Playing the Game: Strategies of Resistance and Co‐optation in Diversity Work

Abstract

The article addresses diversity work as a specific form of management work that involves complex micro-political strategies of resistance. Diversity work stems from an activist agenda that has been adopted by mainstream management practice, especially new public sector management. But in being adopted, it has been critiqued for also being co-opted, and as a result de-radicalized. The article seeks to examine this critique. First, we examine the politics of diversity, discussing critiques of diversity work from political theory and referencing femocrats, an earlier movement affecting women in management. Secondly, we recognize that the ambivalence of diversity work can be understood in terms of co-optation and resistance. Here our central contribution is to understand these two processes in a much more nuanced way, drawing on our own and other organizational studies of diversity work in practice. We locate this more nuanced analysis of diversity work in the emergent context of new public sector management. We draw attention to three micro-practices that help to exhibit a complex understanding of co-optation and resistance: (a) discursive resources, (b) embodied resources and (c) management technologies as resources. Finally, we conclude by outlining the article's contribution: extending Meyerson and Scully's notion of the tempered radical in four key ways. We do this by emphasizing the importance of the specificities of occupational resources of resistance, arguing that resources of resistance move beyond the discursive, emphasizing the gendered, classed and racialized variegated nature of insider/outsider dynamics and finally, stressing that co-optation and resistance are temporal, dynamic, intermingled processes in diversity work.

Agents for Change and Changed Agents: The Micro‐politics of Change and Feminism in the Academy

“…We argue, therefore, that more specific analysis is needed at the micro-political level. Currently the politics of micropractices in context is under-investigated (see also Swan and Fox, 2010) but, as several authors suggest (e.g. Davies, 2005a and2005b;Barry et al, 2007), the politics of daily practices of resistance has significant potential for change, at least at the institutional or organisational level.…”

Towards a Performative Theory of Resistance: Senior Managers and Revolting Subject(ivitie)s

“…We are thus analysing the micro-politics that are the focus of feminist theorists of resistance (Swan & Fox, 2010). Defined as resistance at the level of meaning, identity or subjectivity (Thomas, Mills & Mills, 2004), at its centre is a 'quest for the achievement of a positive sense of self' (Dick, 2015, p. 29).…”

Att skapa drivkrafter för lärande och förändring : En studie om jämställdhetsintegrering och dess förutsättningar i en kommun

“…Andra risker med mätning och krav på kvantifierbara mått och målstyrning är att frågor om makt och rättvisa riskerar att förbises i arbetet (Walby 2005;Wittbom 2009). Samtidigt menar andra forskare att betoningen på mätbarhet, evidens och faktabaserad utveckling skulle kunna innebära att jämställdhetsexperter och genusforskare ges tillträde till tidigare könsblinda områden (Swan & Fox 2010). Att mäta eller inte mäta, fokus på resultat eller process, är genuina dilemman i jämställdhetsintegreringsarbete.…”