This module outlines how the management of people is approached and understood within different cultural, economic and political contexts. It will review to what extent the meanings, strategies and practices of managing work and workers have changed over the last couple of decades. Particular emphasis is thereby placed on the exploration of the social, temporal and spatial dimensions of managing and regulating work within the organizational context and beyond.
Overall, the module aims to outline the organizational as well as individual challenges, ambiguities and complexities that are concomitant with current modes of managing workers and employees. We will cover topics such as bureaucratic and entrepreneurial forms of work organization, creative knowledge work and workers, employee subjectivity and identity, normative forms of power and control, as well as ethico-political aspects of contemporary management.