Professionalization

Professionalization is the social process by which any trade or occupation transforms itself into a true "profession of the highest integrity and competence." [cite web |last=Nilsson |first= Henrik |title= Professionalism, Lecture 5, What is a Profession? |publisher=University of Nottingham |date=undated| url=http://www.cs.nott.ac.uk/~nhn/G52GRP/LectureNotes/lecture05-4up.pdf |accessdate=2007-08-05|format=PDF] This process tends to involve establishing acceptable qualifications, a professional body or association to oversee the conduct of members of the profession and some degree of demarcation of the qualified from unqualified amateurs. This creates "a hierarchical divide between the knowledge-authorities in the professions and a deferential citizenry." [http://polaris.gseis.ucla.edu/pagre/conservatism.html "What Is Conservatism and What Is Wrong with It?" Philip E. Agre, August 2004] This demarcation is often termed "occupational closure", [http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/cgi-bin/resolve?id=doi:10.1086/344121&erFrom=-9070006284381187248Guest Kim A. Weeden, "Why Do Some Occupations Pay More than Others? Social Closure and Earnings Inequality in the United States," American Journal of Sociology, 108, 2001, pp.55–101] [http://soc.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/24/4/675 Anne Witz, "Patriarchy and Professions: The Gendered Politics of Occupational Closure," Sociology, 24.4, 1990, pp.675-690] [http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/routledg/cgee/2003/00000015/00000001/art00004 S. A. L. Cavanagh, "The Gender of Professionalism and Occupational Closure: the management of tenure-related disputes by the 'Federation of Women Teachers' Associations of Ontario' 1918-1949," Gender and Education, 15.1, March 2003, pp. 39-57] [http://www.eric.ed.gov/ERICWebPortal/custom/portlets/recordDetails/detailmini.jsp?_nfpb=true&_&ERICExtSearch_SearchValue_0=EJ422280&ERICExtSearch_SearchType_0=eric_accno&accno=EJ422280 Karen Mahony & Brett Van Toen, "Mathematical Formalism as a Means of Occupational Closure in Computing--Why "Hard" Computing Tends to Exclude Women," Gender and Education, 2.3, 1990, pp.319-31] as it means that the profession then becomes closed to entry from outsiders, amateurs and the unqualified: a stratified occupation "defined by professional demarcation and grade." [http://careerfocus.bmj.com/cgi/content/full/328/7431/s19 Rhona Macdonald, "The Hospital at Night," British Medical Jnl, 2004] The origin of this process is said to have been with guilds during the Middle Ages, when they fought for exclusive rights to practice their trades as journeymen, and to engage unpaid apprentices. [see Benton, 1985]

Professions also possess power, [see Johnson, 1972] prestige, high income, high status and privileges; [http://64.233.183.104/search?q=cache:3bUoc0ranJ0J:www.usca.edu/essays/vol62003/tinsley.pdf+professional+esteem&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=9&gl=uk Ron Tinsley & James C Hardy, "Faculty Pressures and Professional Self-Esteem: Life in Texas Teacher Education."] [http://www.rcpath.org/index.asp?PageID=28 Royal College of Pathologists, "The role of the College and benefits of membership," 16 Dec 2005] their members soon come to comprise an elite class of people, cut off to some extent from the common people, and occupying an elevated station in society: "a narrow elite...a hierarchical social system: a system of ranked orders and classes." [http://polaris.gseis.ucla.edu/pagre/conservatism.html "What Is Conservatism and What Is Wrong with It?" Philip E. Agre, August 2004]

The professionalization process tends to establish the group norms of conduct and qualification of members of a profession and tends also to insist that members of the profession achieve "conformity to the norm." [http://ndpr.nd.edu/review.cfm?id=4281 Steven Hetcher, "Norms in a Wired World, Cambridge University Press, 2004, 432pp, Reviewed by Stefan Sciaraffa," University of Arizona] [http://www.medialens.org/bookshop/guardians_of_power.php David Edwards and David Cromwell, "Guardians of Power: The Myth of the Liberal Media," Medialens, 2005, Ch. 11] and abide more or less strictly with the established procedures and any agreed code of conduct, which is policed by professional bodies, for "accreditation assures conformity to general expectations of the profession." [http://www.acpe-accredit.org/deans/accreditation.asp "Introduction to the Professional Degree Program Accreditation Process," Accreditation Council for Pharmacy Education, Chicago]

References

Bibliography

*Andrew Delano Abbott, "The System of Professions: Essay on the Division of Expert Labour", Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1988
*Benton JF. (1985) "Trotula, women's problems, and the professionalization of medicine in the Middle Ages," Bulletin of Historical Medicine 1985 Spring;59(1):30-53.
*Jeffrey L. Berlant, "Profession and Monopoly: A Study of Medicine in the United States and Great Britain", Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1975. (ISBN 0-520-02734-5)
*Charlotte G. Borst, "Catching Babies: Professionalization of Childbirth, 1870-1920," Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1995
*Eliot Freidson, "Profession of Medicine: A Study of the Sociology of Applied Knowledge", Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1970
*Merle Jacobs and Stephen, E Bosanac, "The Professionalization of Work," Whitby, ON: de Sitter Publications, 2006
*Terence James Johnson, "Professions and Power", (Study in Sociology Series), London: Palgrave Macmillan, 1972
*Alice Beck Kehoe, Mary Beth Emmerichs, and Alfred Bendiner, "Assembling the Past: Studies in the Professionalization of Archaeology," University of New Mexico Press, 2000, ISBN 9780826319395.
*Gary R. Lowe and P.Nelson Reid, "The Professionalization of Poverty: Social Work and the Poor in the Twentieth Century (Modern Applications of Social Work)," Aldine de Gruyter, 1999
*Keith M. Macdonald, "The Sociology of the Professions", London: Sage Publications Ltd, 1995
*Linda Reeser, Linda Cherrey, and Irwin Epstein, "Professionalization and Activism in Social Work," Columbia University Press, 1990, ISBN 0231067887
*Patricia M. Schwirian, "Professionalization of Nursing: Current Issues and Trends," Philadelphia: Lippencott, 1998, ISBN 0781710456
*Howard M Vollmer, and D L Mills, "Professionalization," New Jersey: Prentice Hall, 1966
*Anne Witz, "Professions and Patriarchy," London: Routledge, 1992
*Donald Wright, "The Professionalization of History in English," Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2005

External links

* [http://www.um.es/ESA/Abstracts/Abst_rn15.htm Article abstracts on this theme]
* [http://www.valt.helsinki.fi/esa/profe.htm ESA research network on sociology of professions]
* [http://www.abdn.ac.uk/public_health/3rdyearreadlist.shtml University of Aberdeen reading list: Sociology of Professions]
* [http://csi.sagepub.com/current.dtl An issue of "Current Sociology" devoted to this topic]
* [http://www.sagepub.com/booksProdDesc.nav?prodId=Book203621 A short review of the book by Keith MacDonald]
* [http://www.ofm.gov.on.ca/english/Certification/Professionalization%20Process/default.asp The Professionalization Process for the Ontario Fire Service]
* [http://faculty.css.edu/tboone2/asep/FLDR/pro1a.html Professionalization of Exercise Physiology online journal]
* [http://www.ifla.org/IV/ifla63/63dask.htm Women as Managers of Libraries: A Developmental Process in India ]
* [http://www.cfc-efc.ca/docs/cafrp/00000284.htm Prestige, Power, Recognition & Respect in Canadian Child Care]
* [http://www.acebo.com/papers/profslzn.htm The Professionalization of Community Interpreting]
* [http://www.acpe-accredit.org/deans/accreditation.asp Aspects of the profession of Pharmacy]