Engaged yet excluded

The processual, dispersed, and political dynamics of boundary work

Bibliographic Data

ID9890844
AuthorsLudo Glimmerveen (0000-0002-4015-0025, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, corresponding author), Sierk Ybema (0000-0003-4957-8906, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Netherlands and Anglia Ruskin University, UK, corresponding author), Henk Nies (0000-0003-3897-206X, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam & Vilans, Netherlands, corresponding author)
Year2020
Volume73
Issue11
Pages1504-1536
Publication date2020-11-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueHuman Relations (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0018-7267 • E-ISSN: 1741-282X
PublisherSAGE Publications (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1177/0018726719875494
OpenAlexW2981786186
LanguageEN
Citations received14
References cited43

What happens when people try to ‘transcend’ organizational boundaries and engage with so-called outsiders? Current boundary-work literature does not fully account for the processual, dispersed, and political dynamics triggered by such efforts. To address this shortcoming, this article builds on an ethnographic study of a professional care provider’s attempts to engage local citizens within one of its care homes. We analyze how actors negotiate the parameters of outsider engagement – that is, how they interactively (re-)erect and (re-)efface boundaries between actors (Who is engaged?), issues (What is their engagement about?), and positions of authority (Does local engagement affect central decision-making?). We contribute to extant theorizing by, first, explicitly scrutinizing boundary work’s temporal and spatial dynamics. Testifying to the importance of analyzing temporal sequences, we show how attempts at transcending boundaries intensified boundary work on multiple organizational platforms. Paradoxically, inclusionary efforts evoked exclusionary effects (and vice versa) as actors came to contest and, eventually, redefine ‘appropriate’ insider–outsider relations. Second, our analysis highlights how the political effectiveness of an inclusive and non-hierarchical approach still, ironically, depends on ongoing hierarchical support and managerial enforcement. Third, our article makes a case for the adoption of long-term, multi-sited methodologies when studying the everyday dynamics of boundary-work processes

Boundary (topology · Boundary-work · CONTEST · Dynamics (music · Epistemology · Ethnography · Extant taxon · Insider · Negotiation · Political science · Politics · Public relations · Social science · Sociology · Work (physics · Emotional Labor in Professions · Employment and Welfare Studies · Law · Management and Organizational Studies

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