Suchergebnisse

This paper examines the similarities and variations in the professional and work organisation of nursing in Greece and Poland. It evaluates the evidence of "convergence" as opposed to "embeddedness" in the professional and gendered organisation of nursing in these two countries. The feminised character of nursing is discussed, in relation to the family within the configuration of health‐care services. This issue also relates to the clientelistic relations and familialism that pervade health‐care delivery in both countries – although for different historical and cultural reasons – and which reflect and reinforce patriarchical relations within these societies.

This article examines the changing configuration of professional-management relations within the English health service, focusing on hospital doctors and managers. It draws on a case study of a hospital apparently under threat of closure during a period when management is pursuing a policy of attempting to rationalize medical work, for example, by expanding day surgery. At the same time, the strategies of medical staff for the defence of their professional interests are also explored. The usefulness of rhetoric, irony and actor-network theory for the analysis of the threatened hospital closure and the implications for professional-managerial relations is explored within the broader context of `governmentality' (Foucault).