Abstract:
The main claim that I aim to substantiate in this
article is that power in the form of control is exerted
in a more insidious manner now that knowledge
work has become ‘networked’. To this end, I first
describe societal control in the current epoch. Given
the fact that my focus is on knowledge work, I next
revisit the human capital literature with the aim of
coming to a more precise understanding of what
knowledge work is. The literature on “leveraging
human capital” (Burud and Tumolo 2004) evidences
how human capital theory draws on the conditions
of free-floating control to optimally capitalise on
knowledge workers. Models of overt management
have come to be replaced by more expansive and
insidious models of control that extend beyond the
sphere of work into the intimate recesses of private
life. Control operative at the societal level (Castells
1996) extends beyond the macro-level (neoliberal),
to the meso-level (organisational), and the microlevel (self-governance). Next, I critically consider
the implications of these conditions of control for
the (self-)governance of the knowledge worker
by drawing on Han’s (2017) further specification of
control as “smart power”. I come to the conclusion
that under the conditions of apparently greater
autonomy and discretion that is so pervasive in
the management literature discussing knowledge
workers, governance as “control” induces constant
work erasing the boundaries between work and
private life. Neoliberalism with its mantra of
investment in human capital has succeeded in producing an optimally efficient, ever-working subject. Throughout my analyses
are informed by Foucault’s (2008) concept of “governmentality”, which fuses
the presiding rationality (knowledge) with governance (power as control)
to throw light on how human conduct is being conducted (orchestrated) for
optimal efficiency.
