Apologies for cross-posting. See below and attached for ephemera CFP.

Nick

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Call for Papers for a special issue of ephemera: theory & politics in
organization

'Professions at the margins'

Issue editors: Nick Butler, Shiona Chillas and Sara Louise Muhr


Professions have become well-established at the centre of public life over the
last one hundred and fifty years. But they also bear an intrinsic relation to
the margins. The margins are to be understood here in the broadest possible
sense – social, political, cultural, economic, geographical, and
epistemological. The Special Issue seeks to conceptualize the relation between
the professions and the margins in all of its various forms.

While some occupations have succeeded in achieving high levels of professional
recognition, others have found themselves languishing at the margins. Although
medical doctors have attained a prestigious professional status, radiologists,
theatre nurses and midwives have struggled to reap the same kind of social and
economic rewards from their work (Freidson, 2007; Scott, 2008). Similarly,
whereas personnel specialists in the UK were able to collectively organize and
obtain a Royal Charter, management consultants have tried and failed to gain
this official mark of distinction (Watson, 2001; Kipping, Kirkpatrick, and
Muzio, 2006). The case of social workers, probation officers, massage
therapists, spiritual mediums, and railway surgeons further attest to the range
of failed attempts by various occupations to fully professionalize. We agree
with McKenna (2008: 208) when he notes that “the specific reasons behind the
institutional failures of these potential professions are far more instructive
than the subsequent explanations of institutional success”.

Sometimes, professions are consigned to the margins over a tussle for power and
influence. When competing occupational groups vie for access to top managerial
positions in large-scale organizations, one profession may come to dominate at
the expense of another. The case of accountancy’s ascendancy over engineering
during the twentieth century provides a particularly illustrative example in
this respect (Armstrong, 1985). This tells us that the relation between the
professions and the margins is, at least in part, determined by conflict and
competition in organizational settings. But the margins present an opportunity
to the professions as well as a threat. It is on the fringes that new services
and innovative techniques are identified, claimed, and appropriated for
collective gain by professional groups. For example, business advisory services
now form the core business for the largest accounting firms, alongside more
traditional auditing activities (Greenwood, Suddaby, and Hinings, 2002).

Professions are also faced with issues of marginalization from within.
Traditionally dominated by middle-class white men, many professions have long
been accused of excluding those who come from a different class, gender, or
race. Professional groups such as pilots (Ashcraft, 2005), police officers
(Boogaard and Roggeband, 2010), medical doctors (Allen, 2005), and management
consultants (Meriläinen et al., 2004) have all received critical attention in
this regard. However, some typically male-dominated professions like IT and
engineering are beginning to rebrand their image to attract more women and
people from a variety of social and ethnic backgrounds (Powell, Bagilhole, and
Dainty, 2009). As a result, previously marginalized employees in these
occupations are now highlighted as examples of diversity in the professions.

The margins are contested: they mark the points at which jurisdictions of
professional practice are fought over, lost and won. The margins are unstable:
what counts as peripheral to a profession is constantly being modified by
institutional reform, political restructuring and wider economic trends. The
margins are liminal: they are the places where professionals encounter and
negotiate with other professionals, non-professionals, clients and the state.
Finally, the margins are perilous: they indicate the threshold of ethical
conduct across which trained practitioners have, time and again, had occasion
to pass.

We welcome all submissions that deal with the question of professions at the
margins. Possible themes include, but are not limited to, the following:

-	Deprofessionalization and the failure of professional projects
-	Interprofessional competition and jurisdiction disputes
-	Ethics and professional misconduct
-	Social class and the professions
-	Gender and the professions
-	Race and the professions
-	Marginal professions
-	Parasitic professions
-	Conflict between professional associations and professional service
        firms
-	Limits of professional practice
-	Boundaries between professional groups
-	Diversity and equality in professions
-	New frontiers in professionalism
-	Social marginalization in the professions

Deadline for submissions: 31st May 2011

All contributions should be submitted to one of the issue editors: Nick Butler
([log in to unmask]), Shiona Chillas ([log in to unmask]), or Sara
Louise Muhr ([log in to unmask]). Please note that three categories of
contributions are invited for the special issue: articles, notes, and reviews.
Information about these different types of contributions can be found at:
www.ephemeraweb.org/journal/call.htm. Contributions will undergo a double blind
review process. All submissions should follow ephemera’s submissions guidelines,
available at: www.ephemeraweb.org/journal/submit.htm. For further information,
please contact one of the special issue editors.



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