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Organizations and their consumers: Bridging work and consumption

Gabriel, Yiannis LU ; Korczynski, Marek and Rieder, Kerstin (2015) In Organization 22(5). p.629-643
Abstract
The last 20 years or so have seen a far-reaching reconfiguration of the characters that dominate the world of organizations. For much of its life, the study of organizations was dominated by two central characters, the manager and the worker, whose relationship with all its tensions, conflicts and accommodations unfolded with within a broader environment of markets, governments, shareholders, social institutions, technological forces and so forth. In recent years, however, there has been a substantial movement to change the two-actor show into a three-actor show, the organizational dyad into a triad. The newcomer to the stage has been the consumer, a character whose whims, habits, desires and practices are no longer seen as impacting on'... (More)
The last 20 years or so have seen a far-reaching reconfiguration of the characters that dominate the world of organizations. For much of its life, the study of organizations was dominated by two central characters, the manager and the worker, whose relationship with all its tensions, conflicts and accommodations unfolded with within a broader environment of markets, governments, shareholders, social institutions, technological forces and so forth. In recent years, however, there has been a substantial movement to change the two-actor show into a three-actor show, the organizational dyad into a triad. The newcomer to the stage has been the consumer, a character whose whims, habits, desires and practices are no longer seen as impacting on' the activities of managers and workers from the outside, but increasingly as defining them. This introduction to the Special Issue on Organizations and their Consumers' examines the ramifications of the rise of the consumer and the hegemony of global markets for (1) the nature of organizations and their management, (2) the employees and the labour process and (3) the consumers themselves as they increasingly find themselves doing work, usually unpaid, on behalf of organizations. (Less)
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author
; and
organization
publishing date
type
Contribution to journal
publication status
published
subject
keywords
working customer, prosumer, post-Fordism, organizations-as-brands, organization, normative controls, labour process, customer-oriented-bureaucracy, crowdsourcing, Consumer
in
Organization
volume
22
issue
5
pages
629 - 643
publisher
SAGE Publications
external identifiers
  • wos:000360394600001
  • scopus:84940051778
ISSN
1350-5084
DOI
10.1177/1350508415586040
language
English
LU publication?
yes
id
a9f9379e-a984-4341-ab10-6fbfcfd409ae (old id 7964881)
date added to LUP
2016-04-01 14:14:00
date last changed
2022-03-21 23:00:57
@misc{a9f9379e-a984-4341-ab10-6fbfcfd409ae,
  abstract     = {{The last 20 years or so have seen a far-reaching reconfiguration of the characters that dominate the world of organizations. For much of its life, the study of organizations was dominated by two central characters, the manager and the worker, whose relationship with all its tensions, conflicts and accommodations unfolded with within a broader environment of markets, governments, shareholders, social institutions, technological forces and so forth. In recent years, however, there has been a substantial movement to change the two-actor show into a three-actor show, the organizational dyad into a triad. The newcomer to the stage has been the consumer, a character whose whims, habits, desires and practices are no longer seen as impacting on' the activities of managers and workers from the outside, but increasingly as defining them. This introduction to the Special Issue on Organizations and their Consumers' examines the ramifications of the rise of the consumer and the hegemony of global markets for (1) the nature of organizations and their management, (2) the employees and the labour process and (3) the consumers themselves as they increasingly find themselves doing work, usually unpaid, on behalf of organizations.}},
  author       = {{Gabriel, Yiannis and Korczynski, Marek and Rieder, Kerstin}},
  issn         = {{1350-5084}},
  keywords     = {{working customer; prosumer; post-Fordism; organizations-as-brands; organization; normative controls; labour process; customer-oriented-bureaucracy; crowdsourcing; Consumer}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  number       = {{5}},
  pages        = {{629--643}},
  publisher    = {{SAGE Publications}},
  series       = {{Organization}},
  title        = {{Organizations and their consumers: Bridging work and consumption}},
  url          = {{http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/1350508415586040}},
  doi          = {{10.1177/1350508415586040}},
  volume       = {{22}},
  year         = {{2015}},
}