The power in positionings: A Foucauldian approach to knowledge integration processes

An increasingly popular management tool is to stratify a workforce along generational lines, to distinguish its qualities and differentiate orientations to work. From this, a range of organisational practices, ranging from leadership styles to reward systems are tailored to fit specific generational characteristics. We term this practice ‘management-by-generation’ and examine how it has the potential to govern as a bio-political technology. The article develops nascent work within organisation studies on governmentality and bio-politics to demonstrate the powerful potential of management-by-generation to govern in contemporary organisations. In line with other Foucauldian studies on ageing, it also contributes to the research on generations in demonstrating how a bio-political construction of generation allows management-by-generation to govern effectively, while more sociologically informed conceptualisations of generation could be a source of contestation to this emerging technology.

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

The generation game: Governing through bio-politics

Reed

Thomas

2020

“…As Jenkins (1996) notes, organisational life typically thrives on the production of internal symbolic distinctions between members and non-members (cf. Engstrand and Enberg, 2020;Hong and O, 2009). These distinctions and divisions are so subtle that they are often missed by outsiders.…”

Section: On Membership Divisions Of Labour and Their Labours Of Divisionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Labours of division: Legitimacy, membership and the performance of business knowledge

Knox,

O’Doherty,

Vurdubakis

et al. 2023

The idea(l) of ‘legitimate peripheral participation’ remains at the heart of debates over the nature and potential of communities of practice. Yet the question of how the legitimacy or otherwise of participation is actually established is seldom addressed. In this article, we focus on ‘legitimacy’ as figure instead of ground. We attend to the ‘displays of competence’, and their associated ‘labours of division’, by means of which ‘practitioners’ claim recognition and are made recognisable to each other as members, or non-members, of an ‘us’. We seek to understand how members come to recognise particular ‘doings’ and forms of knowledge as belonging (or not belonging) to a particular practice. How is the common ‘domain’ (communis) of practice settled (or un-settled) in the course of specific performances of membership? Empirically, the article draws upon a 2-year investigation of how community of practice boundaries and participation were negotiated in ‘UltraGlass Plc’, a multinational manufacturing company, and specifically of the failure of ‘community’ to cohere around practices.

“…Given the presence of multidisciplinary ways of working, knowledge specialization, and the promotion of innovations across organizational sectors, understanding how such power struggles shape knowledge co-creation is of great importance to researchers and practitioners in the fields of management and organization (e.g. Engstrand and Enberg, 2020; Mørk et al, 2008; Oborn and Dawson, 2010).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The analysis focuses on ethnographic observations from meetings and qualitative interviews collected over the course of 18 months. Drawing on discursive positioning, I follow in the footsteps of prior studies that have shown how discourse can be used to legitimate knowledge and bring about political effects (Engstrand and Enberg, 2020; Gherardi and Nicolini, 2002a; Grant et al, 1998; Hardy and Phillips, 2004; Heizmann, 2011). I also explore how coercive power contributes to power and knowledge negotiations in knowledge co-creation by enhancing conflicting discursive positioning and preventing the building of coactive power (e.g.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Power and knowledge negotiations in a collectivity of practice: From peripheralization to epistemological suspicion

Mäkinen

2021

Knowledge co-creation at the boundaries of communities of practice (CoPs) can lead to heightened tensions and power struggles. This study examines how power struggles among CoPs can begin to structure knowledge creation processes. Drawing on a qualitative case study of a new medical research project, the study shows how power and knowledge negotiations became manifested through conflicting discursive positioning and coercive power affecting knowledge co-creation efforts. One CoP adopted an authoritative leader role, prioritized their own problem definition and knowledge creation process, and engaged in the peripheralization of other CoPs. The power and discursive moves prevented the development of shared problems and interconnected practices contributing to epistemological suspicion among the participating CoPs. The study offers new insights to research on power dynamics in situated learning and knowing by problematizing the relationship between localized practices and emerging interconnected practices, by shedding light on how discursive positioning and coercive power operate together, and by developing peripheralization and epistemological suspicion as potential explanations for how and why knowledge workers struggle to act on opportunities for knowledge co-creation.