. For Garner the romantic intentions of the stewardess were the problem, not the company’s marriage rule. But she also justified the rule in terms of the uncertain nature of the job, which she argued ‘wasn’t supposed to be a lasting career because people didn’t know the potential. It was an entirely different life too: you were living out of a suitcase all the time and women weren’t supposed to work after they got married’ (Lowe, 1979). On nursing qualifications, Garner was instrumental in casting the qualifications in terms of skill and experience, seeing the ‘registered nurse’s certificate as a standard of efficiency’ (Lucille Garner files, 1938a). It was argued that stewardesses were chosen from the ranks of graduate nurses ‘because that profession is thought to have the best training in human relationships’ (Pat Eccleston, Garner’s deputy, quoted in Air Canada archive, undated: 1940 or 1941). As the Canadian magazine Chatelaine was to describe it: ‘a graduate nurse has been trained to meet the public. She’s adept at handling people and situations. She can judge character accurately and knows when to take a friendly, informal attitude, and when to leave people strictly alone’ (Alexander, 1939:16). Interestingly, these characteristics are almost identical to those used by Imperial Airways to justify the hiring of men with experience of stewarding on ocean-going liners and firstclass rail (cf. Mills, 1997). But, as Chatelaine went on to detail, nurses were not chosen for their ‘actual medical training [because] while she can administer simple first-aid, she is not prepared to look after any major illness or accident. Doesn’t need to be. Less than one percent of people travelling by air get ill’ (ibid.). In the words of one former stewardess from the time, The fact that in the beginning all stewardesses were graduate nurses turned out to be more of a moral support for the passengers than of any great practical assistance in looking after them. In all my years of flying instances when I used my nurse’s experience were very few. (Lillian Houseman, quoted in Air Canada archive, 1972) In 1941 ‘constant friction’ in the training office led Lucille Garner to resign from TCA and join another airline (Kirkham, 1978). At the time of leaving she had trained almost a hundred stewardesses and witnessed the percentage of female employees rise from 1 per cent to around 14 per cent. In some small but important ways she had changed the image of the stewardess by resisting aspects of the gendered discourse of glamour. In terms of identity, the stewardess image had moved beyond a simple focus on physical beauty and caring abilities to an emphasis on ‘charm and efficiency’. If she did not alter the dominant thinking of the largely male audience the growing number of female employees (155 in 1941) provided a different set of interactions through which new images could develop. Perhaps that much can be glimpsed in the following story of an ‘ill-mannered passenger who chided a stewardess for being nothing but a “glorified waitress” [who] received the cool reply, “Sir, I am part of the safety equipment aboard this aeroplane’” (Smith, 1986:79).

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Analysis and discussion On the surface TCA’s introduction of female flight attendants occurred and proceeded without a hitch. Closer examination indicates that micro-processes of resistance served to alter some of the contours of the gender gestalt associated with the imaging of the stewardess. Through a critical sensemaking framework we have attempted to reveal some of the problems of resistance and its link to plausibility. That there was little resistance to the hiring of female flight attendants can be explained in terms of the sense that it made to those involved. It was a change but not a shock to the ongoing sense of gender imagery that existed within the all-male company. As a new position, flight attending did not disturb the gender division of labour so much as add to it, serving—through contrast—to strengthen the masculine character of piloting and engineering. By casting the new employees in the role of glamour girls, existing masculinist notions of womanhood were also largely undisturbed. Finally, rules and regulations associated with the new job helped to construct narrow images of womanhood, focused on beauty, youth, and marriageability. To understand how and why these narrow images were constructed and maintained we need to examine the symbols and interactions that encouraged a particular form of mental work (or sensemaking). For one thing the respective uniforms of the pilots and the stewardesses projected a contrasting focus on rank and experience with glamour and appearance. Initial examination of the reactions of the early stewardesses suggests little or no resistance to the glamour image. Indeed, the company’s narrowly constructed image of the glamour girl proved popular with a number of young women who applied in their hundreds for the few jobs on offer. Yet, through an examination of the sense made of the various aspects of the job it can be argued that there was some resistance. It is hard to know the extent to which those involved were uneasy with some of the elements of the job. In many ways recruitment was self-selecting. Women who were not comfortable with the character of the job were, presumably, less willing to apply and less likely to be appointed if they did. None the less, in the absence of collective action or demonstrable objections there is some evidence that the sense of the job was questioned. Lucille Garner constructed her own retrospective sense of the job requirements that provided stewardesses with an identity of experience (nursing and airline training), while retaining a sense of glamour (fashionable in appearance). The changes did not serve to challenge the ongoing masculine sense of the organization but helped to create cues that served to maintain the plausibility of established men’s and women’s work. That may help to explain how small but significant changes occur over time. It also raises some interesting questions for further study. Three main insights stand out. First, the study seems to suggest that resistance can effect some change where it is not seen to disturb the dominant sense of plausibility. But are such changes small and inconsequential or are they the seeds of a changing plausibility over time? Second, there is also the suggestion that different areas of plausibility can co-exist within the same organization. Thus, to what extent is a dominant form of plausibility maintained in the face of competing areas of plausibility? For example, Lucille Garner managed to develop a set of cues and a retrospective sense of stewarding that were perceived as plausible to male and female employees but in different ways. Third, the institutionalization of an

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organization, including processes of mimetic isomorphism, may be more about form than content. TCA took over the established practice of hiring registered nurses, yet the sense of why stewardesses had to have such qualifications differed between airlines. In the sensemaking of apparently similar practices we may have another important cue to resistance.

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9 Resistance to organizational culture change A gendered analysis Deborah M.Shepherd and Judith K.Pringle

In this chapter we argue that resistance to change processes within organizations can be usefully analysed using a gendered perspective of cultures. As Aaltio and Mills state (2002:10), ‘the organizational culture debate has opened up an important theoretical space for exploration of gender within organizational analysis’. In the discussion that follows we turn this argument back on itself to demonstrate that research on gender provides a powerful analytic tool for considering both the significance of organizational cultures and the nature of resistance at the micro level of human interaction. We briefly sketch the salient literatures from organizational change, culture, resistance and theories of gender before focusing on a case study of attempted organizational culture change. Truisms such as ‘change is the only constant’ abound in today’s organizational vocabulary. As Bennett (2001:149) suggests, ‘change occurs more rapidly, in greater volume and is more complex than ever before’. Unfortunately, many organizational changes, including culture changes, are often embarked upon with little clarity of purpose, little co-ordination and without consideration of the consequences for employees or organizational performance. Efforts to change organizational culture are but one of many initiatives hailed as the latest panacea for achieving organizational success. Since the publication of In Search of Excellence (Peters and Waterman, 1982), there has been unprecedented research interest in the concept of organizational culture. After a long period in organizational studies where the emphasis was on the seemingly objective, rational and easily measured factors within organizations such as structure and strategy, there was a shift in direction. Organizational researchers began to investigate culture; ‘the plethora of values, beliefs, rituals, customs, and other characteristics in organizations which seem to affect the behaviour of organizational participants’ (Bourantas et al., 1990:61). Within the organizational culture literature there have been many competing and conflicting views as to what culture is, how it can be known, and how, if at all, it can be measured, managed or manipulated (see Alvesson, 2002; Martin and Frost, 1996). Martin (1992) has theorized that culture can not only be usefully considered from unitary or integrated perspectives, but may also be differentiated among sub-groups or fragmented within and across sub-cultures. While there is strong argument to support a multi-perspective approach to understanding cultures, for the purposes of this chapter we are predominantly focusing on culture, or at least the espoused culture, from a unitary perspective. Such an approach clearly has limitations but for the case study discussed below it reflects the way the organization was characterized and it also offers a contained cultural lens from which to incorporate a gendered analysis.

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The extensive literature exploring organizational culture attests to interest in culture as a useful vehicle for understanding organizations. This recognition of cultures within organizations led to discussion and debate about whether, and how, organizational cultures can be managed and changed. A number of culture change models and strategies have appeared offering managers and other change agents advice on how to pursue this delicate topic of culture change (e.g. Brown, 1995; Kilmann, 1985; Kotter and Heskett, 1992). However, within this flurry of writing activity, there is little evidence to suggest that culture change initiatives predictably achieve the desired results. It appears that many fall well short of the coveted outcomes desired by managers or the consultants who market the strategies for change. ‘Put “culture” and “change” together and the chance of anything coherent emerging become all the more unlikely’ (Bate, 1994:3). One reason such change strategies do not achieve their intended outcomes is due to resistance to change. The term ‘resistance to change’ can be traced back to the early work of social psychologist Kurt Lewin in 1947 and has evolved to a definition we adopt for the current discussion. That is, ‘any conduct that serves to maintain the status quo in the face of pressure to alter the status quo’ (Zaltman and Duncan, 1977:63). Resistance has been consistently acknowledged in the change literature and there is an increasing body of research endorsing resistance as an important contributor to change failures (e.g. Eisen et al., 1992; Waddell and Sohal, 1998). Resistance can come from any organizational stakeholder, be either overt or subtle, and above all can be sufficient to derail change initiatives. In the organizational literature, managerial perspectives have prevailed in analyses of resistance to change (see Dent and Goldberg (1999) for a critique of this perspective). From this view resistance is considered as one more variable that change agents and/or managers need to be aware of and address throughout the change process. The assumption underlying this perspective is that the change initiatives are unquestioningly ‘good’ for the organization (and therefore its members) and that any resistance is negative. Consequently, resistance to change must be managed and controlled. Considering resistance in this light suggests that managers and change agents, by recognizing and understanding both reasons for, and behavioural manifestations of, resistance, will be able to ‘manage’ and reduce any negative repercussions so that the change initiatives are not limited or undermined. Infrequently in the organizational literature are alternative positions to understanding resistance posited, for example, where resistance may be considered beneficial to the change process. From this viewpoint, resistance can be seen as a source for further understanding of the change process. Furthermore, resistance might also highlight the possible impact of proposed changes on the prevailing organizational culture at the level of individual experience. People are often reluctant to give up on the old and embrace the new due to the dominant set of historical values and beliefs within the organization. That is, real or perceived threats to existing organizational culture are a powerful source of resistance, which Tichy (1983) refers to as ‘cultural resistance’. A parallel research stream that has developed alongside the organizational culture debate is an exploration of the gendered nature of organizations. It is only recently that the assumed gender neutrality of organizations has been questioned and the gendered

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nature of organizational cultures explored and discussed (see, for example, Aaltio and Mills, 2002; Acker, 1990; Gherardi, 1995; Green and Cassell, 1996; Harlow and Hearn, 1995). We invoke gender as an analytic frame for trying to understand micro-political resistance to change in one organization that embarked on a deliberate effort to change its organizational culture.

Gender as an analytic organizational tool In order to use gender as an analytical lens for exploring organizational issues, it is first necessary to trace the ambiguous and confusing nature of sex and gender (Scott, 1999) and to delineate our position within this field. The early gender research began with a mapping of masculine and feminine characteristics that were embodied in the individual (e.g. Alvesson and Billing, 1997). Further inquiry into the ways in which people ‘do gender’ has moved conceptions of sex and gender beyond ‘bio-men and ‘bio-women’ (Alvesson and Billing, 2002:76) to being interconnected and relational within changing historical and social contexts (Delphy, 1993; Fenstermaker and West, 2002). Gender is ‘dynamic, adaptable, mutable and deriving its particular meaning through social interaction’ (Moloney and Fenstermaker, 2002:207). As players on the organizational stage we enact and accomplish gender within micro-level interactions in a gendered organization that is itself situated within broader macro societal settings that are also gendered in nature (Glenn, 1999). This conceptual ambiguity of sex and gender is amplified by the interconnection between masculinity and femininity. As a consequence, the concept and lived experience of gender cannot avoid the dual invocation of both masculinity and femininity. We concur with Alvesson and Billing (2002:79) who suggest, ‘concepts such as masculinity and femininity should be used to describe the cultural and symbolic meaning with which people of a particular cultural group endow particular phenomena [such as culture]’. There is a large cross-disciplinary literature that explores the characteristic dimensions of femininity and masculinity. Characteristics described as feminine include: interdependent, co-operative, cautious, changeable, delicate, dependent, emotional, emphasizing relationships, gentle, intuitive, nurturing, passive, patient, personal, receptive, showing concern for others, soft, subordinate, supportive (Cunha and Cunha, 2002; Fondas, 1997; Marshall, 1984). Kerfoot and Knights (1996:79) describe the core of masculinity as ‘preoccupation with a particular instrumental form of “rational control”’. More specifically, stereotypical masculine characteristics include: independence, competitive, achievement-oriented, active, aggressive, competent, focused, dominant, hard, in control, money-oriented, organizing, powerful, rational, status-conscious, strong and unemotional (Cunha and Cunha, 2002; Marshall, 1984). Organizational culture is as likely to be endowed with feminine and masculine characteristics as any other human activity, although it need not be simply applying gendered characteristics to cultures. By examining the demographic composition of many organizations, Hearn (2002:43) posits that the gendered nature of organizations and organizational cultures offers a curious contradiction: ‘Many, perhaps most, organizations are predominantly men’s organizations; and […] most organizational

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cultures are predominantly men’s organizational cultures.’ However, paradoxically, he argues that the notion of organizational culture has been a ‘repository category for that which is not structure, including the “feminine”. Organizational culture has thus often been encoded as “feminine” and “female”’(ibid.: 45). Organizational culture then is associated with that which is intuitive and ‘soft’, in opposition to the ‘hard’ form of organizational structure and design (Martin and Knopoff, 1997). Culture then is an amalgam of the less tangible, the implicit and informal processes of organizational life. A delayering of implicit dichotomous gendered cultures is particularly apparent within the work of Fondas (1997). She carried out a textual analysis of three popular management texts where she highlights the feminine shadow within a dominating masculinity. She traces a subtle shift to a ‘feminization’ of management in the qualities that are advocated, where ‘feminization’ is defined as ‘the spread of traits or qualities that are traditionally associated with females to things or people not usually described in that way’ (1997:258). Alvesson and Billing (2002:77, 81) extend this concept of feminization to suggest that to understand the construction of gender at work ‘four elements should be studied. These are: (1) the percentage share of the two sexes; (2) the gender aura or image of the activity; (3) the values and ideas that dominate the activity; (4) the form in which the activity is conducted’, such as the private or public sector. Our focus is on elements 2 and 3 as we trace the gendered nature of organizational cultural change. Gendered organizational processes and practices may be open, as in the nature of interactions between organizational members, or more deeply hidden in the symbols and values of organizational cultures. Halford and Leonard (2001) draw on Smircich’s (1983) conception of culture as a metaphor for understanding gendered organizations and describe representations of cultural values in material artefacts such as logos, uniforms, mission statements, use of space and everyday terminology. The symbolic meanings of cultural artefacts are defined and modified through the perceptions and values of the organizational actors to gain a more subtle understanding of the enactment of gender. As researchers we can discern layers of meaning from a close reading of participants’ ‘small stories’ (Calas and Smircich, 1999). It is through these organizational narratives that members not only constitute organizational culture, but also attempt to maintain and reproduce meaning. Through these processes, culture becomes a dynamic product of the social interaction and negotiation of organizations’ members as well as a way of producing meaning within organizations. Using individuals’ organizational stories, we seek to analyse some of the gendered layers of the micro-politics of resistance to organizational cultural change. The field study We offer a case study as a way of illuminating the gendered nature of organizational cultures and more importantly the gendered nature of resistance to specific attempts to change the organizational culture. The case organization, Technica (a pseudonym), is a US-based multinational corporation operating in the information technology industry in New Zealand. This is an industry that has rapidly become masculine, despite its apparent gender-neutral beginning (Game and Pringle, 1983). This research is based on a twelvemonth investigation and the specific change issues addressed in this chapter draw from

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this ethnographic research. The ‘findings’ of an interpretive approach to data analysis captured the richness of subjective experiences of the organizational members and provide what Geertz (1973) describes as a ‘thick description’ field study. A number of exemplary quotations transcribed from interviews and discussions are included to illustrate the main themes being presented. We were interested in conflicting and converging views of the changes, including any overt or covert resistance to change, and the perceived success of the outcomes as assessed by organizational members. Technica Technica is an internationally recognized company that develops and manufactures information technology. Historically, within the company structure the sales people have been well rewarded compared to the technical people even though it is the latter group who have actually provided the ongoing support and service that generates most of the company revenue. For many decades, Technica had commanded a strong market position and had built a loyal customer base. However, the increasing competitiveness of the high tech industry and internal problems such as rising costs and decreasing efficiencies and sales volumes meant that Technica was experiencing increasing pressure to change. Once loyal customers now had far greater choice, and other service and technology providers were eroding Technica’s past market dominance. To address these challenges, a number of change initiatives were introduced from the international head office, which aimed at changing the individualistic competitive organizational culture to one that emphasized diversity, teamwork, quality and customer focus. Each of these initiatives required a fundamentally different style of operating by challenging existing organizational values, norms, beliefs, behaviours and reward systems, and questioning the accepted modus operandi within the company. It was hoped that this ‘new’ organizational culture would encourage a new lexicon, different and more explicit ‘shared’ values, changed behaviour, and ultimately different constructions of meaning and sensemaking. A new values set A major change that occurred at Technica during the field study was that the US Head Office of Technica developed a set of five values known as ‘Our Common Bond’. All Technica staff worldwide were expected to embrace the five values associated with this Common Bond as the guiding principles for working at Technica and interacting with staff and customers. The general descriptor of the values set was: We commit to these values to guide our decisions and behaviour. By living these values, Technica aspires to set a standard of excellence worldwide that will reward our shareowners, our customers, and all Technica people. The values were: respect for individuals; dedication to helping customers; highest standards of integrity; innovation; and teamwork. Two of these explicit values, ‘respect for individuals’ and ‘teamwork’, will be discussed more fully in the following sections.

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The process of ‘rolling out’ the new values set incorporated a compulsory two-day training course for all Technica employees. Less than a day into the training at the New Zealand office the espoused values had been reduced to a standing joke with humour and sarcasm used as a mechanism for subverting and resisting the values, particularly the value ‘respect for the individual’. Humour was used to undermine the intention and seriousness of Our Common Bond with people calling the values ‘The Common Blond’. This form of resistance draws directly on the sexist jokes about women with blond hair and insinuates that the new values are somehow dizzy, emotional and very feminine. Another manifestation of resistance soon became evident in the form of a joking ‘indictment’. Fellow Technica members were ‘charged’ with being ‘guilty of Common Bond violations’ following behaviour or comments which were perceived as a values contradiction. For example: ‘We joke about Common Bond violations but it doesn’t mean anything. Just say that I’m rude…All he can say is “You’re not showing respect for the individual” and I reply, “Who cares?” Nothing is going to happen.’ While many Technica members reported that the values captured by Our Common Bond were generally positive and that respecting individuals was important, few participants felt that the value had any significant impact on the daily behaviour of Technica members, especially those in senior positions. Indeed, the views of some employees were that those in management positions had no reason to make any changes to their behaviour as a result of the values being introduced. The exchange below captures this concern: ‘Our Auckland manager violates the Common Bond all the time and no one can say anything to him…Well, he would just make your life more difficult because he doesn’t like being challenged and he doesn’t care about the Common Bond things anyway.’ Overall the values were seen as being ‘warm and fuzzy’ and not relevant to the actual task-focused objectives of the organization which was about sales and efficient service delivery. Although everyone attended the training because it was deemed ‘compulsory’ by the US Head Office, both the training and the values set were considered an unimportant aside to ‘getting the job done’. Arguably, in the eyes of many Technica employees, the image of the tasks associated with the business of Technica (Alvesson and Billing, 2002) was very masculine. Valuing diversity The first value, ‘Respect for the Individual’, was the focus of much of the micro-level resistance to the implementation of a new values set. Technica explicitly tried to improve the way in which it valued its diverse workforce through this value which was defined as follows:

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We treat each other with respect and dignity, valuing individual and cultural differences. We communicate frequently and with candor, listening to each other regardless of level or position. This value was Technica’s way of managing the workforce diversity apparent in its offices internationally. New Zealand, like other western countries, is an increasingly multicultural society and workforce, and the implications of this workplace diversity are only now starting to be understood (e.g. Joneset al., 2000; Pringle and Scowcroft, 1996). However, instead of increasing the tolerance and regard offered to others and providing a culture of participation and respect, some Technica staff suggested that the values actually gave those in management an additional tool with which to control and sanction the behaviour of staff (Casey, 1995; Kunda, 1992). Indeed, despite the focus on respecting differences, the values actually provided a mechanism for managers to encourage assimilation. One Technica member captured this sentiment as follows: ‘The Common Bond has had no impact and so therefore the training was a waste of valuable time. It was a reaction to a couple of harassment problems in the US and the “feel good” approach to business at Head Office [USA]. But people here in the New Zealand office, especially in management positions, make ad hoc interpretations of the values and use it to justify their own cause or excuse poor behaviour.’ Despite the intention of Our Common Bond values which aimed to diminish power distances and value diversity so that organizational members felt empowered to challenge unacceptable behaviour from other Technica members, the experience for many at lower levels in the hierarchy was vastly different. Challenging a senior person on the basis of Our Common Bond could potentially, and in some instances did, result in negative repercussions for the individual. While some Technica members were positive about the potential usefulness of the values as a type of ‘code of conduct’ or as behavioural guidelines, these members were typically not in positions of power and therefore were unable to exert influence over those holding power. The demographic composition of the New Zealand Technica office illustrates the gendered nature of those holding positions of power. Seventy-nine per cent of those working at Technica NZ were male and men held seven of the nine senior management positions. Teamwork Another key strategy of the ‘new culture’ of Technica was a much stronger and more overt focus on teams instead of the rampant individualism that had underpinned the dominant culture of Technica. Teamwork was specifically named as a value in Our Common Bond and was described as follows: We encourage and reward both individual and team achievements. We freely join with colleagues across organizational boundaries to advance the interests of customers and shareowners.

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In addition to including teamwork in the values framework, Technica also implemented a ‘customer-focused business model’, which led to the formation of cross-functional teams known as ‘customer-focused teams’. This business model called for an explicit focus on providing excellent customer service and support. The aim of these teams was to provide Technica customers with a more complete and comprehensive service. Within the new business model, Technica called for teams of people with diverse functional backgrounds to come together to understand customer needs, interpret those needs and then work collaboratively to provide smart, deliverable solutions for their customers. While this shifting focus towards teamwork has been widely practised in organizations in recent times (e.g. Casey, 1999; Guzzo and Salas, 1995; Kunda, 1992; Parker, 1996), for Technica this change sat in sharp contrast to past practices. Historically, Technica had valued independence and individual competition as the primary motivators driving the organizational sales achievements. Financial and other rewards were clearly linked to individual sales achievements. As such, those in sales positions had much to lose financially and in terms of individual work identity with the new emphasis on teamwork. This effect was exacerbated further by the fact that the teams were cross functional in composition which forced together people from different functional areas which had previously held little or no respect for each other (most notably between the engineers and the sales people). ‘It’s a very competitive environment even between the teams and there’s still the “What’s in it for me?” and “Who’s going to pay for this?” mentality inherited from the old internal focus. This real inward focus continues and there’s no feedback loop. For those reasons I doubt the teams will ever meet the potential they are capable of.’ Competition was a deeply ingrained and integral part of the old organizational culture which not surprisingly then led to strong resistance to attempts to move towards a more collaborative working style. Soon after the teams were formed competition arose not only between cross-functional teams but also within teams. ‘Although the customer-focused business model was supposed to get groups of people working collaboratively together…there is already competition between customer-focused teams and also between individuals within the teams who are ambitious and competing for incentives. Because of the way the incentives are set up, people do not always work in the best interest of the company. Remuneration and people’s concern with lining their own personal back pockets influence the decisions that are made.’ The drive towards a more co-operative working model focusing on developing and fostering stronger relationships and interdependence among employees was again considered not congruent with the business of Technica. The resistance, both overt and covert was channelled towards maintaining the masculine culture of individualism and competition.

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Change: success or resistance? By the end of the twelve-month field study (see Shepherd, 1999) there were few signs that there was any increased value of, or respect towards, diverse individuals working at Technica NZ, or that the new cross-functional teams were actually working productively together. People were still individually competing for recognition and rewards and the entrenched competitive culture, especially among those in sales positions, had not diminished. Reward systems were still based on individual sales achievements rather than team achievements and even when part of the remuneration became team based, there was still little shift in behaviour. Team members had difficulty communicating with each other and team leaders were frequently consumed with how well their team was performing relative to other teams internally rather than focusing on delivering to the customer. Self-interest continued to guide people’s behaviour and diversity was not an issue of concern or interest to people either in management or staff positions. Moreover, there appeared to be little incentive or encouragement to align behaviour with the values. Comments evaluating the changes included: ‘It hasn’t made any difference’, ‘A waste of valuable time’, ‘What’s in it for me?’, and ‘I doubt teams will ever meet the potential they are capable of’. This self-centred approach is in contrast to the three sub-themes identified by Fondas (1997) that underpin what she described as a feminization of the workplace. These themes are the need for managers: (1) to surrender control and share responsibility; (2) to be willing to help and develop others; and (3) to place importance on building connected networks of relationships. ‘These messages are interconnected by their emphasis on managers’ relinquishing some of the authority and prerogative of the traditional managerial role, which, in turn, requires them to change their modes of interaction and ways of working with others, particularly subordinates’ (Fondas, 1997:263). Valuing diversity and teamwork both call for similar responses and yet in Technica managers and employees alike resisted both initiatives. While there are many possible reasons that could explain, at least in part, why each of the change initiatives failed, we will argue that a gendered analysis provides an informative perspective for understanding why these change initiatives were resisted. As noted earlier, the gendered nature of organizations has been largely ignored in the organizational literature generally and the change literature specifically. We contend that such a perspective offers significant potential for increasing our understanding of organizational change, particularly attempts to change the culture. Gender, culture and change initiatives Reviewing the literature surrounding change strategies a number of common themes emerged which seem to capture the essential characteristics associated with successful change. For example, the research on teams suggests that encouraging individuals to take greater ownership of processes and systems through participation and sharing of power is crucial to team success. Furthermore, researchers (e.g. Belbin, 1993; Guzzo and Salas, 1995; Parker, 1996) highlight the following qualities as necessary for team success: valuing of collaboration, co-operation, interdependence and a concern for the welfare of

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others rather than self-interest. For diversity initiatives to succeed, it is critical that a concern for the welfare of others is valued and that people are supportive and empathic towards others. There also needs to be a concern among power holders that goes beyond personal ambition and power over others (e.g. Cox, 1993; Kirton and Greene, 2000; Thomas and Ely, 1996). As highlighted above, the change initiatives implemented at Technica called for a way of organizing and managing that was in contrast to the existing corporate culture. The shift from an individual approach to a team approach demanded that information be shared, and that teams take responsibility and be accountable to the customer groups. Collaboration and co-operation were required, and indeed essential. In response to the increasingly diverse workforce and customer base confronting Technica there was a realization that staff needed to be open and supportive of differences and willing to consider different styles of working and interacting. The diversity and team initiatives both called for participation and involvement from a wider pool of staff, greater recognition and understanding of differences as a strength to better achieve organizational goals, and a significant shift in the underlying values of the dominant and historical culture. The masculine characteristics of independence, individualism and competition dominated the Technica culture of old, while the change initiatives were demanding more interdependence, collaboration and inclusion; characteristics associated with femininity (Cunha and Cunha, 2002; Fondas, 1997). The table below highlights the characteristics documented in the relevant literature that are considered precursors to the success of the particular change initiatives attempted along with the characteristics that dominated Technica at the time of the research in terms of what was encouraged, valued and rewarded at Technica. We contend that the characteristics in the column capturing desired qualities implicit in the change initiatives strongly overlap with the feminine characteristics described previously, whereas the characteristics of Technica’s existing culture are congruent with earlier described masculine characteristics. Consequently, we have labelled the characteristics associated with the desired or ‘new’ Technica culture, that is the desired qualities underlying the change initiatives, as ‘feminine’ and the characteristics associated with the existing organizational culture as ‘masculine’. Considering the underlying characteristics of the change initiatives as feminine attributes helps to understand why the changes were resisted so strongly. At an implicit level, attempts were made to introduce feminine cultural changes into a masculine culture. By resisting these changes, the dominant masculine culture which promoted and encouraged individualism, competition, task focus and a patriarchal and narrow definition of competence and achievement continued to be perpetuated. We do not want to suggest that there was a conscious categorization or advocacy of the changes as feminine nor imply that the resistance was an overt rejection of the feminization of the workplace. People throughout the company, at all levels of the hierarchy, had devised strategies for subverting, ignoring or undermining the desired changes. Feminine characteristics were implicitly embedded in the change initiatives, characteristics that are devalued by society as well as organizations. The resistance therefore served to maintain the status quo and reinforce value ascribed to masculine characteristics and values.

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The gendered nature of organizational change Change strategy

Desired characteristics of the change initiatives

Existing characteristics of Technica’s corporate culture

Diversity

Collaboration, co-operation, interdependence, concern about the welfare of others, not solely motivated by selfinterest.

Independent, competitive, individual recognition and advancement, self-reliant.

Teams

Concern about the welfare of others, supportive, receptive, empathic. Orientation towards power as a transforming and liberating force to be used for public purposes rather than for personal ambition and power over others.

Individual recognition and advancement (of behaviours that fit the status quo), hierarchical structure, forcefulness, statusconscious.

Feminine characteristics

Masculine characteristics

Conclusions Organizational cultures are imbued with gender and so attempts to change the culture will also challenge the gendered power arrangements that are implicitly part of organizational cultures. As long ago as 1985, Smircich (1985:67) called for the addition of a feminist voice to cultural research. We suggest that the gender analysis of change initiatives offered here goes some way towards fulfilling this goal. In this chapter we have illustrated how attempts to change a masculine dominated culture to one which values and encourages feminine characteristics was resisted. Attempts to doggedly maintain the status quo were widespread at Technica with people at all levels devising strategies for subverting, ignoring or undermining the change initiatives. This resistance manifests itself in various communication exchanges, jokes and non-compliant behaviours. We argue that the changes that threatened to disrupt the cultural status quo, in this case a shift from a masculine culture to a feminine culture, were strongly resisted due to the underlying ‘genderedness’ of organizational cultures and the implicit values of the change initiatives. Gender is also clearly intertwined with power; power that shapes ‘the ideas, values, will and identity’ (Alvesson and Billing, 2002:78). As many feminist theorists (Acker, 1990; Cockburn, 1991; Martin and Knopoff, 1997; Calas and Smircich, 1993) have convincingly argued, the characteristics and values of masculinity are ascribed greater power in society and organizations. As Martin states, ‘there is nothing the matter with difference; the problem is that one of the two categories…is devalued’ (1994:8). What is needed is to call into question not what has been socially constructed as feminine but why these characteristics are ascribed less value and status. As masculinity dominates and is accorded greater value, then the ‘other’ (Czarniawska and Hopfl, 2002) is also present in the shadows, and sometimes, in unconscious form. This differential status awarded to masculinity and femininity in western society is also apparent in organizational settings. Stereotypical feminine characteristics such as cooperation, empathy, an emphasis on relationships and connection are not valued, beyond rhetoric, in a company like Technica because of cultures and practices that reinforce

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competition, individual sales and ‘getting an edge’ over competitors. So while there may be a desired shift towards incorporating implicitly feminine characteristics there is also a competing subconscious resistance that works to maintain the masculine status quo. We are not advocating that one set of characteristics (either feminine or masculine) be elevated over the other. However, considering the change initiatives at Technica as examples of a ‘feminization’ of the workplace we highlight an alternative lens for analysing why organizations often struggle to implement critical cultural changes. Using individuals’ stories, we have offered a gendered perspective on the micro-politics of resistance as a vehicle for understanding the complexity surrounding the change initiatives implemented. This case study analysis offers empirical support for the argument suggested by Fondas (1997) that feminization of the workplace is subtle and resisted. While using gender as an analytical tool carries with it the risk of rigid or literal application of masculine and feminine as dichotomous categories, these dimensions do provide a useful and powerful analysis for understanding the layers of micro resistance to organizational change. Theories of gender and culture are therefore situated in parallel: gender is both a process and an outcome (Moloney and Fenstermaker, 2002), while organizational culture is both a variable and a metaphor (Smircich, 1983). Together they are infused, revitalize and sustain each other. Organizational culture serves to reproduce gendered societal and family relations, while gendered interactions maintain and alter organizational culture on a daily basis. We do not wish to imply that the consultants and change agents in the case study organization deliberately sought to introduce feminine characteristics. Rather the changes were a response to an outdated organizational world. This underlying and unnamed feminization of the changes and the lack of awareness of the lesser value ascribed to the feminine caused the changes not to be embedded in a predominantly masculine organizational culture. Acknowledging and naming the resistance to the feminization that is taking place in such organizations allows managers, practitioners and academics to better understand why masculinist cultures continue to dominate and prevail. Such a gendered analysis offers theoretical and practical insights into the failure of the change initiatives in the case study organization—insights that would not be gleaned from the extant organizational change literature.

References Aaltio, I. and Mills, A. (eds) (2002) Gender, Identity and the Culture of Organizations, London: Routledge. Acker, J. (1990) Hierarchies, jobs, bodies: A theory of gendered organizations, Gender and Society, 4, 139–158. Alvesson, M. (2002) Understanding Organizational Culture, London: Sage. Alvesson, M. and Billing, Y. (1997) Understanding Gender and Organizations, Newbury Park: Sage. Alvesson, M. and Billing, Y.D. (2002) Beyond body-counting: A discussion of the social construction of gender at work. In I.Aaltio and A.Mills (eds) Gender, Identity and the Culture of Organization, London: Routledge. Bate, P. (1994) Strategies for Cultural Change, Oxford: Butterworth-Heinemann. Belbin, M. (1993) Team Roles at Work, Oxford: Butterworth-Heinemann.

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Bennett, J. (2001) Change happens. Human Resource Magazine, 46 (9), 149–156. Bourantas, D., Anagnostelis, J., Mantes, Y. and Kefalas, A.G. (1990) Culture gap in Greek management, Organization Studies, 11(2), 261–283. Brown, A. (1995) Organizational Culture, London: Pitman. Calas, M and Smircich, L. (1993) Dangerous liaisons: The feminine-in-management meets globalization, Business Horizons, 36(2), 71–81. Calas, M. and Smircich, L. (1999) Past postmodernism? Reflections and tentative directions, Academy of Management Review, 24 (4), 649–671. Casey, C. (1995) Work, Self and Society: After Industrialism, London: Routledge. Casey, C. (1999) ‘Come, join our family’: Discipline and integration in organizational culture, Human Relations, 52 (2), 155–178. Cockburn, C. (1991) In the Way of Women, London: Macmillan. Cox, T. (1993) Cultural Diversity in Organizations: Theory, Research and Practice, San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler. Cunha J.V. and Cunha, M. (2002) Reading between the lines: Unveiling masculinity in feminine management practices, Women in Management Review, 17 (1), 5–11. Czarniawska, B. and Hopfl, H. (eds) (2002) Casting the Other: The Production and Maintenance of Inequalities in Work Organizations, London: Routledge. Delphy, C. (1993) Rethinking sex and gender, Women’s Studies International Forum, 16 (1), 1–9. Dent, E. and Goldberg, S. (1999) Challenging ‘resistance to change’, The Journal of Applied Behavioral Science, 35 (1), 25–41. Eisen, H., Mulraney, B. and Sohal, A. (1992) Impediments to the adoption of modern quality management practices, International Journal of Quality and Reliability Management, 9 (5), 17– 41. Ferree, M., Lorber, J. and Hess, B. (eds) (1999) Revisioning Gender, Thousand Oaks: Sage. Fenstermaker, S. and West, C. (eds) (2002) Doing Gender, Doing Difference: Inequality, Power and Institutional Change, New York: Routledge. Fondas, N. (1997) Feminization unveiled: Management qualities in contemporary writings, Academy of Management Review, 22 (1), 257–282. Game, A. and Pringle, R. (1983) Gender at Work, Sydney: George and Allen Unwin. Geertz, C. (1973) The Interpretation of Cultures, New York: Basic Books. Gherardi, S. (1995) Gender, Symbolism and Organizational Cultures, London: Sage. Glenn, E. (1999) The social construction and institutionalization of gender and race. In M.Ferree, J.Lorber and B.Hess (eds) Revisioning Gender, Thousand Oaks: Sage. Green, E. and Cassell, C. (1996) Women managers, gender cultural processes and organizational change, Gender, Work, and Organization, 3 (3), 168–178. Guzzo, R. and Salas, E. (1995) Team Effectiveness and Decision Making in Organizations, San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. Halford, S. and Leonard, P. (2001) Gender, Power and Organisations: An Introduction, Basingstoke: Palgrave. Harlow, E. and Hearn, J. (1995) Cultural constructions: Contrasting theories of organizational culture and gender construction, Gender, Work, and Organization, 2 (4), 180–191. Hearn, J. (2002) Alternative conceptualizations and theoretical perspectives on identities and organizational cultures: A personal review of research on men in organizations. In I.Aaltio and A.Mills(eds) Gender, Identity and the Culture of Organizations, London: Routledge. Jones, D., Pringle, J. and Shepherd, D. (2000) Managing diversity meets Aotearoa/New Zealand, Personnel Review, 29 (3), 364–380. Kerfoot D. and Knights, D. (1996) ‘The best is yet to come’: The quest for embodiment in managerial work. In D.Collinson and J.Hearn Men as Managers, Managers as Men, London: Sage. Kilmann, R. (1985) Beyond the Quick Fix, San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

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Kirton, G. and Greene, A. (2000) The Dynamics of Managing Diversity: A Critical Approach, Oxford: Butterworth-Heineman. Kotter, J. and Heskett, J. (1992) Corporate Culture and Performance, New York: Free Press. Kunda, G. (1992) Engineering Culture, Philadelphia: Temple University Press. Marshall J. (1984) Women Managers: Travellers in a Male World, Chichester: John Wiley and Sons. Martin, J. (1992) Cultures in Organizations: Three Perspectives, New York: Oxford University Press. Martin J. (1994) The organization of exclusion: Institutionalization of sex inequality, gendered faculty jobs and gendered knowledge in organizational theory research, Organization, 1 (2): 401–431. Martin, J. and Frost, P.J. (1996) The organizational culture war games: A struggle for intellectual dominance. In S. Clegg, R.Hardy and W.Nord (eds) Handbook of Organization Sstudies, London: Sage. Martin, J. and Knopoff, K. (1997) The gendered implications of apparently genderneutral theory: Re-reading Weber. In A.Larson and R.E.Freeman(eds) Women’s Studies and Business Ethics, New York: Oxford University Press. Moloney, M. and Fenstermaker, S. (2002) Performance and accomplishment: Reconciling feminist conceptions of gender. In S.Fenstermaker and C.West(eds) Doing Gender, Doing Difference: Inequality, Power and Institutional Change, New York: Routledge. Parker, G. (1996) Team Players and Team Work: The New Competitive Business, San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. Peters, T. and Waterman, R. (1982) In Search of Excellence, New York: Harper and Row. Pringle, J. and Scowcroft, J. (1996) Managing diversity: Meaning and practice in New Zealand organisations, Asia Pacific Journal of Human Resources’, 34 (2): 28–43. Scott, J.W. (1999) Some reflections on gender and politics. In M.Ferree, J.Lorber and B.Hess(eds) Revisioning Gender, Thousand Oaks: Sage. Shepherd, D.M. (1999) Organisational culture: Complexities in multinational corporations, Doctoral dissertation, University of Auckland, New Zealand. Smircich, L. (1983) Concepts of culture and organizational analysis, Administrative Science Quarterly, 28, 339–358. Smircich, L. (1985) Is the concept of corporate culture a paradigm for understanding organizations and ourselves? In P.Frost, L.F.Moore, M.R.Louis, C.C.Lundberg and J.Martin (eds) Organizational Culture: The Meaning of Life in the Workplace, Newbury Park: Sage. Thomas, D. and Ely, R. (1996) Making difference matter: A new paradigm for managing diversity, Harvard Business Review, Sept.-Oct., 79–90. Tichy, N.M. (1983) Managing Strategic Change: Technical, Political, and Cultural Dynamics, New York: John Wiley and Sons. Waddell, D. and Sohal, A. (1998) Resistance: A constructive tool for change management, Management Decision, 36 (8), 543–552. Zaltman, G. and Duncan, R. (1977) Strategies for Planned Change, Toronto: Wiley.

Part III Questioning the politics in micro-political resistance

10 Webs of resistance in transnational call centres Strategic agents, service providers and customers* Kiran Mirchandani

Introduction The contributors to this collection have, in diverse ways, highlighted the importance of recognizing the ‘resistance’ which women and men engage in as part of their daily lives. These micro-politics of resistance may not involve mass protests, organized revolt, or unified advocacy but nevertheless provide much insight into agency exercised in the context of the social and economic relations within which individuals are embedded. While recognizing the importance of everyday resistance, however, a number of feminist theorists have noted that the focus on the micro-politics of resistance has sometimes led to a naming of all individual attempts to negotiate and manage the power relations as ‘resistance’. Such romanticization of resistance casts the resister as heroine and can blind us to the complex relations of domination and subordination within which acts of resistance are embedded (Groves and Chang, 1999). Susan Bordo (1993) argues that not only is the romanticization of resistance dangerous in its misrepresentation of the complex nature of inequality, but also in its masking of the overriding tendency towards normalization of the dominant order of the day. Resistance is conventionally defined as action which opposes power; however, as Pile notes, it is no longer enough to ‘begin stories of resistance with stories of so-called power’ (1999:2). This chapter attempts to disrupt dichotomous understandings of power and resistance, particularly in relation to the ways in which this dualism maps on to understandings of global and local. Rather than assuming that certain forces automatically represent ‘power’ and others represent ‘resistance’, I identify the ways in which individuals are intrinsically connected and embedded within what could be understood as a web of diverse resistant forces. Such an approach suggests that understandings of individuals’ micro-politics of resistance need to be situated within analyses of the structures, institutions and power relations which in themselves form other micro-politics of resistance. Through such an approach, this chapter illustrates the ways in which the everyday resistance which three groups of individuals most affected by the subcontracting of work across national borders– workers, managers and customers—engage in on a daily basis form, and are simultaneously formed by, globalized work organizations, relations, norms and processes. This is not to suggest that various social actors and groups occupy equivalent positions of power. Rather, I draw from insights developed by feminist theorists over the past two decades about transnational and globalized work regimes; this literature illuminates the ways in which individual actions are a part of (rather than simply occurring within) global processes. In particular, I provide an analysis of the work experiences of women and men working in Indian call centres which provide telephonebased customer service to international customers.

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Global resistance Early analyses of globalization often reproduced dichotomous understandings of the global (as the site of power) and local (as the site of resistance). Basu et al. (2001) identify several ways in which the literature on the relationship between globalization and social movement often reproduces the dichotomy between structural power relations and individualized acts of resistance. They note: There are those who distinguish between globalization from above (i.e. capitalist accumulation processes) and globalization from below (i.e. nongovernmental organizations and coalitions). In this schema, globalization from above is always a form of domination, and globalization from below becomes an aspect of resistance to dominant forces. [Second] there are those scholars who see capitalist accumulation as a global process and social movements as local ones. In this approach, once again, the local is always viewed as a form of resistance to the global. (Basu et al. 2001:944) Such a formulation of globalization as capital flows or macroeconomic policies underplays the agency of women and masks the ways in which capitalism has depended on sexism in order to become global (ibid.: 943). Rather than such masculinist understandings of globalization, Basu et al. argue that we need to focus on the ways in which ‘political economy, social movements, identity formation and questions of agency are often inextricable from each other’ (ibid.: 944). Freeman (2001) illustrates such an approach through her ethnography of ‘higglers’ (traders) who are also employed by a transnational data processing centre in the Caribbean. These women use the performance perks (free airline tickets) and wages they earn to make purchases abroad which they then sell locally through their informal networks. Freeman notes that higglers’ work is simultaneously an individual activity and a global process—simultaneously power and resistance. Such approaches challenge understandings of globalization as power which is entrenched in codified rules, processes and structures such as cross-border trade agreements, globalized financial networks, transnational companies and international regulatory organizations. Freeman argues that not only has globalization theory been gendered masculine but the very processes defining globalization itself—the spatial reorganization of production across national borders and a vast acceleration in the global circulation of capital, goods, labour and ideas…are implicitly ascribed a masculine gender. (2001:1008) This erasure of gender in macro constructions of globalization brackets women’s agency around global processes labelling these as resistance.

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Contrary to such dichotomous and masculinist understandings of globalization, Sassen notes that ‘the global economy needs to be implemented, reproduced, serviced, financed’ (2001:190, 192). It cannot be taken as an automatic function of the power of multinational corporations. Sassen highlights the ways in which the global economy is ‘achieved’ through the efforts of various groups such as capital-rich actors, ‘strategic agents’ who contribute to the management and co-ordination of the global economy, and workers who perform the required labour of material production. This is not to suggest that these groups possess equivalent abilities to effect the relations within which transnational organizations operate. As Abu-Lughod has noted, it is important not to ‘read all forms of resistance as signs of the ineffectiveness of systems of power and the resilience and creativity of the human’ (1990:42). Rather, the focus on the differently located women and men acting in resistance to the barriers they face disrupts notions that global power is inevitable, automatic or even separable from the resistance. As Groves and Chang argue, rather than assuming that resistance is an unproblematic indicator of power, we should question whether it is always possible to distinguish between power and resistance (1999:237). Accordingly, the discussion in the sections below disrupts the masculinist construction of transnational corporations (TNCs) as unified and co-ordinated sources of power against which resistance occurs. Rather, I explore the experiences of various groups affected by the transnationalization of work (exercising power and resistance vis a vis TNCs as well as one another), and examine the forms of resistance which are exercised by those who are embedded in the newly emerging transnational call centre industry in India.

Methods The primary purpose of this project was to explore the nature of call centre work within the context of global economy relations. The call centre industry has been identified as India’s ‘new sunshine sector’ (India Today, 18 November 2002). The dot.com bust and the recession in the West have led to the increased subcontracting of back office and service work to low-wage countries. The individuals interviewed for this project reported that the centres in which they worked had grown more than ten times in the past year alone. Interviews were conducted in 2002 with two sets of individuals in New Delhi— call centre workers and managers/trainers. Interviews included discussions on workers’ work processes, their interactions with customers and company policies. Although customers were not interviewed, workers provided detailed descriptions of their interactions with customers and these are included in the analysis. All respondents were with organizations serving American clients. Call centre workers were contacted via friends and colleagues in India, and were employed by a variety of companies located mostly in the export processing zone (Noida) in New Delhi. Thirteen workers (seven men and six women) were interviewed. While most interviews were one-to-one, in some cases room-mates or other call centre workers were present in workers’ homes where the interviews were conducted. Respondents were, on average, 25 years of age. One man was married, and one of the women was engaged to be married—all other respondents were single. All respondents had Bachelors’ degrees, and several had Masters’ degrees or additional Diplomas as well. None of the respondents had worked in call centres for more

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than one year (which is not surprising given the recent emergence of the industry). Workers earned between Rs 5,500 and Rs 10,000 (C$150–400) per month, with the exception of one male worker who had seven years of work experience and earned Rs 30,000 (C$1,200). A significant portion of salaries was tied to performance incentives. In addition to call centre workers, I also interviewed individuals who held management positions at three call centres, as well as representatives of three agencies which provide training for workers. These individuals (five men and one woman) are generically referred to as ‘managers’ in this chapter, although there are significant differences in the positions they occupy. They include, for example, human resource professionals, vice presidents and owners of training facilities. These interviews focused on the history of the industry, labour force demographics and work processes. All interviews were tape recorded and transcribed in full. Analysis focused on themes which emerged out of the interviews; the focus of this chapter is on the ways individuals managed and challenged the barriers they face. Abu-Lughod notes that ‘studying the various forms of resistance will allow us to get at the ways in which intersecting and often conflicting structures of power work together these days in communities that are gradually becoming more tied to multiple and often nonlocal systems’ (1990:42). Focusing on the ways in which differently located individuals and groups attempt to overcome the barriers they face allows for an understanding of the nature of these barriers; in this sense, resistance can provide a ‘diagnostic of power’ (ibid.). Accordingly, the forms of resistance of three groups who are central actors in transnational call centres– managers/trainers, call centre service providers and customers—are described below. The resistance of each of these groups occurs in part in opposition to global corporate management; however, these forms of resistance also give rise to new definitions of the nature of ‘globalization’ itself. Managers: cobras walking on the road Call centre managers in Indian transnational call centres are examples of what Sassen (2001) has termed the ‘strategic agents’ who contribute to the management and coordination of the global economy. As noted earlier, masculinist constructions of globalization assume that the power of transnational capital is both automatic and absolute. In contrast, I argue that the facilitation of the links between nations requires considerable labour on the part of Indian call centre managers. A large part of the work of these strategic agents is to promote India’s skilled, English-speaking and cheap labour force as its central competitive advantage to the West, and simultaneously to market call centre work, which is scripted, repetitive and routinized, to India’s labour force. As Sassen has noted, many of the negotiations for the implementation of a global economy have to do with the creation of new business cultures and new consumer cultures…and they have to do with distinct ways of representing what is the ‘economy’ and what is ‘culture’. (2001:195)

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The ‘resistance’ of managers takes the form of the management of the contradictions which arise in the ways in which call centre work is promoted to clients (in the West) and experienced by workers locally. In promoting India as an appropriate destination for subcontracted work managers identify a number of stereotypes about India in the West: ‘Say you’re a prospective client, you walk into [this company], you have a lot of apprehension…about India. You walk into India, you see elephants, you see cobras walking on the road, you have tigers…You’re outsourcing the important part of your business, your customer service. So we take care of the apprehension in terms of technology, in terms of infrastructure, in terms of people, in terms of training.’ ‘I know a lot of people who don’t even know what India is. They still think India is a place where bullock carts are around and snakes are around.’ These references to wildlife in urban areas fuel an image of India which predates mass communication, global media and travel. For anyone who has travelled to urban India, the absurdity of these images is clear. The question therefore arises about the purposes served by such a construction. Implicit in these quotes is in fact the construction of the western business executive as untravelled, highly insular and parochial. At the same time the images evoked highlight parallels between early western colonialists facing the dangers of Indian cobras, and contemporary agents in charge of facilitating global economic alliances facing the dangers of poor customer service. Managers easily argue that both fears are unfounded—just as cobras do not roam the streets, Indian workers are cosmopolitan, highly educated and skilled service providers. Managers note: ‘[Our employees] are all graduates [Bachelors’ degrees] because that is the minimum baseline…That means that for the 1,800…people we have on board with us at the moment they’d all have completed mandatory fifteen years of academic experience.’ ‘The common denominator, as I said, is basic graduation [Bachelor’s degree], who can speak good, correct English, and who have an energy and enthusiasm, and have…learning capacities.’ ‘We introduce associates [call centre workers] to [foreign clients], and they talk to them. They say,…[the associate] speaks with the same accent!…They’re very, very impressed. Extremely impressed.’ Managers also tell stories of the transformational effect of short training programmes, through which workers are immersed in American culture and language. Prasad and Prasad note that training programmes are often ‘organizational locations for the construction of otherness through the systematic transformation of images about self and the other that markedly echo the legacy of colonialist discourses’ (2002:65). Indeed, the

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success of training programmes is signified by workers’ ability to assimilate into American society while remaining in India. As one manager notes, ‘The learning curve is very high. People take the job so seriously. We had a girl with a huge Maratha influence [regional accent]. When she joined us I went back to her and I told [the trainer], this girl is untrainable. But you know this girl went back home and she transformed herself to the US [accent], talked to her boyfriend in the US [accent], went to the bathroom and read aloud from papers with the accent, she watched only CNN, she recorded CNN and started pronouncing the words the way the newsreaders pronounced the words. In two months there was a sea change in her.’ Through this construction of call centre workers as requiring not only highlevel education but also training and aptitude, managers resist conventional definitions of this work as low-skilled, feminized and routine. As Freeman notes, highly structured training programmes give workers the illusion that they are being introduced to new and broadly applicable skills (2000:152). In these ways, managers make attempts to convince foreign clients that Indian workers are adaptable, cosmopolitan and highly educated. By developing highly routinized processes, managers note that it is possible for foreign companies to seamlessly outsource the exact scripts and procedures currently in place in their local call centres to India, thus accruing considerable labour cost savings. The image of Indian workers as highly skilled is often mentioned in training programmes, and employees are told that they share the responsibility of reinforcing it. The rhetoric of national responsibility is frequently evoked. India’s competitive advantage as a subcontractor is said to depend on workers’ ability to satisfy the demands of foreign clients, particularly in the context of the fact that most foreign clients do not reveal their subcontracting arrangements to their customers. As one female worker notes, ‘[In our centre, customers] are calling in. But they are of the opinion that they’re calling back [the foreign company] but that company’s calls are actually diverted to our place…So we have to be double cautious that we don’t irritate the customer, and we have to serve them.’ Having packaged India’s labour force as proficient in western ways and language, however, managers face the challenge of identifying and training workers who fit this image and of promoting call centre work to this workforce. One strategy through which this is achieved is by targeting young workers (both women and men) and providing them with higher than average pay.1 One worker says, ‘For a fresher [new graduate], six thousand, seven thousand [C$200) they are paying. I think it’s a pretty good amount…Like my first job [in a different job, I was paid] two and a half thousand.’2

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Call centres jobs are also presented as providing excellent opportunities for career advancement.3 Managers comment on the fact that turnover rates of around 20 per cent in fact signal the quality of call centre jobs: ‘Some people leave us for better opportunities, or because of the fact that [this company] grooms them very well and therefore they are ready for the next level for another organization. So we are happy for them.’ ‘They move on because of various things. One is better career opportunities. They get a stamp of a call centre, say for one year as an entry level person, they can jump to another call centre as a supervisor…ecially if they get some good training like what [this company] gives them…There are companies that are providing, without any interviews, if you take them an appointment letter [from this company], they give you double the salary and take you.’ Managers promote Indian workers to foreign clients as inexpensive and well-educated, and at the same time tell employees that call centre jobs are well-paid and careeroriented. In these ways managers depict Indian workers as cosmopolitan and highly educated, and therefore easily able to follow standardized customer service protocols for foreign clients. At the same time workers are told that they require extensive training given the challenging and competitive nature of transnational call centre work. Melissa Wright (2001) describes a similar rhetoric in place in maquiladora factories where she notes that female supervisors receive extensive training on how to promote self-supervision but at the same time, there is a discourse of untrainability in the maquiladora industry where the female workforce is considered unskilled. The construction of work as requiring considerable training and learning, and at the same time being unskilled, is used to maintain the low cost of labour. As discussed in the next section, however, workers recognize the inconsistency between the depiction of call centre work and their own experiences of this work. Workers: the more you bluff, the more you gain Workers’ accounts of call centre jobs differ dramatically from the representation of this work provided by managers. In fact, workers note that call centre jobs are tedious, repetitive and offer few opportunities for skill development or career progression. One male worker notes, ‘The call centres are not very much employee-oriented…the policy is not to retain [workers] but their policy is to just get the work done. To get the volume of business done.’ There are two facets of call centre work which are most frustrating for workers—first, the work process in which service provision is highly scripted and monitored, and second, the requirement that workers do not reveal their locations or identities. Workers develop a

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number of strategies through which they resist the dehumanizing effects of these two dimensions of their work. Large transnational corporations often have multiple call centres which are located in a number of different countries. Work processes are standardized across centres so that customer calls can be directed automatically to any call centre. As a result, the processes in place are highly routinized and call centre agents follow fixed scripts and protocols, often reading from a menu-driven computer screen. Call centre workers have quotas for the number of calls they are expected to handle each day and their performance is monitored. Managers often listen to calls at random and customers are asked to provide feedback. Workers receive financial incentives for receiving exceptionally high satisfaction scores and are reprimanded, sent for further training (during which time they receive reduced pay) or fired if they fail to meet performance targets. Lisa Adkins (2001) notes that these job characteristics which were traditionally associated solely with ‘women’s work’ now predominate in many new service industries in which both women and men are employed. Male as well as female call centre workers experience the processes in place as demeaning and inappropriate given their qualifications. This is illustrated by the following comments. ‘Temporarily it’s OK. But if someone tells me to choose [the call centre industry] as my career, it doesn’t suit me. [I would prefer something] that is more demanding…That would suit me more, rather than taking calls. (Female worker) ‘The system doesn’t allow…[isn’t] professional with me. If I’m ready to put my eight or nine hours job then I must be getting something in return. Or at least nobody just out of the blue come up to me and say [harsh tone] “Why didn’t you do that?” though that is not my responsibility. So I need that kind of professionalism at least.’ (Male worker) Jermier et al. (1994) argue that the deskilling of work or the downgrading of the employee experience can be accompanied by attempts to sabotage and resist the imposition of capitalist control strategies. In a similar vein, Freeman shows how informatics workers in the Caribbean ‘trick’ the system to lighten the load of the production quotas; ‘these incidents reveal a degree of ingenuity and understanding of the labour process and the technology which directly challenges the “closed-system” design of these jobs’ (2000:210). Indeed, call centre workers develop a number of work strategies to maximize their performance scores in the context of the routinized processes which they have to follow. To achieve the highest performance scores workers need to resolve customer issues quickly so that they can meet their quotas, receive positive feedback from customers, and have customers who do not call back within a certain period of time. Workers sometimes sacrifice their scores on one of these dimensions when it allows them to maximize their scores on others. In order to speed up calls, workers often assess the length of time an issue is likely to take to resolve, depending on the problem at hand as well as the mood of the customer. In cases where issues are

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complicated and customers are irate, workers sometimes decide to give customers a ‘talla’ or a hoax solution, as shown in the following examples. ‘You have to judge the person…according to whether he is very much irritated, whether he wants to resolve the issue…If you find a person, like, he is very much irritated, you know you cannot deal within twenty minutes, so just ask him, “Sir will it do if I call you after 48 hours? Because I will try to research the issue properly.” And if he says, “Yes, fine, 48 hours”, you don’t call him back after 48 hours.’ (Male worker) ‘When you get a call you have to decide in the first fifteen, twenty minutes, how long is this call likely to take…if you know it’s going to be a very difficult call it’s kind of like better for you to hang it up… finish it quickly.’ (Female worker) ‘You say [to the customer], “OK, take out the battery, keep it underneath the sun, and it’s going to work after 48 hours”. Because 48 hours is the time if the client doesn’t call back within 48 hours you’re going to get Rs 500 for that call. So most of the time this happens. Ninety per cent…The more you bluff, the more you gain.’ (Male worker) Gutek (1997) notes that interactions between service providers and customers can be characterized as either relationships or encounters. Relationships are based on repeated interactions during which customers and service providers develop trust, mutual understanding and emotional connections. Encounters are one-time, anonymous interactions based on rules. Gutek argues that encounter workers are often expected to act as if they have relationships with customers. Call centre workers, however, clearly resist this trend; their frequent use of ‘tallas’ is based on their knowledge that calls can be directed to multiple call centres and that it is highly unlikely that they will talk to the same customer twice. At the same time, such employee practices are surprising given that calls are continuously and randomly listened to for quality and consistency by supervisors. However, as Gottfried argues, ‘the possibilities for more illicit, subterranean forms of resistance like sabotage and theft have been enhanced by computerization giving workers the ability to shut down entire systems with minimal effort’ (1994:120). Freeman notes that ‘workers cleverly manipulate a tool that by design is meant to elude their understanding’ (2000:210). One male call centre worker mentions that he knows when his supervisor is listening to his calls: ‘As soon as they barge into the call you hear a beep sound, like this [very soft and low beep] so we get to know that now the call is being recorded. OK, so there’s a certain time, like, he’s going to record the call for five minutes or ten minutes.’

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Highly routinized performance measurement, in these ways, allows workers to maximize their scores without actually providing solutions to customers, even though workers may be fully competent and knowledgeable on the issues which customers need to have resolved. Aside from the mechanistic and script-driven work process, workers are also encouraged to distance themselves from their work through the requirement of anonymity. During training programmes, workers are assigned westernized pseudonyms which are their ‘work names’, and they are given instructions not to reveal their location. As one male worker notes, this assumed identity makes it difficult to take pride and responsibility for his work: ‘We’ve been given an alias…I’ve been given the name Nick…Maybe a problem which I know it will take one and a half hours to solve, and I solve it in twenty minutes. I’m very much happy and satisfied. Customer, he’s also very happy. He congratulates, “Well done! You really helped me”, and then he asks you your name. So if I tell “Nick”. [pause] I’m not Nick! I don’t know who Nick is, then what’s the use of giving my alias when I’m the one working, I’m solving the problem, I’m from India? …[But] no, we cannot give my name.’ One woman worker notes that her pseudonym allows her to divert unwanted sexual attention: ‘One gentleman [customer] he said, “Oh, your parents have given you a very nice name” [pseudonym]. I can’t say—“Ha, Ha”. I [just] said, “Yeah”.’ Collinson notes that workers respond to being treated as commodities by enacting a ‘resistance through distance’ whereby they ‘distance themselves physically and symbolically from the organization and its prevailing power structure’ (1994:25). Workers distance themselves from their jobs by emphatically stating their intention to leave the industry as soon as better opportunities become available. ‘I’m going to leave the job…today you have the ball in your court, you play it. Tomorrow I’ll have it, I’ll play it.’ (Male worker) ‘Once I’ll get settled with this job, I’ll start doing my higher studies. If I can finish up that higher studies that will enhance my position in this job or I can apply to some other job. That time the avenues will be more.’ (Female worker) ‘This was the best possible opportunity we were having, which present scenario around it was not possible to earn anywhere else apart from this. We all are here, working, waiting for our opportunities to come.’ (Male worker)

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Contrary to the views of managers described in the previous section about the value of call centre experience, workers note that their involvement in the call centre industry hinders their future job opportunities: ‘At the end of the day, the main factor that you think is, this experience, whatever you are gaining from a call centre doesn’t count anywhere else in India…nobody is going to give weightage with this experience…I have visited some [placement] consultancies over here in Delhi…so that I can get some openings in other industries. I say that I’m working in [my company], and they say, “It’s a call centre”. They have a different impression on their face, so I can make out what people think about call centres.’ (Male worker) In these ways, call centre workers find ways of following the work rules established by foreign transnational corporations while at the same time extracting benefits from the inflexibility of the routinized processes in place. Workers recognize that their education and skill far outweigh the requirements of the job, and explicitly define themselves as a mobile rather than captive workforce. These strategies bring about shifts in transnational economic relations between capital-rich ‘core’ countries and labour-providing ‘peripheral’ ones, whereby Indian workers manipulate the most valuable resource of American organizations—their customers. Workers reinforce notions that scripted service is poor service and that good service cannot be provided by disembodied workers stripped of identity, location and dignity. The next section describes the resistance exercised by customers. Customers: just shouting, shouting, shouting Although no American customers were interviewed for this project, worker accounts of their interactions with customers provided vivid illustrations of customer reactions. The subcontracting of customer service work has a direct and immediate impact on customers, who are unaware of the location they are calling, or the processes which have been developed to manage large volumes of calls. One male worker notes, ‘The client needs the solution. And sometimes they get irritated. Why? Because most of the time what happens is they don’t know where the call is landing. It may be in India, it may be in America, it may be anywhere. So everywhere this is the same thing [the existence of performance targets]. So maybe first it landed in America, any call centre, and they said, “Sir, you keep it under the sun for a few hours”. So he does it, but it doesn’t work. So again he makes a call, maybe landing in America or comes back to India, again he gets any sort of bluffing. So the client may be calling for the last two days. And his [product] is not working. So what happens is after two days it may happen the called landed on me and as soon as I pick up the phone… he said, “I don’t know anything, this is my

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[number], for the past two days I’m trying to call up. I’m getting the resolution. They are solving the problem. But nothing happens.”’ In circumstances when the experience of seeking service is frustrating, the most common customer response is anger. Workers note: ‘Sometimes they’re really pissed off. They really start, like, using fourletter words and you have to listen patiently. You have to listen to the customer, and after he finishes, try to cool him down and try to solve the problem. But you have to listen to the customer, whatever he is saying.’ (Female worker) ‘In case you find a customer who is very difficult, even then you cannot disconnect the call. The customer was warning me, if you disconnect the call I will surely go and complain to [the American company]…I had to spend four hours with him on the call…he told me, I could realize that, he was drunk. Moreover he was, his girlfriend has left him.’ (Male worker) ‘Some frustrated customers, they don’t even want to speak to your supervisor. They will be speaking to you only. Keeping on, you know, just shouting, shouting, shouting.’ (Female worker) Women claim that they are better able to manage customer anger: ‘For females, especially for Indian females, it’s OK because they’re very patient and for males…once the customer is really annoyed, you know, they have to control their ego to tell them, “No, I’m not irritated at all”.’ (Female worker) Appadurai notes that contemporary global capitalism is dominated by two forces—the fetishism of production and the fetishism of the consumer. Production fetishism is an illusion that transnational economic alliances strengthen the control of nations, indigenous businesses and workers to whom work is subcontracted. Consumer fetishism is the illusion that the customer is the most important social actor in business arrangements. Appadurai notes that this is a ‘mask for the real seat of agency, which is not the consumer but the producer and the many forces that constitute production’ (1996:42). While Appadurai argues that consumers hold little power, the anonymity of phone service allows for the exercise of considerable power by customers; in the context of power differentials between American customers and Indian service providers this power is often expressed in the form of racism. Workers note: ‘Most of the time the client says, “Can I speak to someone who knows English?”’ (Male worker)

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‘They say, “I want to speak to an American”.’ (Female worker) Customers who have read newspaper articles on the subcontracting of call centres or are familiar with publications (such as this one!) often use their knowledge of the fact that customer service jobs have been shifted across national borders to secure better quality service: ‘[Sometimes] the customer, the client, he knows everything. As soon as we pick up the phone, from there he himself, he or she himself or herself says, “My name is this, my [number] is this…I’m fine today” …There are customers who say, “I know you’re from Delhi”, or “You’re from India. I know the supervisor also. So don’t fool around with me.”’ (Male worker) Customers therefore play an active role in defining global relations by sabotaging attempts by transnational corporations to shift the servicing of their needs to low-wage countries, expressing racism, or getting angry. Appadurai’s observation that power resides in the contemporary globalized economy with the forces of production rather than with the customer is only partially valid when it comes to customer service work. Consequences of customer resistance to the depersonalized customer service they receive are borne primarily by front-line service workers. These workers are situated in the context of subcontracting relations within which ‘work-providing’ nations hold far greater power than ‘labour-providing’ ones. Consequently, racist attitudes towards immigrants and foreigners merge with notions of the incompetence of service provision to give rise to the micro-processes of customer resistance which often take the form of racialized anger.

Conclusions The analysis in this chapter suggests that globalized relations and work processes are constituted and reconstituted on a continuous basis. Rather than a predetermined macro arrangement, it is the actions of a number of groups, each of which occupies a different social location within the transnational call centre industry, which forms ‘globalization’. Customers, managers and workers resist the forces which structure their lives in the local settings within which they are embedded; together these form a ‘web’ of resistances. This view disrupts the masculinist notion that the global economy is inevitable and selfgenerating. This is not to suggest, however, that the resistance exercised by the global actors described here is likely to slow down the proliferation of the global economy and fundamentally shift the unequal power relations between rich and poor nations which forms its bedrock. Indeed, a number of feminist theorists suggest that resistance is often romanticized and the analysis of the structural constraints of power diminished. Rather, focusing on the micro-processes of resistance shows that like workers, managers and customers too constantly attempt to gain advantage. By assuming that groups and actors

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act in resistance only to transnational corporations, these corporations are reified and assumed to have enormous coherence and unity. While often experienced as allencompassing by workers, the analysis in this chapter suggests that the power of transnational corporations is in fact far from absolute.

Acknowledgement * This project was funded by the Shastri Indo-Canadian Institute and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (Grant number 451915). I would like to thank the interview participants for their enthusiastic and generous involvement with the project. My thanks also to the editors and to Alissa Trotz for thoughtful feedback on an earlier draft.

Notes 1 These salaries are defined as competitive in the context of the extremely depressed wage structure in India as well as the high costs of living. One worker living in a hostel notes that her monthly spending on rent, transport and food is around Rs 5,000 per month, provided she shares her single room with four other people. She earns Rs 5,500. 2 Workers simultaneously note that they are paid very poorly when compared to the fees which the subcontractor receives for each call. Based on a calculation of these amounts, workers estimate that they earn their daily salary by taking two to three calls per day. On average, workers note that they are required to take between twenty and thirty calls, therefore 90 per cent of the earnings from their labour goes towards non-labour costs. 3 As will be discussed in the next section, workers have a different view of the career prospects within the call centre sector.

References Abu-Lughod, L. 1990. ‘The romance of resistance: tracing transformations of power through Bedouin women’, American Ethnologist 17:41–55. Adkins, Lisa 2001. ‘Cultural feminization: “Money, sex and power” for women’, Signs 26, 3:669– 695. Appadurai, Arjun 1996. Modernity at Large: Cultural Dimensions of Globalization. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. Basu, A., Brewal, I., Kaplan, C. and Malkki, L. 2001.‘Editorial’, Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society. Special issue on globalization and gender, 26, 4: 943–948. Bordo, S. 1993. ‘Feminism, Foucault and the politics of the body’. In C.Ramazanoglu (ed.) Up Against Foucault: Explorations of Some Tensions between Foucault and Feminism. London: Routledge. Collinson, David 1994. ‘Strategies of resistance: Power, knowledge and subjectivity in the work place’. In J.M.Jermier, D.Knights and W.R.Nord(eds) Resistance and Power in Organizations. London: Routledge, pp. 25–68. Freeman, Carla 2000. High Tech and High Heels in the Global Economy: Women, Work and Pink Collar Identities in the Caribbean. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.

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Freeman, Carla 2001. ‘Is local:global as feminine:masculine? Rethinking the gender of globalization’, Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society . Special issue,on globalization and gender 26, 4: 1007–1038. Gottfried, H. 1994. ‘Learning the score: The duality of control and everyday resistance in the temporary-help service industry’. In J.M.Jermier, D.Knights, and W.R.Nord (eds) Resistance and Power in Organizations. London: Routledge, pp. 109–120. Groves, J.M. and Chang, K.A. 1999. ‘Romancing resistance and resisting romance: Ethnography and the construction of power in the Filipina domestic worker community in Hong Kong’, Journal of Contemporary Ethnography. 23, 3: 235–265. Gutek, B. 1997. ‘Dyadic interaction in organizations’. In Cary L.Cooper and Susan E.Jackson (eds) Creating Tomorrow’s Organizations: A Handbook for Future Research in Organizational Behaviour. New York: John Wileyand Sons. Jermier, J.M., Knights, D. and Nord, W.R. (eds) 1994. Resistance and Power in Organizations. London: Routledge. Pile, S. 1999. ‘Introduction: Opposition, political identities and spaces of resistance’. In S.Pile and M.Keith (eds) Geographies of Resistance. London: Routledge. Prasad, A. and Prasad, P. 2002. ‘Otherness at large: Identity and difference in the new globalized organizational landscape’. In Ilris Aaltioand Albert J.Mills (eds) Gender, Identity and Culture in Organizations. London: Routledge. Sassen, S. 2001. ‘Cracked casings: Notes towards an analytics for studying transnational processes’. In L.Pries (ed.) Transnational Social Spaces: International Migration and Transnational Companies in the Early 21st Century. New York: Routledge, pp. 187–207. Wright, Melissa W. 2001. ‘Asian spies, American Motors and speculations on the space-time of value’. Environment and Planning. 33:2175–2188.

11 The bearable lightness of being Identity formation, resistance and gender considerations among the UK television workforce Gillian Ursell

Introduction The endeavour of this book of readings is to focus on the micro-politics of resistance, particularly as these may generate insights into factors conditioning identity formation and the performance of gender in occupational settings. This is a task in part motivated by feminist concerns for the mundane realities of women’s existence and, in other part, by a desire to contribute to academic argument about the character and inner workings of contemporary western society. Many theorists identify the intensification of forces making for heightened individualism as a major characteristic of contemporary western society (e.g. Beck 1992; Giddens 1991a, 1991b). They argue that hitherto stable and enduring collective affiliations and structures are increasingly displaced by single person existence, frequent job search and change, and the necessity for total self-reliance. Simultaneously, the communication of tradition, history and membership is displaced by the communication of mass-mediated simulacra and exhortations to lifestyle consumption. This is the thesis of a late modern or postmodern condition asserting, among other themes, that identity formation becomes individuated, fluid and susceptible to corporate representations. In Foucault’s analysis (e.g. 1972, 1980), such individuation represents a ‘technology of the self’, a subjectification process which makes the subject simultaneously the agent and the subordinate of a contemporary western power regime. In the less oppressive view of Rose (1998, 1999), what we have is the ‘entrepreneurial self’, self-constituting and selfgoverning, an achievement of liberal freedoms. Jameson (1991), by comparison, embraces both these positions in his argument that postmodernism is ‘the cultural logic of late capitalism’, and that we should acknowledge capitalism equally for its achievements as for its rapacities. Whichever view is taken, the focus for empirical investigation shifts to the level of the individual, to the minutiae of distinct instances of self-actualizing endeavours. However, there is no immediate reason to expect this level of investigation to reveal a ‘micro-politics of resistance’, since that phrase contains within it the two assumptions that there is something to be resisted and that, in offering resistance, the individual is acting politically. It should rather be the task of empirical investigation to test these two assumptions. To that end, this chapter investigates the experience of women workers in British television production. These are people who participate directly in the production of the television simulacra and corporate representations regarded by many as profoundly

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influential in contemporary western identity formation. Yet they are also employees, and their engagement in this form of cultural production is significantly conditioned by the specificities of the labour process of television manufacture. Finally but by no means least, they are women whose genderized identities and womanly roles must be negotiated both within and without the employment terrain. To elucidate the complexities of identity formation for these people, this chapter proceeds initially by further reflection on the problematics of conceptualizing resistance, politics and identity. It then considers two features of the television labour process which are of particular relevance to television employees in general and women workers in particular; namely, informal networking and the cultivation of a vendible identity. It then investigates the experience and activities of women in television in their efforts to influence their contributions as cultural workers, and their status and role as employees. To what extent their performance in the workplace constitutes resistance and politics is then weighed against the themes raised earlier in considering the problematics of conceptualization.

Conceptualizing resistance, politics and identity Feminist theorizations have contributed significantly to academic debate over recent decades in that they have argued persuasively for genderized sexual identity to be recognized as socially constructed rather than given in nature. As such, it follows that gender (and other) identity should be seen as mutable, not infinitely but certainly open to reconsideration and renegotiation (Butler 1990, 1993). The potential for resistance, understood as political action for change, is immediately evident. However, a number of problematics have attended this feminist contribution. Notably it has participated in the emergence of deconstructionist ‘postmodern’ arguments to the effect that all meaning is socially constructed, including the very rules for claiming the credibility and verisimilitude of one’s accounts of reality (e.g. Baudrillard 1995a, 1995b). This postmodern focus on the deconstruction of texts and narratives so as to reveal their social construction, however, is a methodology which leads easily to an idealist ontology. Moreover, simultaneously it jeopardizes competence and security in judging better from worse: its advocates accordingly become politically impotent. Attached to identity formation, for example, the postmodernist argument could be used to refute the legitimacy of any and all identity claims. In this sense, postmodernism as a set of arguments can be deeply conservative (Fenton 2000; Hutcheon 1989). By contrast, feminism remains essentially a moral-political project, intent on identifying normative and performative inequalities disadvantageous to the status of women. A feminist approach does not need to disavow the revelatory value of deconstructionist perspectives, but it must rather proceed on social structural and constructivist arguments. This, in the manner of Giddens’ structuration thesis (1984), allows investigation and analysis of the social constitution of structural inequalities disadvantageous to women, against which there might be forms of resistance which contribute to political change. However, a second problematic lies in the concept of ‘resistance’ when confined to the level of the individual and individualized identity formation. The problem is related to how we view the relationship between ‘identity’ and ‘self’. The concept of ‘identity’ has

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emerged in postmodern and feminist literature in an effort to capture the essentially social project of constructing social beings from individuals who exist with a sense of self. Identity is forged and reforged in fields of social interaction and practice. In one perspective, identity exists in the constant work of negotiating the self in social settings comprised of others. In this view, human agency lies precisely in the individual’s efforts to manoeuvre around, outmanoeuvre and/or to employ instrumentally and selfishly the normative and organizational parameters preferred by others for one’s performance. These efforts to perform one’s self in identity are what, in this view, it is possible to regard as ‘resistance’. Such agency does not automatically contribute to political change at the social structural level. None the less it can be construed as political in the sense of securing a social space for the expression of a sense of self. This perspective seems to be implicit in Butler’s arguments regarding the social identity of gender: she says, Gender is neither a purely psychic truth, conceived as ‘internal’ and ‘hidden’, nor is it reducible to a surface appearance; on the contrary, its undecidability is to be traced as the play between psyche and appearance (where the latter domain includes what appears in words. (1993:227; italics in the original) The reference to the psyche as a contributor to gender identification processes reflects Butler’s concerns to acknowledge the significance of the physical body within social theorization. To some extent, her writings are compatible with those of Kristeva (1986) who proposes the existence of an archetypal masculinist gaze which attempts to construct women according to the particularities of male sexual desire and male identity formation. It is noteworthy that asserting the contributory role of a bodily-conditioned psyche or an archetypal male gaze undermines the postmodern thesis of an epoch-characterizing individualism. This is by positing the existence, first, of pre-social forces, and second, of potential grounds for collective identity and action. There is an alternative reading, however, which sees not only identity but also the self and the experience of individualization as socially constructed. In this reading, self and identity are as one, the product of socialization. This reading is exemplified by Foucault’s thesis of subjectification; that is, as Knights and Willmott express it, the making of the individual subject is ‘a product of disciplinary mechanisms, techniques of surveillance and power-knowledge strategies’ (ibid.: 544): ‘the very exercise of power relies upon the constitution of subjects who are tied by their sense of identity to the reproduction of power relations’ (ibid.: 536). Moreover, under postmodern conditions, this sense of identity is uniquely individual. This is a power regime based on division and fragmentation in all spheres of performance including identity. The thesis of subjectification at first face renders the notion of a micro-politics of resistance in identity formation as irrelevant. Resistance in such an analysis is not only futile but, more to the point, unthinkable. Further reading of Foucault, however, reveals his view that the individuational forces of this particular power regime render it prone to anarchy and perpetual contestation. Indeed in his later, explicitly political, writings, Foucault recommends the latter as a necessary redress. We might ask, redress of what? In what are located these individuating forces? What is the character of these modern power regimes? Writers otherwise diverse as Foucault, Giddens (see, for example, 1984), Rose

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(1998, 1999), Beck (1992) and Bauman (1998, 2001) concur that the regimes are founded in post-industrial capitalism. Thus it is in the particularities of post-industrial capitalism that we are to find the roots of individuation. Individuation is rational to the decentralization of risk (Beck), to the stimulation of consumption (Bauman), and to new forms of social structuration (Giddens), all anchored and stabilized in self-governance (Rose). Postmodernity is not limited, that is, to the postmodernism of contemporary social theory and culture. Rather it is the general social condition of de-industrialized nations. It is the condition of political economies which have been substantially transformed by the collapse of communism (McGuigan 1999:2), and the restructuring of capitalist organization around the potentialities of new communications technologies (Malpas 2001) for changing the shape of production and the reach of distribution/markets. Thus we can be encouraged, following Jameson (1991), to view the postmodernism of contemporary culture and the postmodernity of contemporary structure not as dislocated and discrete but rather as intimately related in ways worthy of exploration and representation. We can proceed with the view that postmodernism is ‘the cultural logic of late capitalism’, and that therefore what is needed is investigation of the various arenas in and mechanisms by which this cultural logic is produced. Postmodern theorization typically directs our attention to the significance in cultural production of mass-mediated simulacra and corporate representations (e.g. Klein 2001; Lash and Urry 1994) and this suggests that a particularly relevant arena to explore is mass media production. If the postmodern condition is all that characterizes contemporary western society, it is reasonable to suppose that those who work to produce these simulacra and representations will reveal at a personal level the features of postmodern identity: that is, individuated, self-actualizing, self-governing and reproducing, by its own performance, the divisions in terms of which the power regime secures governability. If however these workers reveal aspects of collectivity and commonality in their identity performances, we may regard the postmodern condition as an incomplete or partial understanding of contemporary western society. Empirical inquiry into these matters is here facilitated by a broader research project into television labour processes in Britain under recent conditions of significant work and employment change. For that project, data have been gathered on television workers in longitudinal and triangulated forms, namely: 1 documentary evidence from government, industry trade associations, television companies and television unions; 2 personnel records from 1986 onwards of a northern regional ITV producer-broadcaster, investigated initially in 1994, again in 1996 and again in 2001; 3 interviews with senior executives and managers at that regional company, initially in 1992 with follow-ups in 1994 and 1996; 4 interviews with two full-time union officials in 1993, 1996 and 1998; 5 postal questionnaires to 450 of the 600 registered union members in northern England in 1993, and to all of the 300 union members registered in 1999; 6 interviews with six independent production companies in 1994, and with a further four in 1999; 7 interviews with thirty-one journalists in 2002.

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These data facilitate analysis of identity formation processes among television workers in general and with particular regard to women workers, as indicated below.

Employment in television production A first observation to be taken from the data is that the commodifying and promotional discourses of much western media material are replicated in the self-commodifying and self-promotional performances nowadays required of television production workers. That is, to secure such employment the person is obliged to self-commodify in the sense of building and marketing an occupational identity which is vendible. To be vendible, this identity must offer individual attributes and competences which promise to contribute to successful broadcasting. Accordingly, it is conditioned by the normative parameters judged by production executives to contribute to such success. Their judgements are informed by a complex interplay of their own preferences and perceptions with evidence from television audience ratings, programme sales, peer review, politician and public discussions; that is, by normative parameters embedded and realized in the wider social fabric. In terms of our earlier discussion, this is an identity which is fashioned selfreflexively and instrumentally. Of itself, it does not automatically imply an existential investment of the self but neither is that precluded. Moreover, within this cultivation of vendible identity, gender norms are both insignificant and significant. They are insignificant to the extent that television employment often rewards normative transgressions around gender performance, partly because of a production culture which disdains illiberalism and partly because of the appetites of television audiences. Market valorization can attach not only to archetypal representations of men and women but also to gender-inbetweeners, to cartoon characters, to anthropomorphized wild animals and to infantilized domestic pets. But genderized identities are significant in so far as there persist structured inequalities in television employment possibilities which favour men, and there are sizeable product markets for stereotypically genderized material which television executives seek to satisfy. Both dimensions reflect the ‘circuit of culture’, as described in du Gay (1997), and both condition the experience of women at work in UK television, as is considered below. Moreover, the performance of identity for women, as for men, television workers relies heavily on successful participation in the informal networks of colleagues by which, in the highly competitive labour markets of contemporary TV work, most employment is secured. The formation/performance of vendible identity and the formation/performance of informal networking should be seen as integral twin dimensions of the labour process in television production employment. However, self-commodification in terms of the extant norms and practices of informal networks is not to be interpreted simplistically as evidence of determinism, other than in the Foucauldian sense of subjectification. Television production employment is, at least in contemporary western societies, an arena for the pursuit and performance of values of self-actualization and individualism. Labour process analysis of television labour markets cannot proceed without recognizing the large measure of voluntarism entailed. The price rewards of television production, however, are not generally sufficient to explain why so many people volunteer for it. Logically then it must be the non-price rewards which, for

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the majority, make such employment desirable. These non-price rewards can be viewed as psycho-social. They are the popular association of television with glamour, action, interesting people and a pivotal role in the stuff of daily life, plus the acclaim, status, popularity, admiration or loving regard which can be sought from colleagues and viewers alike to feed back on and to nurture self-regard. To the extent that the experience of television employment satisfies these psycho-social desires, the expectation of a micropolitics of resistance is unreasonable, except in the soft Butlerian sense of an individual jostling for social space. Television employment is desired because it appears to promise self-actualizing opportunities in the ‘playful’ (in the sense explored variously by Altar 1989; Gadamer 1988:105; and Fink 1968) postmodern environment of television production. The desire is to exercise agency, to participate and to experience life in a very specific realm producing culture. The ideal television production project, from the individual’s point of view, is that which is ‘fun’ and/or which allows him/her a high degree of self-expression and self-confirmation. The ideal production is that which allows for the, more or less, free play of imagination, creativity, artistic or technical or social talents, and erotic appeals to audiences for confirmation. Self-commodification for the purposes of securing television employment can be a very bearable lightness of being. However, we need at this point to recall that, in western media industries, ‘The craziness is all in the entertainment, not in the organization’ (McGuigan 1999:28). While the craziness may be permitting wider degrees of freedom for the formation of identity vis a vis gender stereotypes, it is in the organization that are found the principal limits.

Television as entertainment As far as the ‘craziness’ of the entertainment is concerned, the broad cultural sense in which television texts are symbiotically related to the normative and organizational structures of society has consequences for what women find to be possible in the world of television work. For example, while not all television workers are onscreen personalities, there is widespread recognition that different onscreen personalities sell differently in different consumer markets. With regard to gender, for example, particular constructions of ‘womanliness’ or ‘manliness’ are tested in the marketplaces of viewers, critics and peers. There is a significant market for television products which portray their male and female characters in ways which accentuate sexual attributes and sexual activity to the neglect of anything else, and/or which rely on archetypal representations of man and woman. Here we have a circuit of culture which could be described, following Lyotard (1993), as a ‘libidinal economy’. The amount of such material in programme schedules seems to be significantly a function of intensified market competition. In Britain during the 1990s, Channels 3, 4 and 5 displayed such programming behaviour. They do so at risk of criticism from colleagues, regulators and public alike but, criticism notwithstanding, there remain plenty of TV job opportunities for women (and men) who choose to rely on their bodily appearance and their sexuality as their vendible identity. In doing so, they can hope to attract also the attention of the print media, large sections of which exist in textual symbiosis with television. Sexualized bodily appearance for the younger age groups is an easy way to capture that public visibility which is an essential

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component of vendible identity. But continual media representation of such sexualized individuals both leads and follows the general cultural norms attaching to gender definitions and expectations (Walkerdine and Melody 2001), with consequences for women trying to work in television. On a more positive note for British women, there has been over time some change in employer perceptions of audience preferences. The Journalism Training Forum (2002) reports that nowadays 54 per cent of the UK’s TV reporters are women. This contrasts with the first decades of British television, when the BBC would not use women to present the news in the sincere belief that the women’s physical appearance plus their lightertoned voices would distract from the authenticity of the news content. The BBC was not finally moved from this position until its rival, Independent Television News, in the 1950s demonstrated the public’s ready acceptance of women news presenters. Even then there was consternation twenty years later at the BBC when its news presenter, Angela Rippon, appeared in a Morecombe & Wise comedy show, revealing her legs and her talents as a dancer. She had transgressed the required identity norms of ‘being a news presenter on the BBC’, by interposing the identity norms of ‘being an entertainer’ and, worse, ‘being a female entertainer’. Her success with audiences was secure but slowly Angela disappeared from news presentation to reappear in more entertainment-oriented programming. Nowadays, by contrast, in local television news the BBC prefers a jocular, flirtatious type of female presenter, almost always working alongside an equally jocular and flirtatious male presenter. This is all to do with the ‘the cult of personality’ now required by broadcasters of news presenters in the effort to secure brand loyalty from audiences able to channel-hop. In national news, however, a dispassionate appearance is still the performance norm but it is a not-too-old female appearance which continues to matter. Kate Adie (a BBC foreign correspondent who in 2003 announced her move from television to radio reporting) has recently protested that ‘old trouts’ like her were being sidelined in favour of younger reporters with ‘cute faces and cute bottoms and nothing else in between’ (Adie 2002). But her colleague at the BBC, Nick Higham, gives a slightly different angle to her experience, commenting (2003) that ‘she can attract unkind comments—sometimes, you suspect, from male colleagues of a certain age who have difficulty accepting her success as a woman in what was once a man’s game’. Change for women journalists inside British television is apparent, but these workers are still subject to the gaze and the competitive behaviour of the men for and with whom they work. Adie’s autobiography reveals her to have been single-minded and determined in her reach to become a BBC foreign correspondent. While we must accept that a certain amount of mythology will attach to her story, none the less colleagues such as Higham speak with admiration of her charismatic and dominating presence in news rooms and foreign reporting locations. These biographical and autobiographic sources suggest that Adie’s career represents a quite successful micro-politics of resistance on her part. She became what she wanted to become notwithstanding the sometimes unconducive behaviour of male colleagues. Outside of television journalism and in the realm of television entertainment, the treatment of gender can demonstrate significant ambivalences with regard to gender norms. Consider the following instance, the appearance on British television of gendertransgressive host individuals with guests of gender-neutral appearance, where the

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appearance of gender neutrality was the focus of the programme’s attention. The programme was a chat show in which the quasi-gay host was interviewing a quasiandrogynous female actress. Their collaborative task was to identify the gender of three other persons from the observation (shared with the studio and viewing audiences) of one small part of a body, e.g. an upper arm or a leg. Having successfully attributed the correct gender identity to the first two individuals, the host and the actress arrived at the third image - a piece of upper torso. They were unable to make an identification on the basis of this image. The camera panned back to reveal the full person. Host and actress were still unable to make an identification and shrieked in (what seemed to be) genuine surprise and raucous laughter, ‘What is it?’ This question was tossed around between them for a few minutes, with the camera alternating between them and the individual who was hearing their comments with an expressionless face. The normative transgression was more or less complete: here was a person whose gender could not be allocated on the basis of bodily appearance. But the normative ambiguity to which that transgression gave rise, conditioning the initial somewhat hysterical reaction, gave way rapidly to an effort on the part of the host and actress to stress the individual’s acceptability and dignity as a human being. They were not in a position to retract the ‘it’ of their initial question, ‘What is it?’ but their sense of propriety compelled them to attempt to redress the denigrating effect of describing a person as an ‘it’. These various instances arguably reveal a number of important aspects of contemporary media-saturated culture: first is the importance of bodily appearance as a signifier of identity; second is our genuine difficulty in operating without an ability to ascribe gender to individuals; third, that there is some, albeit limited, scope in TV programmes for exploration and play with gender norms; and fourth, there is also substantial recourse to gender stereotyping.

Television as organization The latter point needs to be revisited from the organizational aspect contrasted by McGuigan (1999) as ‘not crazy’. Jameson (1991:113) describes the postmodern condition as ‘a new type of social life’ and a ‘new economic order’. The transformations in deindustrializing countries across the twentieth century have indeed been considerable, but there are dangers both of overstating the magnitude of change and of losing sight of continuities. The perspective preferred here is that which has been outlined by, among others, Giddens (1991a, 1991b) and Westergaard (2003). In this perspective, we are not discussing the dissolution of capitalist political economy, rather we are considering its calculated restructuring for reasons of maintaining or improving financial viability in the face of intensified competition. That calculated restructuring is expressed in new product types and ranges, in new market activity, and in new corporate arrangements for exploiting the factors of production, one of which is labour. In British broadcasting, the changes in work and employment wrested by employers and government since the 1980s have obliged many workers additional to the public celebrities to network informally and to cultivate a vendible identity. As touched on before, in a context where 50 per cent of the total workforce is freelance and project-only

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(Skills Dialogue 2002:41), securing the next job has become for the majority contingent upon personal reputation and contacts. Regular participation in the informal, but also hierarchical and discriminatory, network of other television workers has become crucial to securing employment. ‘You’re only as good as your last job’, and ‘If you’re not seen, you don’t exist’ are phrases frequently uttered by television workers, knowing that they must catch the favourable attention of the few who can access broadcast commissions. At the same time, those who do find work are faced with more demanding production regimes, faster-paced work, longer shifts, more anti-social hours and often also requirements to be multi-skilled. These working and employment conditions, layered into the twin necessities of cultivating identity and networking within an hierarchical and discriminatory informal network, all mitigate against the progress of women in the television workforce. While the general working population of Britain is almost 50 per cent female, only 34 per cent of those in the audio-visual sector are women (2002:39). Notwithstanding the particular progress of women into television journalism, Paterson’s research (2001) reveals that the drop-out rate of women from the freelance labour force in film and television is significantly higher than that for men, a fact confirmed by Skills Dialogue’s finding of just 26 per cent of freelancers being women (2002:39). It is also significant that the audio-visual sector relies on a young workforce, a majority being less than 35 years old. For women workers, this is likely to require decisions as to which identity to prioritize, that of mother/wife or that of worker. The difficulties have led to the creation of a campaigning group, Women in Film and Television (WFTV). The significance of WFTV for present purposes is that it offers resistance in the sense of pursuing political change, and does so as a collective organization built on the common identity, experiences and ambitions of women as socially (and maybe also existentially) gendered beings. That is, television production employment may be necessitating the individuation of individuals but, in that it simultaneously creates categories of differential employment experience along gendered lines, it also produces collectivity. The material and aspirational interests of people as employees act to constrain their individuation, at least where those interests are inadequately met in the terrain of employment and where there are grounds for common identification. Thus WFTV was founded twelve years ago in the UK to fight what its current chair, Barbara Benedek, describes as ‘the 50:50 campaign’; that is, for as many men as work in film and television, there should be an equal number of women (Broadcast, 9 December 2002; interview article with Jane Marlow). Skillset research (2002) reveals that women represent only 10 per cent of the workforce in areas such as lighting, camera and sound, while they are a large majority of workers among wardrobe, hair-styling and make-up occupations. But it is currently less these areas of imbalance which concern WFTV; rather they have a particular eye on the boards of the country’s media companies. Citing research by Singh and Vinnicombe (2002a, 2002b) which shows that women hold only 7 per cent of all the directorships comprising the FTSE 100, Benedek told her interviewer, ‘We don’t have precise figures for media boards, but even if it’s twice as good in the media…it would only mean that women made up 14 per cent of board members’. Benedek acknowledges her debt to researches undertaken in North America, informed in part by which she and her executive are developing the strategy and tactics of the UK’s WFTV. Their aim, says Benedek, is ‘to create a network so that women will think of

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other women when they are appointing…Since women are only beginning to be in senior management, the relationships are just being forged. We’re hoping to hothouse the network.’ American research into these issues has been undertaken over a considerable period, for example, the United States Commission on Civil Rights (1977), Ferri and Keller (1986). The former study reported on the low levels of participation of women and individuals from ethnic minorities in television work. Similar patterns were revealed for the UK by the Institute of Manpower Studies (1989): namely, in British broadcasting in the mid-1980s, men comprised 75 per cent of all employees, 66 per cent of all freelancers, and 66 per cent of all television journalists. And 98 per cent of all broadcast workers were white. Ferri and Keller (1986) augmented the US Government study by investigating career barriers for women TV news anchors. In the late 1990s, Ferri revisited the issues and concluded, ‘A comparison of this study’s results with those of (the) 1986 study shows some but not sufficient change towards equality’ (Engstrom and Ferri 1998:789). In the late 1990s, women TV anchors in the US felt challenged in their employment by television’s preoccupation with the physical appearance of women (see also Wood 1994), by conflicts between the roles of wife/mother and newscaster, and by difficulties in balancing career and family demands. Sanders and Rock (1988) similarly found many of the problems for American women television journalists to stem from their multiple roles as workers/wives/ mothers. Just as British research (Paterson 2001) reveals, a central problem is that of combining long and irregular working hours, and work-related demands for geographical relocation with the demands of wife/mother. Sanders and Rock’s research (1988) also identified the male-dominated ‘buddy system’ as a major problem, just as is the case in Britain. In the United States, the proportion of women enrolling in college media courses exceeded that of men for the first time in the early 1970s, leading observers at the time to anticipate a ‘gender switch’ in television. But twenty years later, Creedon (1993:3) was moved to comment, ‘The quiet revolution in values we expected to result from the gender switch…has not occurred. The potential of the gender switch to bring about a paradigmatic rupture in the basic assumptions of mass communication practice is as yet largely unrealized.’ It can be suggested that this is further evidence of the circuit of culture. As Engstrom and Ferri comment (1998:790), ‘The role of women anchors…not only encompasses the individual’s expectations for news anchors but also gender roles— society’s expectations for females.’ And, perhaps needless to say, television’s texts are implicated in producing and reproducing those expectations, as is revealed by evidence (Zoch and VanSlyke Turk 1998; Liebler and Smith 1997) to the effect that there is little difference in the selection of sources as between men and women reporters. Zoch and VanSlyke Turk comment, ‘a number of studies…have shown women badly underrepresented as sources in newspapers and on television newscasts. The emphasis continues to be on male authorities and officials.’ (1998:774). This is of course hardly surprising, given that reporters focus particularly on the activities and statements of the more powerful sections of society, within which men greatly outnumber women.

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Summary and concluding reflections From the preceding discussion, we can conclude that, in television production employment and output in the UK, there is evidence of both ambivalence and change in the norms and practices attaching to attributions of gender. An initial corporate resistance to using women as news presenters has given way to their widespread employment. Moreover, there is nowadays scope in entertainment shows for the appearance onscreen of gay or androgynous identities, and there is some corporate space for experimentation with and reflection on gender stereotyping. At the same time, there persist occupational imbalances in the high concentrations of women workers in some television occupations, and their relative absence from others. This includes their relative absence from executive positions. Additionally, women continue to be disadvantaged in work if they carry domestic responsibilities, that is, if they have multiple identities of worker/wife/mother. And, for very many onscreen women workers including news presenters, it is the case that sexualized performance and an attractive appearance constructed in gender stereotypical terms are not only rewarded by the corporations but are actively demanded. Television production could therefore be proposed as an organizational setting, a formally created and supported space, for the construction of and (some degree of) experimentation in identities, gendered or otherwise. To the extent that any identity is possible if it can find a market, the concept of a micro-politics of resistance in identity formation is redundant in this organizational setting. In this analytical light, television production could be viewed as an arena of social activity which allows for selfactualization and the cultivation of social relations which might serve to underscore and nurture self-regard and self-confirmation. Thus we could accept that, for competitive economic and psycho-social reasons, television workers volunteer, often literally, to actualize their ‘selves’ in the production processes. This is evidence which supports such accounts as that offered by Rose. It is evidence which allows conceptually for a micropolitics of resistance, not in the sense of attempting to achieve political change but in the sense of a person negotiating for personal space within a fabric of social relationships, as Butler has suggested. At the same time, however, the mechanisms of advanced capitalism are also readily apparent. The changes to employment and labour relations which accompanied the movement of television production towards freer market forces embraced casualization, intensified labour market competition and government legislation to limit the powers of the trades unions. In compensation for the loss of older and more stable forms of working relationship, and in resistance to the corrosive effects of the new patterns, an informal ‘economy of favours’ (Ledeneva 1998) performed in networking has emerged to mediate workers’ relationships with each other, and to an extent to mitigate the experience of exploitation in the cash economy of the employers. But at the same time, this economy of favours can be seen to lubricate and make possible the cash economy. Ultimately, workers are pitted one against the other in conditions of competition but, ultimately also, it is the workers who are making the system work.

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This fragmentation of employment forms and work relations in television production has both disguised and strengthened the structural inequalities distinguishing employers from workers, and one class of worker from another. Simultaneously, in the extra-mural steps taken by workers to secure and retain employment, the fragmentation has stimulated the emergence of new structured inequalities. These steps include attenuated forms of self-commodification in which there is considered cultivation of vendible individual identity. The vendible identities of television workers are among the symbolic raw material from which television contents are crafted, and as such they are actively sought, tested in the marketplace and here and there rewarded by the employing structures. The rewards are one source of the psycho-social impulses facilitating the individuation of television workers. Another source arguably is constituted in considerable part in the television contents. This argument requires that we accept the notion of a circuit of culture (du Gay 1997). Television contents, as a ubiquitous element of post-industrial cultural production, can be said to contribute significantly to the consumerist, fashion-conscious, individualistic and identity-experimenting proclivities of television workers (male and female) in their identity as audiences. One can say that a cultural production of contents of simulacra and their pervasive exhibition via television ‘captures’ television audiences and workers alike in a circuit of culture. People whose everyday lives are saturated with and made more pleasurable by the consumption of simulacric identities are arguably more disposed to regard the creative source of the simulacra as an exciting and pleasurable domain of employment; one they will willingly commodify themselves so as to enter. This circuit of culture, under postmodern conditions, takes character as a cycle of commodification and consumption. There is however no automatic reason to suppose that it is unchallenged. Undoubtedly it is realized and reproduced in individuated identity formation but commodification and consumption do not constitute the totality of individual experience. The necessity in television production, for example, of selfcommodification is specific to securing employment, and there is no automatic reason to regard it as existentially invasive. It also remains the case that most people must work so as to consume, and the experience of work and employment potentially challenge and limit their experience of consumption. Thus, as far as gender is concerned, the employer-sanctioned spaces for identity development and experimentation could be experienced as liberating, but there are limits to this liberation from two sources. One is the market competitiveness of broadcast organizations as they negotiate the late capitalist relations of post-industrial society. Television worker identities, whether aiming for onscreen or offscreen occupations and however motivated at the level of the individual, are cherry-picked by production executives for corporate purposes with market and financial goals in mind. In this context, a micro-politics of resistance, in the sense of creating social space for self, is not futile and may even be rewarded. But, if it is rewarded, it is as an object captured for commodification: it is as an object expropriated for the purposes of late capitalism. One could read from this that capitalism fashions, expropriates and capitalizes on subjectivity, which would be to confirm Foucault’s notion of subjectification. However, hopefully what has been argued here, to the effect that there is no automatic reason to believe that the stimulation to consumption and the obligation to self-commodify for employment

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purposes are so total as to be existentially invasive, is sufficient to render that confirmation subject to further empirical investigation. Moreover, the second source of limitation, particularly as it affects women, suggests that this is as much a story of continuities as of change. Within all the normative and narrative fluidities ascribed to the postmodern condition, or found within television production, are two older, enduring features. One is the practice and thereby the experience of gender-related employment inequalities and dissatisfactions. The existence of the campaigning organization, Women in Film and Television, demonstrates the potency of these practices and related experiences in stimulating collective organization on the common, shared basis of being female. This macro-level politics of resistance, geared to the wresting of structural changes, is doubtless fuelled by frustrations at the micro level. However, we can suggest also that it reflects a general recognition that solidarity among workers is still the only likely route to significant improvement in the terms and conditions of employment. What constitutes an additional but related obstacle for women workers is the other of the two enduring features: the presence of a pre-modern archetypal masculinist construction of woman as gendered opposite. In employment terms, many of the genderrelated disadvantages, which women continue to experience, can be traced back to male preferences and male decision-making. In their onscreen representations, too, women workers are seen to be rewarded for a sexuality and appearance pleasing to men. Indeed the competitiveness and market-regulated character of late capitalism seems to stimulate the recourse to such representations. However, if we accept Butler’s argument of the significance of the body in social theorization, we must qualify the power of the male gaze in terms of women’s chosen self-actualization as mothers and lovers. That is, it is reasonable to suppose that a majority of contemporary western women can elect whether or not to be celibate or childless. If that is so, then the micro-politics of resistance with regard to gender identity formation becomes one of trying to resolve what are potentially competing demands on one’s time and resources, in a context where other people and social arrangements are only variably supportive. Moreover, we should perhaps finally reflect that male identities have also to be developed in this fluid and uncertain postmodern terrain: we should perhaps question whether it is the comfort and reassurance of archetypal representations which secures them their place in it.

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Bauman, Zygmunt, 2001, The Individualised Society, Cambridge, Polity Press. Beck, Ulrich, 1992, Risk Society: Towards a New Modernity, trans. Mark Ritter, introduction byScott Lashand Brian Wynne, London, Sage (original published 1986). Butler, Judith, 1990, Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity, London, Routledge. Butler, Judith, 1993,Bodies that Matter -On the Discursive Limits of ‘Sex’, London, Routledge. Creedon, Pamela J., 1993, Women in Mass Communication, 2nd edn, Newbury Park, CA, Sage. Du Gay, Paul (ed.), 1997, Production of Culture/Cultures of Production, London, Sage. Engstrom, Erikawith Anthony J.Ferri, 1998, ‘From barriers to challenges: career perceptions of women television news anchors’, Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly, vol. 75(4), winter: 789–802. Fenton, Natalie, 2000, ‘The problematics of postmodernism for feminist media studies’, Media, Culture & Society, vol. 22(6): 723–742. Ferri, Anthony J.with Jo Keller, 1986, ‘Perceived career barriers for female television news anchors’, Journalism Quarterly, vol. 63, autumn: 463–467. Fink, Eugene, 1968, ‘The oasis of happiness: towards an ontology of play’ in J. Ehrmann (ed.), Game, Play, Literature, Boston MA, Beacon Press, pp. 19–30. Foucault, Michel, 1972, The Archeology of Knowledge, London, New York, Routledge. Foucault, Michel, 1980, Power/Knowledge: Selected Interviews and Other Writings, 1972–1977, ed. and trans. Colin Gordon, Brighton, Sussex,Harvester Press. Gadamer, Hans-Georg, 1988, Truth and Method, 2nd revised edn, trans. J.Weinsheimer and D.G.Marshall, New York, Continuum. Giddens, Anthony, 1984, The Constitution of Society: Outline of the Theory of Structuration, Cambridge,Polity Press. Giddens, Anthony, 1991a, Modernity and Self-identity: Self and Society in the Late Modern Age, Cambridge, Polity Press. Giddens, Anthony, 1991b, The Consequences of Modernity, Cambridge, Polity Press. Higham, Nick, 2003, ‘Working alongside Kate Adie’, http://news.bbc.co.uk/%20l/hi/entertainment/tv_and_radio%202709177.stm, 31 January. Hutcheon, Linda, 1989, The Politics of Postmodernism, London, Routledge. Insitute of Manpower Studies, 1989, Key Facts of the Media Workforce, Report No. 186, Part 1 and Final Report, London, IMS. Jameson, Fredric, 1991, Postmodernism: or, the Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism, London, Verso. Journalism Training Forum, 2002, Journalists at Work: Their Views on Training, Recruitment and Conditions, July, London, NTO/Skillset. Klein, Naomi, 2001, No Logo, London, Flamingo. Knights, David and Hugh Willmott, 1989, ‘Power at work; subjectivity at work: from degradation to subjugation in social relations’, Sociology, vol. 23: 535–558. Kristeva, Julia, 1986, The Kristeva Reader, ed. Toril Moi, Oxford, Blackwell. Lash, S. and J.Urry, 1994, Economies of Signs and Space, London, Sage. Ledeneva, A., 1998, Russia’s Economy of Favours: Blat, Networking and Informal Exchange, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press. Liebler, Carol M.with Susan J.Smith, 1997, ‘Tracking gender differences: a comparative analysis of network correspondents and their sources’, Journal of Broadcasting and Electronic Media, vol. 41, winter: 58–68. Lyotard, Jean-Francois, 1993, Libidinal Economy, trans. Iain Hamilton Grant, London, Athlone. McGuigan, Jim, 1999, Modernity and Postmodern Culture, Buckingham, Open University Press. Malpas, Simon (ed.), 2001, Postmodern Debates, Basingstoke, Palgrave. Paterson, Richard, 2001, ‘Work histories in television’, Media, Culture & Society, Vol. 23:495– 520. Rose, Nikolas, 1998, Inventing Our Selves: Psychology, Power and Personhood, New York, Cambridge University Press.

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Rose, Nikolas, 1999, Powers of Freedom: Reframing Political Thought, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press. Sanders, Marlene with Marcia Rock, 1988, Waiting for Prime Time: The Women of Television News, Illinois, University of Illinois Press. Singh, V. and Vinnicombe, S., 2002a, ‘Top companies without women directors: a persistent and international phenomenon’, paper presented to the Gender Research Forum, London, 8 November. Singh, V. and Vinnicombe, S., 2002b, ‘The 2002 female FTSE report: women directors moving forward’, paper presented to the Women’s Leadership Summit, London, 13 November. Skills Dialogue, 2002, An Assessment of Skill Needs in the Media and Creative Industries, Annesley, Nottingham, DfES Publications. Skillset, 2002, Census 2002: A Snapshot in Time, London, Skillset. United States Commission on Civil Rights, 1977, updated January 1979, ‘Window dressing on the set: women and minorities in television’, United States Government Printing Office. Walkerdine, Valeriewith June Melody, 2001, Growing Up Girl: Psycho-social Explorations of Gender and Class, Basingstoke, Palgrave. Westergaard, John, 2003, interviewed by Steve Taylor, in Network, no. 85, summer, British Sociological Association. Wood, Julia, 1994, Gendered Lives: Communication, Gender and Culture, Belmont CA, Wadsworth. Zoch, Lynn M.with Judy VanSlyke Turk, 1998, ‘Women making news: gender as a variable in source selection and use’, Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly, winter, vol. 75(4): 762–775.

Index

Aaltio, I. 160, 162 Abu-Lughod, L. 181, 182–3 academic identities 128–31 academy, idea of and academic identities 125–8 Acker, J. 115, 133, 162, 172 Ackers, P. 86 Ackroyd, S. 1, 2, 3 action 9 acts of resistance 2 Adie, K. 203–4 Adkins, L. 187 age 98, 99, 127 agency 1, 2, 4, 5–6, 9, 11, 12, 14, 15; creative 110, 120; critical sensemaking approach 142, 143, 144; distance 56; managerialism 124, 127, 132, 133; public service organizations 105, 106, 107, 108; television workforce in United Kingdom 198, 202; transnational call centres 179, 180, 181 Air Canada 141 airline industry 149–55 Alapuro, R. 47 Alcoff, L. 12, 125, 126, 127, 132, 136 Alexander, J. 155 Alison Halford case 82 Altar, R. 202 Alvesson, M. 1, 4, 11, 29–30, 87, 89, 105, 111; organizational culture change 160, 162, 163–4, 166, 172 Andersson, E. 45 antiquity 25–9 anxiety 35 Appadurai, A. 192–3 appearance/attractiveness 152, 154, 156; television workforce in United Kingdom 203, 204, 207, 208, 210; see also body shape and size; height; weight

Index

Arikan, S. 89 Arthur, M.B. 85 Ashcraft, K.L. 142, 144, 145 Askling, B. 123, 124 attribution error 81 Australia 86 authoritarianism 90 Bagilhole, B. 128, 129, 130, 133, 134, 135 Ball, K.S. 10, 11, 85–100 Barker, J.R. 88 Barry, B. 68, 71 Barry, J. 12, 123–37 Bartky, S.L. 109 Basu, A. 180 Bate, P 161 Bateman, T.S. 68, 71 Baudelaire, C.R 33 Baudrillard, J. 197 Bauman, Z. 53, 199 Becher, T. 126 Beck, U. 196, 199 behaviours of resistance 2 Belbin, M. 170 beliefs 162 Bellizzi, J.A. 89 Benedek, B. 206 Bennett, J. 160 Berg, E. 12, 123–37 Bernauer, J.W. 27, 28, 30, 34 Best, S. 2, 142 Beynon, H. 118 Billing, Y. 89, 162, 163–4, 166, 172 Blackler, F. 143 body shape and size 88, 89 Bordo, S. 7, 14, 109, 120, 179 Bouckaert, G. 123 Bourantas, D. 160 Boxall, P. 69 Braam, G. 124 Bradley, H. 127 Braverman, H. 72, 88 Brewis, J. 8, 9, 11, 23–38 British Airways 141 Brittan, A. 91 Brown, A. 161 Brown, G. 118 Brown, J.M. 74 Bryson, V. 106, 107 Buchanan, B. 152 buddy system 207

180

Index

181

bureaucracy, de-emphasis of 97 Burrell, G. 87, 141 business process re-engineering 86 Butler, C. 145 Butler, J. 105, 110, 197, 198, 202, 208, 210 Calas, M. 164, 172 Canada 86; airline industry 149–55 Carby, H.V. 126 careerism 90 Carpenter, G. 56 Carter, C. 86, 87, 89 Casey, C. 167, 168 Cassell, C. 68, 71, 74, 80, 82–3, 162 catastrophizing 36 Cavanaugh, J.M. 70 Champy, J. 86 Chandler, J. 10, 12, 13, 123–37 Chang, K.A. 179, 181 Cheng, C. 89, 90 class 71, 72, 88, 89, 107, 125, 126, 127, 146 Clegg, S. 88, 99, 143, 145 cloning, cultural 57–9, 60 Coch, L. 3 Cockburn, C. 172 coherence 144 collaboration 170, 171 collective resistance 70–1 Collier, R. 56 Collinson, D. 1, 7, 8, 40, 51, 73, 112, 118, 189; new managerialism 88, 89, 90, 91, 98, 99, 100 Collinson, M. 112 Colville, I. 146 competition 169, 171, 172, 173 conceptualizing resistance, politics and identity 2–5, 197–200 conformity 133 Connell, R.W. 91 Connolly, W. 25, 34 consent 74 consumer fetishism 192 control 95 co-operation 170 Cox, T. 69, 170 Creedon, P.J. 207 critical ontology of self 32–8 critical sensemaking approach to resistance 141–57; discourse 144–5; formative contexts 143; micro-politics in Canadian airline industry 149–55; organizational rules 153–4

Index

182

Crosby, P. 86 cues 148, 151, 157 cultural cloning 57–9, 60 culture 86; campaign 73; circuit of 209; new managerialism 97; see also organizational culture change Cunha, J.V. 163, 171 Cunha, M. 163, 171 customers 191–3 Czarniawska, B. 172 Davies, A. 4, 11, 13, 14, 105–20; managerialism 124, 128, 129, 130, 132, 135 Davies, C. 56, 124, 126 Davies, K. 131 de Certeau, M. 7 dedication to helping customers 165 Deem, R. 124, 128, 130, 133, 134, 135 Deetz, S. 29–30, 111 Delphy, C. 162 Deming, W.E. 86 Dent, E. 161 Dent, M. 124 Departmental Leading Group 52, 58 Derrida, J. 126 Deveaux, M. 142 deviance 3 Dews, P. 32 Dick, G. 112 Dick, P. 9–10, 12, 13, 14, 67–83 difference 59 differentiation 59 DiMaggio, P. 151 discipline 126 discourse 13, 144–5 discrimination 124; unfair 81 discursive practice 75–7, 79 discursive resistance 4 distance 8–9, 40–61, 73, 129; cultural cloning 57–9; homosociality 55–7; information falsification 45–8; opening ploys 41–2; positions, resistance and refusal 48–50; powers: transnational, organizational and individual 51–5; procedure, invention of 43–5 diversity 170, 171 diversity initiatives 16, 67–83;

Index

critical perspectives 71–9; theoretical issues 69–71 diversity, value of 167–8 Dixon, J. 86 domination 82, 106, 107, 120, 142, 179, 180; see also oppression; patriarchy Doyle, C. 124 du Gay, P. 1, 201, 209 Duncan, R. 161 Eastern Airlines 151 Eccleston, P. 155 Eckholm, Professor 44 Edley, N. 91, 92 Edwards, R. 118 Eisen, H. 161 Elg, U. 126 Ellis, C. 67 Elsmore, P. 123, 124 Ely, R. 170 emotionality 90 empowerment 86, 92–3, 95, 99, 100 enactment of sensemaking 147–8, 151 Enders, J. 126 Engstrom, E. 207 entrepreneurialism 90 environmentalism 127 equality 56, 57, 58 Eräsaari, R. 42, 48, 50, 53 Ergeneli, A. 89 Essed, P. 57 ethnicity 88, 89, 125, 126, 127; see also minority groups; race/racism Europe 51, 126; social movement 135 European Court of Justice 45–6 Evans, M. 125, 126 excellence genre 86 Ezzamel, M. 4 Fairclough, N. 75 family 88, 131, 132 family-friendly policies 68 Fawcett, B. 60 feminine/femininity 12, 162; attributes 90, 99; critical sensemaking approach 145, 149, 151; discourses 114; managerialism 126;

183

Index

184

new managerialism 85, 98; organizational culture change 163, 171, 172, 173; public service organizations 108, 117 feminism 2, 5, 14, 16; academic 134; Black 107; critical sensemaking approach 141, 142; cultural 126; distance 57; Foucauldian 106, 108–11, 118; liberal 106, 141; managerialism 127, 132, 135; Marxian 141; materialist 107; micro-politics 8–16; poststructuralist 11, 105, 106, 108, 141, 142; public service organizations and micro-politics 106–8, 119–20; radical 107, 108; socialist 106, 107, 108, 141; structuralist 141, 142; symbolic 107–8; television workforce in United Kingdom 196, 197, 198; transnational call centres 179, 180, 193 feminization 14, 113, 163, 169 Fenstermaker, S. 162, 172 Fenton, N. 198 Ferguson, K.E. 141 Ferri, A.J. 206–7 fetishism 192 Finch, J. 124, 126, 133 Fink, E. 202 Finland 16, 40–1 Flax, J. 108 Fleming, P. 4, 7, 11, 73 Flynn, T. 145 Fogelberg, P. 124 Fondas, N. 10, 163, 169–70, 171, 173 formative contexts 13, 143, 150 Foucault, M. 1, 5, 8, 9, 10, 16, 24–5, 30, 32–5, 37–8; diversity initiatives 67, 72, 74, 81, 82; managerialism 126; micro-politics and public service organizations 108, 111, 115, 120; new managerialism 86–7; sensemaking approach to resistance 141, 142, 143, 144–5; United Kingdom television workforce 196, 199, 201; see also feminism, Foucauldian Fox, S. 146 Freeman, C. 180–1, 185, 187, 189 French, J.R.P. 3 Frost, P.J. 160 Fullerton, J. 69 functionalist approach 69–70

Index

Gadamer, H.-G. 202 Game, A. 164 Garfinkel, H. 72 Garner, L. 150, 151, 152–4, 155, 156–7 Geertz, C. 164 gender: lens 14, 16; neutral 97; switch 207 Gewirtz, S. 86 Gherardi, S. 162 Giddens, A. 55, 147, 196, 198, 199, 205 glamour 152, 153–4, 155, 156 Glenn, E. 162 global resistance 180–1 Goldberg, S. 161 Goldberg, T. 57 Goode, J. 128, 129, 130, 133, 134, 135 Gottfried, H. 4, 188–9 Green, E. 162 Greene, A. 170 Grey, C. 86, 87 Gronow, Dr 42 Groves, J.M. 179, 181 Gundelach, P. 42 Gutek, B. 188 Guzzo, R. 168, 170 Habermas, J. 136 Halford, S. 164 Halsey, A.H. 124 Hammer, M. 86 Harlow, E. 162 Hartman, H. 106 Hartsock, N. 7, 127, 142 Hasty, R.W. 89 Haug, F. 41 Hearn, J. 8–9, 40–61, 162, 163; new managerialism 89, 90, 91, 98, 99, 100 height 152 Hekman, S. 110, 132 Helkama, K. 42 Helms Mills, J. 1–16, 141–57 Helsinki University Equality Committee 50 Henriques, J. 70 Henry, W. 151 hermeneutics of self 26–7, 28 Heskett, J. 161 Hickman, C.R. 86 hierarchy 86, 90, 100

185

Index

Higham, N. 203–4 higher education see reforming managerialism Hind, P. 124 Hindess, B. 28 Hochschild, A.R. 90, 152 Hodgson, D. 87 Holloway, P. 56, 124, 126 Hollway, W. 74, 75 Holmer-Nadesan, M. 110, 114, 117 homosociality 55–7, 58, 59, 60 Hong Kong 86 Honour, T. 127 Hood, C. 123 Hopfl, H. 172 Houseman, L. 155 Hungerford, S. 151 hupomnēmata 26–7 Hutcheon, L. 198 Hyman, R. 3, 118 ideational analysis 75 Ihamuotila, R. 44, 47, 48, 50 image 155 Imperial Airways 151, 155 inclusion 171 independence 171 India 15; see also transnational call centres individualism 169, 171, 172 Industrial Tribunals 82 inequality 124 informalism 90, 99, 100 Information Technology 13 innovation 165 Institute of Manpower Studies 206 interdependence 170, 171 internationalism 58 internationalization 55 ‘irrational’ resistance 69–70 Italy 127 Jack, G. 68–9, 70 Jacques, R. 1, 70 Jameson, E 15, 196, 199, 205 Japan 73, 110 Jary, D. 124, 128, 130 Jenkins, R. 129, 136 Jermier, J. 71, 72, 88, 124, 187 Johnson, P. 151 Jones, D. 167 Jonnergård, K. 126

186

Index

Journalism Training Forum 203 Judson, A.S. 3 Juran, J.M. 86 Kandola, R. 69 Kanter, R.M. 90, 98 Kärreman, D. 87 Katila, S. 4 Keller, J. 206–7 Kellner, D. 2, 142 Kerfoot, D. 4, 89, 90, 98, 131, 163 Kilmann, R. 161 Kirkham, T. 153, 155 Kirton, G. 170 Klein, N. 200 Knights, D. 1, 7, 24, 34, 105, 118, 163, 199; diversity initiatives 71, 72; managerialism 124, 131; new managerialism 88, 89, 98 Knopoff, K. 163, 172 knowledge 8; critical sensemaking approach 145; diversity initiatives 81; new managerialism 86–7; public service organizations 108, 110; television workforce in United Kingdom 199 Knowles, R.E. 151 Kondo, D. 3, 4, 73, 110, 114, 118 Kotter, J. 86, 161 Kristeva, J. 198 Kunda, G. 167, 168 Laclau, E. 136 Lash, S. 200 Lawrence, P.R. 89 Ledeneva, A. 208 Leonard, P. 164 Lewin, K. 161 liberty 37, 38 Liebler, C.M. 207 Liff, S. 71 logoi (‘truths’) 26 Lorbiecki, A. 68–9, 70 Lorsch, J.W. 89 Lothian, G. 150, 153 Lowe, P. 154, 155 Lyon, K. 126 Lyotard, J.-F. 202 McCabe, D. 105 McDowell, L. 89, 90, 99

187

Index

188

McEachern, A. 153, 154 McGuigan, J. 199, 202, 205 McHugh, D. 91 McNay, L. 5, 11, 14, 28, 37, 105, 107–8, 109, 110, 120 macro-processes 51–2, 54 Mahon, M. 27, 28, 30, 34 Maier, M. 89, 90, 91 Malpas, S. 199 Mama, A. 74 management: of change 3; see also new public management; total quality management managerialism see new managerialism; reforming managerialism managers 183–6 manliness 202 Marlow, J. 206 Marshall, J. 68, 90, 98, 106, 133, 163 Martin, B. 85 Martin, J. 6, 160, 163, 172 Martin, P.Y. 56 Marx, K. 71–2 Marxism 3, 71, 106 masculine/masculinity 11, 12, 14; competitive 118, 119; critical sensemaking approach 145, 149, 150, 151, 156; hegemonic 90; new managerialism 85, 89, 91, 97, 98, 99, 100; organizational culture change 162, 163, 164, 166, 169, 171, 172, 173; public service organizations 108, 112, 115, 117, 119; reforming managerialism 126, 131, 133, 135, 137; subjectivity 113, 116; television workforce in United Kingdom 198, 210; theory 16; transnational call centres 180, 181, 183, 193 meanings 2, 105 measurability 86 measured performance 97 Melody, J. 203 Melucci, A. 12, 125, 127, 132, 134, 135, 136 Meriläinen, S. 4, 115 Merton, R.K. 130 meso-processes 51 Messerschmidt, J.W. 89, 90, 91 Metcalf, B. 112 Meyerson, D. 4, 6, 7, 9 micro-politics 6–7; in Canadian airline industry 149–55; critical sensemaking approach 142; distance 40, 59; and feminist debates 8–16; organizational culture change 162, 164, 167, 173;

Index

189

television workforce in United Kingdom 196, 199, 204, 208, 210; transnational call centres 179; see also public service organizations and micro-politics micro-processes 51–2, 54 Milberry, L. 150 Mills, A.J. 1–16, 69, 70, 141–57, 160, 162 Mills, C.W. 125 minority groups 68 Mintzberg, H. 89 Mirchandani, K. 14–15, 179–94 mischief 3 Mitev, N. 86 modernity 25–38; critical ontology of self 32–8 Moloney, M. 162, 172 Monaghan, L.F. 90 Morley, L. 128, 134 Mouffe, C. 136 Mumby, D.K. 142, 144, 145 Murgatroyd, S.J. 143 Mykhalovskiy, E. 41 National Health Service 130 neo-Marxism 3 new managerialism 10, 11, 12, 85–100; power 89–97; rise 85–8 new public management 11, 12, 111, 117, 123, 124, 127, 128–31 New Zealand 86, 164 Newton, T. 7, 118, 119–20 Niemi, H. 42 Nikola, P. 48 NIMBY-ism 53 Nord, W. 146 Norris, C. 29 North America 70, 206; see also Canada; United States North West Airlines 151 O’Neill, O. 130 ongoing sense 147, 148 oppression 106, 107 organizational culture change 160–73; change 169–72; diversity, value of 167–8; field study 164; new values 165–6; teamwork 168–9; Technica (pseudonym) 165 organizational resistance 9

Index

190

organizational rules 13, 153–4 Ozga, J. 135 Palnitkar, S. 127 Pan American Airways (PanAm) 141, 151 Parker, G. 168, 170 Parker, M. 113, 119, 124, 128, 130 Parkin, W. 40, 55 paternalism 90, 99 Paterson, R. 205, 207 patriarchy 90, 100, 107, 108, 110, 114, 119; critical sensemaking approach 141; organizational culture change 172 Patton, P. 30, 32 performance 86; culture 130; management 123 persistence 8–9 Perth, W.A. 153 Peters, T. 86, 160 Pile, S. 179 plausibility 148, 151, 156, 157 police force 112–15; see also diversity initatives Polish Workers’ Defence Committee (KOR) 13, 146 political correctness 70 Pollert, A. 4, 141 Pollitt, C. 123 positive discrimination 75–7, 80 post-colonialism 5, 14, 16 Poster, M. 26 post-Marxism 14, 16 postmodernism 107, 126, 132; television workforce in United Kingdom 196, 197, 198, 199, 200, 202, 205, 210 poststructuralism 5, 16, 85, 126, 132, 147 poststructuralist feminism 11, 105, 106, 108, 141, 142 Potter, J. 92 Powell, W. 151 power 2, 5, 8, 9, 14, 15, 37, 74; critical sensemaking approach 141, 142, 145, 146; disciplinary 109; distance 40, 55–6, 57, 59; diversity initatives 71, 72, 74, 76–7, 81–2, 83; new managerialism 85, 86–7, 88, 89–97, 98, 99; organizational culture change 170, 172; patriarchal 56; public service organizations 106, 107, 108, 110, 114, 115, 118, 119, 120; television workforce in United Kingdom 199, 200; transnational call centres 179, 180, 181, 182–3, 189, 192–3; transnational, organizational and individual 51–5 Power, M. 123

Index

191

Prasad, A. 1, 3, 4, 7, 10, 118, 130–1, 184; new managerialism 88, 98, 99 Prasad, P. 1, 3, 4, 7, 10, 68, 69, 70, 118, 130–1, 184; new managerialism 88, 98, 99 praxis 106 Prichard, C. 124, 128 Pringle, J. 13–14, 160–73 Pringle, R. 164 privilege 70, 71, 78 production fetishism 192 professionalism 131, 132 psychiatry 28, 35 psychology 28, 35, 70 public service organizations and micro- politics 105–20; case studies 111–18; feminism 106–8, 119–20; Foucauldian feminism 108–11 Rabinow, P. 8, 33, 34 race/racism 58–9, 80, 127, 146 Raddon, A. 132 Raivio, Rector 45 Rajchman, J. 6 Ramazanoglu, C. 126 reaction 9 Reed, M. 81 reforming managerialism 123–37; academy, idea of and academic identities 125–8; contexts and issues 123–5; negotiation of academic identities: new public management 128–31; ‘why’ of resistance and accommodation 131–6 relational analysis 75 religion 88 resistance, rise of workplace 1–2; understanding 2 respect for individuals 165, 166, 167 retrospective sensemaking 147, 151, 152 reward systems 169 Richards, W. 124 Rippon, A. 203 Riska, E. 42, 47, 49 Rock, M. 207 Roper, M. 56, 90, 91, 98 Rose, N. 9, 80, 132, 196, 199, 208 Rossiter, M. 124 Rouse, J. 141–2 Rousseau, D.M. 85 Rummel, D. 150, 152 Rutherford, S. 90 Ryan, C. 149

Index

sabotage 3 Salas, E. 168, 170 sales 173 Sanders, M. 207 Sassen, S. 181, 183 Sawicki, J. 6, 11, 108, 109, 120, 145 Sayer, A. 89 Scott, J. 4, 162 Scully, M.A. 4, 7, 9 self 8, 12, 13, 54, 116, 118, 198, 199, 208; critical ontology of 32–8; hermeneutics of 26–7, 28; as maverick 11; as other 114, 117; sense of 117; techniques of 25–9 self-actualization 67, 80 self-bricolage 33 self-construction 26 self-decipherment 27 self-empowerment 96 self-interest 169 self-management 86 self-renunciation 27 sensemaking 13, 16; see also critical sensemaking service providers see transnational call centres Sewell, G. 1, 3, 86, 88 sex 162 sexual orientation 88 Shaw, M.M. 150 Shepherd, D.M. 13–14, 71, 160–73 Siikala, J. 42 Silva, M.A. 86 Singh, V. 206 skill 98, 99 Skills Dialogue 205 Skillset research 206 Sköldberg, K. 11, 105 Smart, B. 72 Smircich, L. 164, 172, 173 Smith, P. 150, 155 Smith, S.J. 207 Smithers, R. 130 Snowcroft, J. 167 social movement 127, 135, 136, 180 social practice 75, 77, 79 Social Sciences Faculty 45 social sensemaking 148, 152 Sohal, A. 161 Sonnenfield, J.A. 67 Spicer, A. 73

192

Index

193

Spivak, G. 120 standards of integrity 165 stereotyping 208 strategic agents see transnational call centres Strauss, A. 148 strikes 3 structuralism 147 structure 1, 4, 146 subject formation 108 subjectification thesis 199 subjectivity 2, 12, 15, 24, 29–30, 73; critical sensemaking approach 145; management 117; managerialism 124–5; public service organizations 105; see also under masculine/masculinity subordination 106, 108, 110, 179 Sulkunen, Professor 42, 47, 48, 49, 50 Sum, N.L. 127 Sutherland, M.B. 126 Sweden 16; see also reforming managerialism Tancred-Sheriff, P 4 task focus 172 Taylor, L. 129 teaching profession 115–18 teamwork 165, 168–9, 170, 171 technological abilities 98 Teelken, C. 124 television workforce in United Kingdom 15–16, 196–210; conceptualizing resistance, politics and identity 197–200; employment in television production 200–2; television as entertainment 202–4; television as organization 205–7 tenure 126 Terry, L.D. 86 text 75, 76, 78 theorizing gender 2 thinking errors 36 Thomas, D. 170 Thomas, R. 1–16, 105–20, 124, 128, 129, 130, 132, 135 Thompson, R 1, 2, 3, 91 Thomson, K. 85 Tichy, N.M. 162 tokenism 80 Törrönen, J. 92 total quality management 86, 100, 123 Townley, B. 1 Trans-Canada Air Lines 13, 141, 143, 149–50, 151, 152, 153–4, 156, 157 transformation 133–4, 135

Index

194

transnational call centres in India 15, 16, 179–94; customers 191–3; global resistance 180–1; managers 183–6; workers 186–90 transnational corporations 181 Treaty of Amsterdam 46 Treaty of Rome 46 Trow, M. 123 truth 29–30, 32, 34, 35; obligations 25–6; of self 31, 37 Tucker, J. 71 ‘uchi’ 73 Unger, R.M. 143 uniforms 152 United Air Lines 141, 151, 152 United Kingdom 16, 86, 87; National Health Service 130; police service 74–9; see also public service organizations; reforming managerialism; television workforce in United Kingdom United States 15, 51, 86, 127, 152, 184, 190, 192, 207; Commission on Civil Rights 206; diversity initatives 68; managerialism 125; organizational culture change 164 Urry, J. 200 Ursell, G. 12, 15–16, 196–210 Ussher, J. 145 Valkonen, T. 42, 47 values 107, 162, 165–6, 172 Van Slyke Turk, J. 207 victims 71 Vinnicombe, S. 206 Vurdubakis, T. 24, 34, 72 Waddell, D. 161 Wajcman, J. 85, 133 Walkerdine, V. 145, 203 Walton, P. 129 Ware, V. 126 Waterman, R. 86, 160 Weber, M. 89 Weedon, C. 6, 11, 105, 106, 109, 110 Weick, K.E. 13, 143, 144, 145–7, 148 weight 152 welfare of others 170

Index

West, C. 119, 162 West, J. 126 Westergaard, J. 205 Wetherell, M. 91, 92 Whitehead, S. 86, 88, 89, 90, 91, 99, 131, 132 Widerberg, K. 41 Wilhelmsson, Vice-Rector 43, 45 Wilkinson, B. 1, 86 Willmott, H. 1, 4, 71, 124, 128, 199 Wilson, E.M. 148 womanliness 202 Women in Film and Television 206, 210 women’s movement 12, 127, 134, 135, 136; see also feminism Wood, J. 207 Working Group Faculty 42–3, 47–50, 57 Wright, M.W. 186 Zaltman, G. 161 Zoch, L.M. 207

195