Economic power continues to transform our societies in new ways, and professional groups seek authority in the competition for control over ‘money’ in the form of credit, finance, investment, tax, and legal-economic relations. Economists, business lawyers, tax consultants, fund managers and finance managers may all be considered money professionals mobilising expertise and organisational resources to gain authority and influence distribution of resources. Their relationships underpin who is permitted access to money in the form of credit and debt (Simmel, 1978; Muldrew, 1998; Ingham, 2004). There are a range of researchers interested in these money professionals although they work in research streams and are often not aware of each other. There are researchers within economic sociology, the sociology of professions, sociology of expertise, sociology of law, sociology of money, sociology of the state—as well as researchers in political economy or public administration—that study professional groups working with ‘money’. These scholars may use quantitative or qualitative approaches of various sorts, different theoretical approaches, but have in common an interest in understanding how such money professionals operate, how they interact with or distinguish from other professional groups, what kind of authority they mobilise, or the ways in which they exert power in society.

With this JPO special issue, we wish to foster a dialogue across sub-fields, as well as across methodological and theoretical approaches, to get betters insight into the role and power of professionals or experts working with ‘money’, broadly conceived. We consider a variety of approaches to money professionals as a fruitful ground for questioning and developing theories of professions and organizations, especially given challenges like rising global and workplace inequalities (Ashley et al., 2023). By calling for contributions from researchers from such a diversity of backgrounds, we seek a better understanding of questions such as:

• What are the sources of authority that allows money professionals to exert influence and control?
• How do jurisdictional struggles play out among those working with money?
• How do professional logics play out in internationalised or transnationalized areas such as finance, business law, wealth management or tax counselling? 
• To what extent do we need to develop theories of professions to grasp the struggles over influence and privilege in these areas?
• What is the role of national professional institutions and organizations in a globalised economy?
• What can studies of professionals working with money teach us about the relationship between public and private sector, or between political and economic power?

Timeline

August 15 2024 – deadline for 250 word abstracts to be sent to Marte Mangset (marte.mangset@sosgeo.uio.no) and Len Seabrooke (lse.ioa@cbs.dk).

September 15 2024 —Mangset and Seabrooke will notify the authors who will be invited to submit full submissions.

March 15 2025 — deadline submission of full manuscripts.

See more information here.

Work and Occupations Special Issue: Working for Social Change

Guest Editors: Jonathan S. Coley, Oklahoma State University

Jessica L. Schachle-Gordon, Stephen F. Austin State University

An emerging body of literature on occupational activism sheds light on how some workers creatively enact their jobs in ways that promote (or resist) social change. Although labor sociologists have long taken workers seriously as agents of change (Cornfield, 2023), as when workers band together through labor unions or “alt-labor” organizations to seek higher pay and better working conditions, the broader concept of occupational activism draws our attention to how the way one performs one’s prescribed job responsibilities can contribute to social transformation.

Emerging scholarship has sought to identify pathways into occupational activism. A common finding is that, due to their prior participation in social movements, many workers carry oppositional consciousness into the workplace, select into socially conscious jobs, and perform their jobs in transformative ways. Scholars have shown, for example, how some environmental activists have taken on jobs as sustainability managers at colleges and universities (Augustine and King, 2022); how graduates of the Nashville civil rights movement entered into jobs as organizers, managers, expressive workers, and governance workers, and subsequently worked to promote the desegregationist values and nonviolence praxis associated with the civil rights movement (Coley et al., 2022; Cornfield et al., 2019); and how participants in teacher walkouts have gone on to promote diversity, equity, and inclusion in their classrooms (Coley and Schachle, 2023).

Scholarship has also identified various “modes” of occupational activism. Occupational activism can be directed at one’s own workplace, as when workers marginalized on the basis of gender identity take redressive action to counter discrimination and promote norms of nondiscrimination in the workplace (Hutchinson et al., 2024). However, occupational activism can also promote values that emanate out of the workplace and into the broader society, as when medical practitioners work to promote and diffuse nonstigmatizing, weight-inclusive healthcare practices (Gomez, 2024).

Because the literature on occupational activism is still in its infancy, there is still much more we need to know about the reasons for, constraints on, and outcomes of workers’ occupational activism. This special issue of Work and Occupations will feature theoretically innovative and empirically rigorous research on occupational activism in and around workplaces and occupational communities. We welcome the use of theoretical frameworks from a variety of sociological subfields, as well as quantitative, qualitative, or mixed-methods approaches.

Topics of interest may include, but are not limited to:

– Pathways into occupational activism
– Characteristics of industries and workplaces that facilitate or stymie occupational activism
– Constraints on (or possibilities for) occupational activism based on workers’ race, class, sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, disability status, nationality, etc.
– Constraints on (or possibilities for) occupational activism based on occupational role (worker, manager, etc.)
– Impact of broader political context on occupational activism
– Types or “modes” of occupational activism
– Analyses of the occupational role of organizer
– Outcomes of occupational activism
– Explanations for differential success of occupational activism
– Measurement of occupational activism

Interested contributors should take note of the following timeline and submission instructions:

– Paper proposal. Submit a proposal article title and extended abstract (up to 500 words) by e- mail to wox.special.issue@gmail.com by September 1, 2024.
– Abstract acceptance. Authors of accepted proposals will be notified by September 15, 2024. Note that abstract acceptance does not constitute a guarantee of publication.

– Paper submission. Complete manuscript drafts are due by December 31, 2024.
– Peer review. The editors will send papers out for external review during the Spring 2025 semester. Contingent on reviews, authors will be given up to 3 months to revise their papers. – Publication. Articles will appear online first after acceptance and will subsequently be published in a special issue of 4-to-5 articles in late 2025 or early 2026.