Emotional Economic Man

Power and Emotion in the Corporate World

Bibliographic Data

ID2370171
AuthorsDaniel P Andrade (0000-0002-5668-0813, Fundação Getulio Vargas, corresponding author)
Year2015
Volume41
Issue4-5
Pages785-805
Publication date2015-07-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueCritical Sociology (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0896-9205 • E-ISSN: 1569-1632
PublisherSAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1177/0896920513497376
OpenAlexW2135859019
LanguageEN
Citations received10
References cited19

This article maps out the genealogy of the anthropological concept of emotional economic man, which emerged in the 1990s tied to the concept of emotional capital. Analysis of the discourse about emotional capital in management and neoliberal economics explains how economic man is linked to emotions and how the management of emotional capital creates an emotional power (or 'pathospower') that is manifested in three main corporate dispositifs: emotional intelligence, organizational culture and the commercialization of experiences. These power dispositifs have led to unprecedented cohesiveness in the construction of workers' and consumers' emotional lives, introducing the management logos as rationality over emotions. Emotions are converted into a vehicle through which power penetrates bodies and subjectivities, sustains active economic conducts, imposes corporate goals for life and disseminates the logic of capital. This emotional power is part of the history of the ways that people feel in contemporary societies

Economic power · Economic system · Economics · Emotion work · Emotional intelligence · Emotional labor · Logos Bible Software · Political economy · Political science · Politics · Rationality · Sociology · Emotional Labor in Professions · Emotions and Moral Behavior · History · Law · Management and Organizational Studies · Psychology · Social Psychology