Professional Knowledge and Social Mobility
Postwar Changes in the Knowledge-Base of Management Accounting
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 2375501 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Peter Armstrong (0009-0002-8439-0749, Management School, University of Sheffield, corresponding author) |
| Year | 1993 |
| Volume | 7 |
| Issue | 1 |
| Pages | 1-21 |
| Publication date | 1993-03-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Work Employment and Society (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0950-0170 • E-ISSN: 1469-8722 |
| Publisher | SAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.1177/095001709371001 |
| OpenAlex | W2078727765 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 3 |
| References cited | 32 |
The mutation of professional knowledge is a neglected issue in the sociology of the professions. Through an historical study of the qualification requirements of the Chartered Institute of Management Accountants (CIMA), this paper argues that upward social mobility for the subordinate managerial professions creates a tendency for their knowledge bases to expand into a common ground associated with senior management practice. The by-product is a tendency to abandon the function-specific knowledges associated with subordinate status. From the point of view of capitalist control techniques, there is a consequential tendency towards stagnation in the immediate means of labour process control. For the professions themselves, upward mobility involves a number of dilemmas. Firstly it implies that their knowledges will tend to overlap in the area of corporate management. Thus the managerial credibility of a professional knowledge is in tension with its secure possession. Secondly the inherent credentialism of professional mobility projects may be counter-productive in the context of a pragmatic management culture. Initially, CIMA sought to overcome the first dilemma by creating an elite grade of membership qualified to practice management accounting, whilst retaining the practice of cost accounting for the main grade. This attempt to divide the knowledge base of the profession failed because it involved the introduction of an examination which threatened the status of existing senior members. Subsequently the Institute has had to manage the tension between managerial credibility and distinctiveness within a single body of knowledge. In the sense that the Institute is now a large body with members in senior managerial positions, its collective mobility project has been a success. In the process, however, the distinctive features of its knowledge base have been eroded. Because of this and because the knowledges required of senior managers may be about to change, the Institute now feels itself to be under threat
Base (topology · Business · Context (archaeology · Credibility · Dilemma · Elite · Epistemology · Knowledge base · Knowledge management · Political science · Public relations · Reflexivity · Social science · Sociology · World Wide Web · Accounting and Organizational Management · Computer Science · Law · Management and Organizational Studies · Management Theory and Practice · Accounting
The Formation of Professions
The Rise of Professionalism
The System of Professions
Marxism and class theory
Power and poverty
On the Economic Identification of Social Classes
Sociological Approaches to Health and Medicine
The Audit of War
The Politics of Work and Occupations
Accountancy and the British Economy, 1840-1980
The Audit of War
Josiah Wedgwood and Cost Accounting in the Industrial Revolution
Indetermination
Professions and Powerlessness
Professions in the Current Context
Engineers, Management and Trust
Industrial Society
Sociological Approaches to the Professions
| Unique citing works | 2 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 0,11 |
| Citation span | 1999 - 2008 (10) |
| Citation velocity | historical |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 3 |