Towards a performative understanding of deservingness: Merit, gender and the BBC pay dispute

Abstract

Drawing largely on a high‐profile case of unequal pay at the BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation) as an illustrative example, this conceptual article considers differences and interrelationships between merit and deservingness, where the latter captures how, through appropriate performances, merit is given recognition and value. We propose a performative understanding of deservingness that highlights its gendered and embodied dimensions. Informed by Judith Butler's account of gender performativity, we show that, while merit is conventionally conceptualized as a relatively fixed set of attributes (qualifications, skill) 'attached' to the individual, deservingness captures how, in gendered terms, value and recognition are both claimed and conferred. As we argue, a gendered, deserving subject does not pre‐exist but is performatively constituted through embodied practices and performances of what is seen as worthy in a particular time and place.

Scientism as illusio in HR algorithms: Towards a framework for algorithmic hygiene for bias proofing

“…Algorithms do not only become visible as social-material artefacts, but they are also the products of and feed into performative acts. Drawing on both Austin (1962) and Butler (1990Butler ( , 1993, performativity focuses on the interactive power of discourse to produce the phenomena it regulates and co-create what seems to be the objective external reality it describes (Simpson et al, 2019). In this way, social norms and structures may be reproduced through performative acts and institutionalised through repetition.…”

Interactional Fairness as a Mediator Between Merit-Based Pay Management and Organizational Commitment

“…Merit-based pay management is an important topic in the organizational pay management domain. In the organizational pay management perspective, merit-based pay management refers to a systematic method used by an organization to allocate fair pay based on worker's actual productivity (Harada, 2019;Simpson et al, 2020). There are two important components in the merit-based pay management, which are communication and performance assessment (Brownson & Fowler, 2020;Ismail, 2020).…”

The Persistence of Sexism and Racism at Universities: Exploring the Imperceptibility and Unspeakability of Workplace Harassment and Discrimination in Academia

“…Specifically, based on my study, the argument can be made that harassment and discrimination are reproduced as some organizational members, particularly white, (Danish,) Western, heterosexual men, feel entitled to harass and discriminate against others to ensure their own comfort. These insights -and the related question of 'how much pain for a gram of comfortableness' -may provide guidance into analyses of the relation between entitlement and organizational inequalities, thereby addressing a research need outlined by Simpson et al (2020) who call for analyses of how entitlement and deservingness based in gendered and other categories of difference (rather than merit) lead to inequalities in organizations.…”

“…A claim, or arguably myth, of meritocracy, that is, the (self-)perception of being a meritocratic, fair, and critical organization that employs objective measures of quality and excellence, persists at universities (Deem, 2009;Scully, 2002;van den Brink & Benschop, 2012). However, for universities as much as for other organizations, this claim of meritocracy has been revealed to be biased and exclusionary towards those who do not fit social and organizational norms that influence measures of quality and excellence, revealing meritocracy to be a myth (J. F. Deem, 2009;Ferree & Zippel, 2015;McNamee & Miller, 2013;Noon, 2010;Scully, 2002;Simpson et al, 2020;van den Brink & Benschop, 2012).…”

“…Furthermore, as Simpson et al (2020) suggest, it is not people's merit that determines organizational rewards but rather what the author's term 'deservingness', understood as performative evaluative processes through which merit is recognized and given value. That is, even if we set aside that norms of quality and excellence are already biased, not everyone's merit will be recognized, as "merit must be given recognition and value to be seen as deserved […and] merit comes to be performatively constituted as deserved through embodied performances of gender that rely on traditionally [white, heteronormative] masculine enactments and displays" (Simpson et al, 2020, pp.…”