Managing social relations: the dimension of intellectual labour

Abstract

PurposeThe purpose of this research is to show that the management of social relations involves specific forms of intellectual labour. An Australian study explores this through life‐history interviews.Design/methodology/approachCareer‐ and life‐history interviews were conducted with 16 intellectual workers whose professions involve the management of social relations. Both individual case studies and group analysis were conducted.FindingsIn some situations this labour is carried out by a collective intellectual increasingly integrated with information technology. Several modes of the organization of knowledge can be specified. Extensive links with global society are found, yet few respondents make global society itself part of their object of knowledge. Participants perform classic functions of assembling and reticulating knowledge, and some have high levels of training, yet tend to refuse an “intellectual” identity.Originality/valueLocal practice tilts away from ivory‐tower models of social knowledge and towards supportive engagement in global market society. Social management is thus partly integrated with neoliberalism; yet among the partly residualized groups of intellectual workers some indications of opposition remain. Knowledge itself therefore seems to be a focus of tension.