Work and imaginaries of self-improvement

Anette Hallin (), Christoffer Andersson (), Lucia Crevani (), Caroline Ingvarsson (), Chris Ivory (), Inti Lammi (), Eva Lindell () and Anna Uhlin ()

Chapter 5 in Creating the Future of Work, 2025, pp 87-107 from Edward Elgar Publishing

Abstract: Chapter 5 addresses work and imaginaries of self-improvement. These imaginaries are not only about how we could, or should, go about improving our bodies and our minds; they also rest on the idea that the human self can be improved in all aspects, and that becoming better is always possible and desirable, both when it comes to work and private life. Central to these imaginaries is the idea that all work can and should be measured and evaluated, and there is a growing abundance of digital technologies to support this. In the chapter, we discuss how these imaginaries assume homogeneous measurable humans, work, and performance in a way that risks suppressing reflection and exploration.

Keywords: Self-improvement; Measurability; Industry 4.0; MES-system; EPM-systems; The never-enough principle; Meaningful (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
ISBN: 9781035324477
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.elgaronline.com/doi/10.4337/9781035324484.00009 (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:elg:eechap:22931_5

Ordering information: This item can be ordered from
http://www.e-elgar.com

Access Statistics for this chapter

More chapters in Chapters from Edward Elgar Publishing
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Darrel McCalla ().