Full Description
This is the first systematic analysis of the class structure of professionals. Their growing numbers, including mainly non-managerial professional employees as well as self-employed professionals, professional employers and professional managers, have been conflated in most prior studies. In this book, evidence comes from a unique series of large-scale surveys since the 1980s as well as recent comparative case studies of engineers and nurses. A primary focus is on issues of job control and skill utilization among these knowledge workers widely regarded as pivotal to the sustainability of knowledge economies. Professional employees in particular are found to face declining job control, diminishing use of their skills and increasing barriers to continuing learning. There are many original benchmarks here to serve as guides for further studies on professional classes, job design and training strategies in advanced capitalist economies.
Contents
Acknowledgements
List of Tables
About the Authors
Introduction: Professional Power and Skill Use
D.W. Livingstone
1 General Research Questions
2 General Context
3 General Theoretical Approach
4 Mystification of Classes and Skills
5 Changing Workplaces
6 Professional Power
7 Underemployment
8 Professional Learning
9 Research Design
10 Basic Data Sources
11 Methods of Analysis
12 Further Chapters
1 The Emergent Class Structure of Professionals in Advanced Capitalist 'Knowledge Economies'
D.W. Livingstone
1 Introduction
2 The Rise of Professional Occupations with Specialised Knowledge
3 Changes in the General Distribution of Occupations
4 Basic Division of Labour in Advanced Capitalist Workplaces
5 The Changing General Employment Class Structure
6 Development of Professional Classes and Distribution of Professionals in the Class Structure
7 Professional Classes and Workplace Power: Initial Profile
8 Concluding Remarks
2 Comparing Power and Working Conditions of Professional Employees and Other Employment Classes: General Levels and Trends, 1982-2016
D.W. Livingstone
1 Introduction
2 Professional Employees in the Class Structure
3 Professional Employees in the Capitalist Labour Process
4 Levels and Trends in Professional Employees' and Other Employment Classes' Job Control
5 Findings
6 Conclusion
3 The Rise and Polarisation of Managers and Professional Managers
D.W. Livingstone
1 Introduction
2 Managerial Levels
3 The Rise of Managers
4 Situating Managers in the Class Structure
5 National Survey Findings, 1982-2016
6 The Rise of Professional Managers, "Hybridity" and Polarisation
7 The Case of Engineering Managers
8 Concluding Remarks
4 Declining Power, Increasing Underemployment and Learning Challenges for Professional Employees in "Knowledge Economies"
D.W. Livingstone
1 Introduction
2 Declining Relative Power of Professional Employees
3 General Changes in Working Conditions
4 Underemployment in Advanced Capitalism
5 Basic Dimensions of Underemployment
6 Contradictions of Paid Employment and Formal Education
7 Growth of Post-Secondary Completion and Credential Underemployment
8 Computer Skill Requirements and Skill Underemployment
9 Underemployment and Continuing Learning
9 Attitudes to Underemployment
10 Note on Other Professional Classes, Underemployment and Continuing Learning
11 Concluding Remarks
5 Comparing Engineers, Nurses, Professionals in General and the General Labour Force: A Class Analysis of Survey Data
D.W. Livingstone
1 Introduction
2 Class Structure
3 Job Qualifications and Regulatory Licensing
4 Association and Union Membership
5 Social Background Profiles
6 General Working Conditions
7 Workplace Control
8 Training and Skill Use
9 Economic Attitudes
10 Concluding Remarks
6 Engineers, Skills, and Intra-Professional Inequalities
Tracey L. Adams
1 Introduction
2 Changing Nature of Professional Work
3 Engineering in Canada
4 Some Methodological Details: The Engineering Case Study
5 Recent Changes to Engineering Practice in Ontario, Canada
6 Engineers at Work in Ontario: An Overview
7 Working Conditions, Authority and Autonomy
8 Skill, Knowledge, and Change over Time
9 Conclusion
7 Nurses, Skills, and Intra-Professional Inequalities
Edward V. Cruz and Peter H. Sawchuk
1 Introduction
2 Historical Origins of Nursing in Canada
3 Some Methodological Details: The Nursing Case Study
4 The Changing Nature of Nursing Skill, Knowledge and Work in Canada
5 Internal Divisions and Dimensions within the Profession
6 Working Conditions, Authority, and Autonomy
7 Skill, Knowledge, and Change over Time
8 Interview Findings
9 Discussion and Conclusions
8 Ethical Dilemmas and Workplace Change: Nurses and Engineers
Tracey L. Adams and Peter H. Sawchuk
1 Introduction
2 Professional Ethics
3 Organisational Logics, Professional Logics and Hybridisation
4 Ethical Tensions and Professional-Managerial Hybridity
5 Survey Findings/Analysis
6 Interview Findings/Analysis
7 Discussion and Conclusions
Conclusion: Waning Power, Wasted Skill
D.W. Livingstone
1 General Findings
2 General Comparisons
3 Engineers and Nurses
4 Further Steps
Appendix 1: List of Quoted Interviewees
Appendix 2: Regulatory Licensing Status of Professionals
Index
