Professional scaling work: How professional segments claim new jurisdictions in a world of trans-local connections

Abstract

The literature on professions, drawing on both sociological and management approaches, has recently turned its focus to the transnational scale. In this article, building on Andrew Abbott’s work on professional jurisdictions, we analyze the way transnational resources come to play a role in local professional claims-making and work practices in the inter-professional struggle over jurisdiction. Comparing case studies set in Denmark into three emerging professional jurisdictions, our analysis shows that professional segments claiming new work tasks engage actively in scaling work that attempts to ‘rescale’ the jurisdiction to fit their own professional projects and claims. We find that scaling practices consist of three different ways professionals invest in transnational resources: organizational avatars, new work regulations and prescriptions, and symbolic legitimacy. These ways in which professionals transform transnational resources into claims used in local professionals situations result in different outcomes for the professional segments involved.