Return to Judgement

Mats Alvesson is Professor at the University of Bath, Lund University and City University of London.Dennis Nørmark is an anthropologist, author and speaker.

• 1. How It Used to be Simpler2. Excess of Professional Administrators and Knowledge Workers3. The Colonization of the Lifeworld4. The Rise of Managerialism and the Decline of Productivity5. A World of Imperfections and Vulnerabilities6. The New Unfreedom7. The (False?) Need for Regulation and Improvement8. Judgement as the Key Principle9. Post-Infantilized Management10. Conclusion and Perspectives

'At work, do you feel encompassed by rules, regulations, by digital disciplining that seems pointless, by being advised to conform to standards, procedures, policies, rubrics and much else that seem to be systematic traps for ensnaring your time and diminishing your autonomy as a person? You’re not alone. Alvesson and Nørmark have written a book that demonstrates this clearly. The existential state they describe is one in which there is an excess of "post-infantilized management" treating knowledgeable and capable adults as if dim-witted children. Kant prefigured enlightenment as liberation from the deadweight of pointless traditions and rituals; today careers are generated in creating increasingly more "modern" rituals of unfreedom from which only our minds, ourselves, can liberate us, by thinking thoughtfully, cultivating maturity and taking responsibility in organizations designed to encourage rather than diminish these features of being a competent person.' Stewart Clegg, University of Sydney