Changing the subject: putting labour into public relations research

Abstract

In this article, I argue for a public relations research agenda which places new divisions of labour and worker subjectivities at the centre. While communication technology may be facilitating greater work flexibility, research is needed into how work processes interact with broader inequality regimes, producing new discourses and possibilities for resistance among public relations practitioners. I discuss the benefits of sociological frameworks which position work as a central organising process through which power relations are constructed and maintained. I then propose that Bourdieu’s theory of habitus complements Glucksmann’s ‘Total Social Organisation of Labour’ (TSOL) framework, combining a focus on power relations within a field with a feminist analysis of new divisions and processes of labour. After briefly discussing cultural and public relations scholarship which problematises work from a critical perspective, I conclude by framing a critical feminist public relations research agenda on labour, which utilises Bourdieuvian theory and Glucksmann’s TSOL.