Coping with Contradictions — Tensions, Double Binds, and Hybrids

Abstract

So far, I have argued for and carefully described two contrasting discourses in creative knowledge work, which I named contractuality and authenticity respectively. Based on that analysis, the point of this final chapter is twofold. First, I wish to continue my commitment to empirical details by showing the variety of manager-employee dynamics which the co-existence of these two discourses can give rise to. Put differently, I will describe the discursive relation between contractuality and authenticity as it is played out when managers and employees attempt to align expectations and establish commitment with each other. This is meant as a correction to the line of literature suggesting that we are in a new “epoch” of post-bureaucracy or a new period of individualized, even narcissistic, modernity (cf. Chapter 1). I will show that there is no such sharp division between periods, and I will illustrate how new trends of self-realization and individualization co-exist with older trends of hierarchy and authority. Second, based on this empirical thoroughness, I wish to nuance some of the critical writings against the alleged pathological and exploitative effects of corporate culture and the societal and managerial focus on authenticity (again, cf. Chapter 1). Following the credo of late Foucault, I will argue that (and not least show how) power and freedom are two sides of the same coin.