The Emancipation of Career

A pioneering analysis of career’s evolving role in contemporary society, presenting a vision for its redefinition as a democratic concept to empower futures.

A groundbreaking analysis of the place of career within contemporary societies and an argument for how this concept can be repurposed as a democratic concept that can support people in imagining a better future. 

'My hope is that, after reading this book, you will find that the emancipation of careers is not merely a utopian dream but, in many ways, an existing reality and therefore a feasible project for individuals, communities, institutions and societies to pursue."

Sanna Toiviainen, Associate Professor, University of South-Eastern Norway

This fascinating research monograph offers a new and comprehensive analysis of how career:

• emerged as a social category
• can be more rigorously theorised to support future analysis, and
• can be reconceptualised to support new forms of living and working.

Tristram Hooley and Rie Thomsen explore the concept of career in contemporary society and sociology, establishing career as an explanatory category for critical social analysis. They argue that the concept of career can also form part of a project of personal and societal emancipation.

Drawing on historical, sociological and psychological evidence, the authors describe the evolution of the career concept since the industrial revolution. They then go on to examine the contemporary environment for careers within the current crisis of capitalism. This prompts them to consider how career can support people to rethink their lives and what they derive meaning from, imagine better worlds, and develop new forms of society.

To date, research on career has largely confined itself to particular strands: the experience of the individual and how to support career development, the organisation or, more rarely, how career fits into political economy and ideal society. This ground-breaking book brings these strands together to develop a new theory of career.