This article presents an exploratory account of how medical professionals understand the relationship between new technology and their professional identities. Drawing on interview data with senior surgeons from a variety of surgical disciplines, the article draws attention to how new technologies provide occasions for the evaluation of existing intra- and inter-professional relationships, and professional identity as a whole. In particular, the role of changing insider/outsider dynamics is emphasized, as is the importance of recognizing professional identity as in constant flux at micro-, meta- and macro-levels. The implications for existing theory are discussed, and further research questions identified.
Abbott A. ( 1988) The System of Professions: An Essay on the Division of Labor. Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press.
2.
Barley SR ( 1986) Technology as an occasion for structuring: Evidence from observations of CT scanners and the social order of radiology departments . Administrative Science Quarterly31(1): 78-108.
3.
Barley SR ( 1990) The alignment of technology and structure through roles and networks. Administrative Science Quarterly35(1): 61-103.
4.
Berg M. ( 1998) Order(s) and disorder(s): Of protocols and medical practices . In: Berg M, Mol A (eds) Differences in Medicine: Unraveling Practices, Techniques and Bodies. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 226-246.
5.
Berg M, Mol A (eds) (1998) Differences in Medicine: Unraveling Practices, Techniques and Bodies. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
6.
Boje DM ( 1995) Stories of the storytelling organization: A postmodern analysis of Disney as ‘Tamara-land’. Academy of Management Journal36(4): 997-1035.
7.
Bowker GC, Star SL ( 1999) Sorting Things Out: Classification and its Consequences . Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.
8.
Boyce ME ( 1996) Organizational story and storytelling: A critical review . Journal of Organizational Change Management9(5): 5-26.
9.
Bucher R., Strauss A. ( 1961) Professions in process. The American Journal of Sociology66(4): 325-334.
10.
Clarke A., Montini T. ( 1993) The many faces of RU486: Tales of situated knowledges and technological contestations. Science, Technology and Human Values18(1): 42-78.
11.
Corbin J., Strauss A. ( 1990) Grounded theory research: Procedures, canons, and evaluative criteria. Qualitative Sociology13: 3-21.
12.
Covaleski MA, Dirsmith MW, and Rittenberg L. ( 2003) Jurisdictional disputes over professional work: The institutionalization of the global knowledge expert. Accounting, Organizations and Society28(4): 323-355.
13.
Czarniawska-Joerges B. ( 1995) Narration or science? Collapsing the division in organization studies. Organization2(1): 11-33.
14.
Czarniawska-Joerges B. ( 1996) Changing times and accounts: Tales from an organizational field. In: Munro R, Mouritsen J (eds) Accountability: Power, Ethos and the Technologies of Managing. London: International Thomson Business Press, 307-328.
15.
Dawson P., Buchanan D. ( 2005) The way it really happened: Competing narratives in the political process of technological change. Human Relations58(7): 845-865.
16.
Dent M. ( 2000) Organization and change in renal work: A study of the impact of a computer system within two hospitals. Sociology of Health and Illness12(4): 413-431.
17.
Dopson S. ( 2005) The diffusion of medical innovations: Can figurational sociology contribute? Organization Studies26(8): 1125-1144.
18.
Dopson S., Fitzgerald L. ( 2005) The active role of context. In: Dopson S, Fitzgerald L (eds) Knowledge to Action? Evidence-based Health Care in Context. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 79-103.
19.
Elliott P. ( 1972) The Sociology of the Professions. New York: Macmillan.
20.
Elston MA ( 1991) The politics of professional power: Medicine in a changing health service. In: Gabe J, Calnan M, Bury M (eds) The Sociology of the Health Service. London: Routledge, 58-88.
21.
Ferlie E., Fitzgerald L., Wood M., and Hawkins C. ( 2005) The nonspread of innovations: The mediating role of professionals . Academy of Management Journal48(1): 117-134.
22.
Fitzgerald L., Dopson S. ( 2005) Professional boundaries and the diffusion of innovation . In: Dopson S, Fitzgerald L (eds) Knowledge to Action? Evidence-based Health Care in Context. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 104-131.
23.
Fitzgerald L., Ferlie E. ( 2000) Professionals: Back to the future? Human Relations53(5): 713-739.
24.
Fitzgerald L., Ferlie E., Wood M., and Hawkins C. ( 2002) Interlocking interactions: The diffusion of innovations in health care. Human Relations55(12): 1429-1449.
25.
Fournier V. ( 2000) Boundary work and the (un)making of the professions. In: Malin N (ed.) Professionalism, Boundaries and the Workplace. London: Routledge, 67-86.
26.
Fox NJ ( 1994) Anaesthetists, the discourse on patient fitness and the organization of surgery. Sociology of Health and Illness16(1): 1-18.
27.
Freidson E. ( 1984) The changing nature of professional control. Annual Review of Sociology10: 1-20.
28.
Gabriel Y. ( 1991) Turning facts into stories and stories into facts: A hermeneutic exploration of organizational folklore. Human Relations44(8): 857-875.
29.
Glaser BG, Strauss AL ( 1967) The Discovery of Grounded Theory: Strategies for Qualitative Research. Chicago, IL: Aldine Publishing .
30.
Hafferty FW, Light DW ( 1995) Professional dynamics and the changing nature of medical work. Journal of Health and Social Behavior35 (Extra Issue: Forty Years of Medical Sociology): 132-153.
31.
Halpern SA ( 1992) Dynamics of professional control: Internal coalitions and crossprofessional boundaries. The American Journal of Sociology97(4): 994-1021.
32.
Heath C., Luff P., and Svensson MS ( 2003) Technology and medical practice. Sociology of Health and Illness25 (Silver Anniversary Issue): 75-96.
33.
Hoff TJ, McCaffrey DP ( 1996) Adapting, resisting, and negotiating: How physicians cope with organizational and economic change. Work and Occupations23(2): 165-189.
34.
Huckman RS, Pisano GP ( 2005) Turf battles in coronary revascularization. New England Journal of Medicine352(9): 857-859.
35.
Hughes TP ( 1987) The evolution of large technological systems. In: Bijker WE, Hughes TP, Pinch TJ (eds) The Social Construction of Technological Systems. New Directions in the Sociology and History of Technology. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 51-82.
36.
Isabella LA ( 1990) Evolving interpretations as a change unfolds: How managers construe key organizational events. Academy of Management Journal33(1): 7-41.
37.
Lamont M., Molnar V. ( 2002) The study of boundaries in the social sciences. Annual Review of Sociology28: 167-95.
38.
Lang PO, Schwarze ML, and Alexander GC ( 2005) New technologies meeting old professional boundaries: The emergence of carotid artery stenting. Journal of the American College of Surgeons200(6): 854-860.
39.
Larkin GV ( 1983) Occupational Monopoly and Modern Medicine. London: Tavistock Publications.
40.
Larson MS ( 1977) The Rise of Professionalism: A Sociological Analysis. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.
41.
Locke K. ( 1996) Rewriting The Discovery of Grounded Theory after 25 years ? Journal of Management Inquiry5(3): 239-245.
42.
Locke K. ( 2001) Grounded Theory in Management Research. London: SAGE.
43.
Locock L., Dopson S., Chambers D., and Gabbay J. ( 2001) Understanding the role of opinion leaders in improving clinical effectiveness. Social Science & Medicine53(6): 745-757.
44.
Lowy I. ( 1993) Introduction: Medicine and change. In: Lowy I (ed.) Medicine and Change: Historical and Sociological Studies of Medical Innovation. Montrouge : Editions John Libbey Eurotext, 1-19.
45.
Lupton D. ( 1997) Doctors on the medical profession. Sociology of Health and Illness19(4): 480-497.
46.
Macdonald KM ( 1995) The Sociology of the Professions. London: SAGE.
47.
Martin GP, Currie G., and Finn R. ( 2009) Reconfiguring or reproducing intra-professional boundaries? Specialist expertise, generalist knowledge and the ‘modernization’ of the medical work-force. Social Science & Medicine68(7): 1191-1198.
48.
May C., Gask L., Atkinson T., Ellis N., Mair F., and Esmail A. ( 2000) Resisting and promoting new technologies in clinical practice: The case of telepsychiatry. Social Science & Medicine52(12): 1889-1901.
49.
McKinlay J. ( 1982) Toward the proletarianisation of physicians. In: Derber C (ed.) Professionals at Work. Boston, MA: GK Hall, 37-62.
50.
McKinlay JB, Arches J. ( 1985) Towards the proletarianization of physicians. International Journal of Health Service15(2): 161-195.
51.
McKinlay JB, Stoekle JD ( 1988) Corporatization and the social transformation of doctoring . International Journal of Health Services18(2): 191-205.
52.
McLaughlin J., Webster A. ( 1998) Rationalising knowledge: IT systems, professional identities and power. The Sociological Review46(4): 781-802.
53.
Mol A. ( 1993) What is new? Doppler and its others: An empirical philosophy of innovations. In: Lowy I (ed.) Medicine and Change: Historical and Sociological Studies of Medical Innovation . Montrouge: Editions John Libbey Eurotext, 107-123.
54.
Nancarrow SA, Borthwick AM ( 2005) Dynamic professional boundaries in the healthcare work-force . Sociology of Health and Illness27(7): 897-919.
55.
Norris P. ( 2001) How ‘we’ are different from ‘them’: Occupational boundary maintenance in the treatment of musculo-skeletal problems . Sociology of Health and Illness23(1): 24-43.
56.
O’Leary M. ( 2003) From paternalism to cynicism: Narratives of a newspaper company. Human Relations56(6): 685-704.
57.
Orlikowski WJ ( 1992) The duality of technology: Rethinking the concept of technology in organization. Organization Science3(3): 398-427.
58.
Orlikowski WJ ( 2000) Using technology and constituting structures: A practice lens for studying technology in organizations. Organization Science11(4): 404-428.
59.
Ovretveit J. ( 1985) Medical dominance and the development of professional autonomy in physiotherapy. Sociology of Health and Illness7(1): 76-93.
60.
Pasveer B. ( 1989) Knowledge of shadows: The introduction of X-ray images in medicine. Sociology of Health and Illness11(4): 360-381.
61.
Rhodes C., Brown AD ( 2005) Narrative, organizations and research. International Journal of Management Reviews7(3): 167-188.
62.
Sanders T., Harrison S. ( 2008) Professional legitimacy claims in the multidisciplinary workplace: The case of heart failure care. Sociology of Health and Illness30(2): 289-308.
63.
Scarbrough H., Swan JA, Laurent S., Bresnen M., Edelman L., and Newell S. ( 2004) Project-based learning and the role of learning boundaries . Organization Studies25(9): 1579-1600.
64.
Spicer A. ( 2005) The political process of inscribing a new technology. Human Relations58(7): 867-890.
65.
Starr P. ( 1982) The Social Transformation of American Medicine. New York: Basic Books.
66.
Stevens F., van der Horst F., Nijhuis F., and Bours S. ( 2000) The division of labour in vision care: Professional competence in a system of professions. Sociology of Health and Illness22(4): 431-452.
67.
Strauss AL, Corbin JM ( 1998) Basics of Qualitative Research: Techniques and Procedures for Developing Grounded Theory. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE.
68.
Suchman L. ( 1994) Working relations of technology production and use. Computer Supported Cooperative Work2(1-2): 21-39.
69.
Suddaby R. ( 2006) From the editors: What grounded theory is not. Academy of Management Journal49(4): 633-642.
70.
Timmermans S. ( 2002) The cause of death vs. the gift of life: Boundary maintenance and the politics of expertise in death investigation. Sociology of Health and Illness24(5): 550-574.
71.
Timmermans S., Berg M. ( 2003) The practice of medical technology. Sociology of Health and Illness25 (Silver Anniversary Issue): 97-114.
72.
Timmons S., Tanner J. ( 2004) A disputed occupational boundary: Operating theatre nurses and operating department practitioners. Sociology of Health and Illness26(5): 645-666.
73.
Tjora AH ( 2000) The technological mediation of the nursing-medical boundary . Sociology of Health and Illness22(6): 721-741.
74.
Will CM ( 2005) Arguing about the evidence: Readers, writers and inscription devices in coronary heart disease risk assessment. Sociology of Health and Illness27(6): 780-801.
75.
Zetka JR ( 2001) Occupational divisions of labor and their technology politics: The case of surgical scopes and gastrointestinal medicine. Social Forces79(4): 1495-1520.
