Power is knowledge? (In)visible conflicts within contemporary professionalism

Christiane Schnell

Chapter 6 in Research Handbook on the Sociology of the Professions, 2025, pp 77-90 from Edward Elgar Publishing

Abstract: While questioning the authority of the established professions was once associated with the hope for democratisation and overcoming paternalism, actually the power relations in the field of professional work did not diminish during the last decades. Obviously, the concept of monopolizing societally relevant knowledge fell into crisis in the era of neoliberalism, but thereafter control over the means of production of information and knowledge, and in particular, the new gatekeeper of financialized capitalism, gained in importance. Referring to three fields of professional work – journalism, cancer medicine, and the multi-professionally operated European Central Bank – invisible and manifest contradictions, disparities, and power struggles of contemporary professionalism will be discussed to reconstruct a reversal of the nexus between knowledge and power.

Keywords: Contemporary professionalism; Knowledge-power nexus; Polycrisis; Journalism; Cancer medicine; European Central Bank (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
ISBN: 9781035323074
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