FREE ESSAY ON CRITIQUE OF ANDREW ABBOTT

CRITIQUE OF ANDREW ABBOTT

Part A: Summary
Introduction:
Andrew Abbott's book, The System of Professions: An Essay on the Division of Expert
Labour contains a mix of comparative historical analysis and current evaluation, which is
assembled within an analytical model that looks at professions from the viewpoint of
their jurisdictions, the tasks they do, the expert knowledge needed for those tasks, and
how competitive forces internally and externally work to change both the jurisdictions
and the tasks. Abbott attempts to show that professions are interdependent systems,
containing internal structures. He accomplishes this task by means of analyzing the
emergence of modern professions and their relationships with each other cooperatively and
competitively.
Section I: Work, Jurisdiction, and Competition
Abbott's book takes on an individualistic direction in its inception then moves to a more
systematic view of professions. Modern studies of formal professions began with the rise
of the discipline of social sciences in the 19th century. In the beginning, scholars
debated about the theoretical interpretations of professionalism. There was a split
between proponents of functionalist and monopolistic approaches. However, academics on
both sides agreed, "that a profession was an occupational group with some special skill"
(Abbott 1988: 7). Abbott mentions that there have been four different perspectives that
have sought to interpret professionalization, a functional, structural, monopolistic, and
a cultural view.
Abbott states that the tasks of professions are to provide expert service to amend human
problems (Abbott 1988: 33). These problems can be objective, in that they originate
naturally or through technological imperatives. Problems can also be subjective, whereby
they are imposed by society or a culture either from the present or past. Abbott argues
that the "real difference between the objective and subjective qualities of problems is a
difference in amenability to cultural work" (Abbott 1988: 36). Abbott outlines that there
are several types of objective foundations for professional tasks. Some being
technological, some organizational, other sources of objective qualities lay in natural
objects and facts, while others came from slow-changing cultural structures. Abbott also
argues that a "profession is always vulnerable to changes in the objective character of
its central tasks" (Abbott 1988: 39). Besides the objective qualities, professional tasks
also have subjective qualities, which make them susceptible to change. Unlike objective
tasks, change does not come from the vagaries of external forces, but from the
"activities of other professions impinge[ing] on the subjective qualities (Abbott 1988:
39). 
According to Abbott, three acts helped to embody the cultural logic of professional
practice. The three subjective modalities being diagnosis, inference, and treatment.
Diagnosis is the process wherein information is taken into the professional knowledge
system, and treatment is wherein instruction is brought back out from it (Abbott 1988:
40). During the process of diagnosis, relevant information about the client is assembled
into a picture of the client's needs. This picture is then categorized into a proper
diagnostic category. This process consists of two sub-processes known as colligation and
classification. "Colligation is the first step in which the professional knowledge system
begins to structure the observed problems (Abbott 1988: 41). Colligation is the forming
of a picture of the client, and consists primarily of "rules declaring what kinds of
evidence are relevant and irrelevant, valid and invalid, as well as rules specifying the
admissible level of ambiguity (Abbott 1988: 41). Classification is the referral of "the
colligated picture to the dictionary of professional legitimate problems" (Abbott 1988:
41). Colligation and classification help to define which type of problems fall under
which body of profession, and specifically what kind of problem it is in that particular
profession. Abbott mentions that sometimes problems of classification arise. For some
problems are constantly shifting classifications, and fall under more than one
classification, due to their defining traits. This may lead to intervention or
competition by other professions who want to assimilate the unclear problem into their
own professional repertoire (Abbott 1988: 44). The procedure of "treatment is organized
around a classification system and a brokering process," whereby results are given to the
client and prescription is offered (Abbott 1988: 44). One major problem associated with
treatment is the client's willingness to accept treatment. A profession that adamantly
forces clients to take treatment risks losing clients to their competition who may be
more flexible to their client's wishes (Abbott 1988: 47). Inference is the process that
takes place "when the connection between diagnosis and treatment is obscure" (Abbott
1988: 49). Inference can work in one of two ways, either by exclusion or construction.
With regards to the ideals of inference, is the fact that professions that have several
chances to infer solutions to a problem will consequently have more failures, than a
profession that gets only one chance. In addition, professions with multiple chances are
generally more vulnerable to intervention and competition, or what is known as ceteris
paribus, for treatment failure is the main attacking point for invading professions
(Abbott 1988: 49). Another factor that leaves professions prone to external attack is the
existence of a problem where no treatment can be inferred. To counteract this potential
downfall, Abbott suggested that professions often direct these unsolvable problems to
elite consultants or are academicized as 'crucial anomalies' (Abbott 1988: 50). These
procedures help to make the difficult problem connected with a vague public label, "which
serves as a stopgap against dangerous questioning" (Abbott 1988: 51). This in turn
removes direct and stigmatizing responsibility of treatment failure away from a
profession, which "protects a profession's jurisdiction" (Abbott 1988: 51).
"Diagnosis, treatment, inference, and academic work provide the cultural machinery of
jurisdiction" (Abbott 1988: 59). However, Abbott argues that this is not enough for an
organized structure to claim jurisdiction. In order to claim jurisdiction, a profession
must ask "society to recognize its cognitive structure through exclusive rights" (Abbott
1988: 59). Jurisdictional claim by a profession can be achieved in several possible
arenas, within the legal system, the realm of public opinion, and within the arena of the
workplace. Claiming jurisdiction is only one means of overcoming jurisdictional disputes
by professions, Abbott mentions that there are five other known types of settlement
options.
A profession's social organization is comprised of three distinct internal structures,
they being groups, controls, and worksites. These modules of professional organization
work in unison to create a more bonded and organized professional structure. Together
they influence professions in several ways. First, the more organized a profession is,
the more effective it is at claiming jurisdiction. Second, organization of a profession
into "a single, identifiable national association is clearly a prerequisite of public or
legal claims" (Abbott 1988: 83). Third, in some conditions oddly, some relatively less
organized professions due to their internal structures have a certain advantage in
workplace competition. For these professional organizations lack rigid focus, and thus
have freedom to move back and forth from different tasks, whereas more organized
professions lack this flexibility to venture into other areas of work to increase
diversity, to become more competitive. Finally, professions that have highly organized
internal structures are more resilient to attacks by less organized professions. 
These facts illustrate that the social structure of professions is neither fixed nor
uniformly beneficial; the nature of it is "constantly subdividing under the various
pressures of market demands, specialization, and interprofessional competition" (Abbott
1988: 84). In addition, these facts demonstrate that different competitive conditions
favour a more or less organized profession. Taken together these factors imply that the
professions as a group will develop in the structured dynamic pattern that Abbott calls
the system of professions.
Abbott upholds in his book the ideal that professions constitute an interdependent
system, and that jurisdiction is exclusive (Abbott 1988: 86). That being true, then a
move by one inevitably affects the others. Change occurs within professions according to
Abbott through two sources. One source is from external factors, these initiate the
"opening or closing [of] areas for jurisdiction and by existing or new professions
seeking new ground" (Abbott 1988: 90). New tasks areas of jurisdiction are opened; some
professions prosper by the acquisition of these new jurisdictions by procedures such as
enclosure at the expense of destroying old jurisdictions, that lead to the weakening of
the jurisdiction of other professions (Abbott 1988: 91). A second source of change comes
from internal factors, these causes unlike external factors do not create or abolish
jurisdiction. Change is initiated internally within the dynamic structures of professions
through the development of new knowledge, and expansion of jurisdictional consolidation
by processes such as professionalization or reduction (Abbott 1988: 91).
Section II: The System's Environment
Abbott defines professional power "as the ability to retain jurisdiction when system
forces imply that a profession ought to have lost it" (Abbott 1988: 136). The power of
professions to expand their cognitive domain, and thus their jurisdiction, Abbott
maintains is dependent on their use of abstract knowledge to annex new areas of work, and
to define then as their own (Abbott 1988: 102). Abbott also adds that knowledge must not
be too abstract or concrete to be jurisdictionally advantageous for a profession. Two
mechanisms help professions to maintain an optimal level of abstraction, these being the
processes of amalgamation and division.
Within professions there exists internal differentiation between the organized groups of
individuals that comprise the profession. One major source of internal stratification
comes from the phenomenon of professional regression. This is a process whereby
professionals withdraw into themselves, working in more purely professional environments,
as a consequence of gaining greater status (Abbott 1988: 118). They inevitably become
segregated from the tasks for which they claim jurisdiction, and from clients, the
public, and other subordinate professionals. Besides professional regression there is the
concept of client differentiation, which leads to specialization within professions, this
creates internal divisions of labour.
A process correlated to labour division is that of degradation. Degradation is the
progression whereby work is systematically segmented from professional to
non-professional status, which leads to the division of labour between "an upper, truly
professional group and a lower, subordinate one" (Abbott 1988: 128). An interrelated
issue of labour division is that of career patterns, Abbott argues that career patterns
are often quite rigid, and that interchangeability between work of different professions
is impossible. For due to demographic rigidity, some professions size and reproduction
mechanisms prevent them from expanding or contracting rapidly, thus constraining their
professionals from practicing outside of the profession (Abbott 1988: 129). Abbott
proposes that large scale general changes on the structures that make up the system of
professions, and not their effects on individual professions must be examined, to
generate an accurate picture of the variables that mediate change (Abbott 1988: 143).
Abbott mentions that two significant circumstances have helped in the advancement of
professional jurisdictions. One being the rise of the large-scale organization, and the
other being the rise of technology (Abbott 1988: 144). Beyond technology and
organizations, social movements have also been responsible for the creation and
abolishment of professional work.
With the organizational revolution of the 19th century professions became more
bureaucratic. The rise of bureaucracies has increased competition between professions, by
absorbing certain forms of work, and thus creating struggle for work that remains (Abbott
1988: 157). As a consequence, there has been a split between workplace and public
jurisdiction, and subsequently a division between administrative and legislative
authority. This Abbott contends leads to various changes in audiences for professional
claims dependent on the social environment (Abbott 1988: 157). Related to the increase of
bureaucracy is that of co-optation, the phenomenon of professions shrinking in number and
becoming more monopolized in power. This process has not decreased interprofessional
competition, but has simply changed its location.... and involving different arrangements
of 'friendly' groups (Abbott 1988: 176).
Besides the many social organizational and structural changes of professions that have
occurred throughout the short history of professions, great cultural changes have also
been involved in remaking the work of professions. The three of most significance have
been the growth in size and complexity of professional knowledge, the emergence of new
types of legitimacy claims for that knowledge, and the rise of the university. The
changes in professional knowledge have involved two processes, that of growth and
replacement. Growth has lead to the subdivision of knowledge, while replacement has
pressured knowledge towards abstraction (Abbott 1988: 179). Legitimation of professions
justifies what forms of work they can do and how they are to do it (Abbott 1988: 184).
The emergence of new forms of jurisdictional legitimacy has been warranted by cultural
shifts such as secularization, and changing cultural values. This has led to a shift in
professional legitimation from a reliance on social origins and character values to a
reliance on scientization or rationalization of technique and on efficiency of service
(Abbott 1988: 179). The ascent of the modern university has been a great external force
behind the development of professions. Universities have served as legitimators of
professional knowledge and expertise. They have helped to generate new techniques of
practice, and have been the training ground for professionals. Finally, universities have
also become another arena for interprofessional competition (Abbott 1988: 196).
Section III: Three Case Studies
In his discussion of information professionals Abbott states that there are two types.
There are those who reside in qualitative information, such as librarians, academics,
advertisers, and journalists, and those who abide in quantitative information, such as
cost accountants, management engineers, statisticians, operations researchers, and
systems analysts. The move by qualitative professions into technical organization has
been attributed to the concept of scientific management. Qualitative information work has
been shaped decisively by organizational and demographic developments... [as well as by]
major technological events (Abbott 1988: 219). The area of quantitative information has
developed through the advent of two detrimental disturbances. One being the invention of
mechanical devices for calculation and tabulation, which helped to rountinize the work,
and the other being the birth of cost accounting, which helped professions to become more
competitive (Abbott 1988: 228). The 1930's were the beginning of the unification between
qualitative and quantitative information. This brought about the emergence of two
practical claimants of this new area of information jurisdiction. The first was
information science (IS) which took a purely theoretical perspective on the topic, and
the second was management information systems (MIS), which had a more practical
orientation.
The initial structural development of the English legal profession began in the early
19th century, while the onset of that of the Americans came at a much later time. Two
organizational structures attributed to the growth in demand for legal services in the
19th century. One was large commercial enterprise, the other was administrative
bureaucracy. In its infancy legal work outgrew its profession. This led to three types of
conflict between competitors within the profession. The first case known as excess
jurisdiction occurs when an incumbent profession cannot grow to meet demand, or increase
output, and thus faces invasion by outsiders. The second kind of conflict arises when a
professional group's potential output exceeds its current jurisdiction. The third type of
conflict occurs when groups who provide equivalent services at lower prices seek to
invade into a settled jurisdiction. Due to the structure of the American legal profession
these conflict problems were less severe than in the British system (Abbott 1988: 252).
The American system because of its use of large firms and the replacement of clerkship
with law school, helped it to produce higher output, thus it avoided problems related to
demand and supply (Abbott 1988: 252). Taken together, this shows that the differences in
the development of the English and American legal system was caused by the actions of the
two professions themselves, the general social environment, and by competitors trying to
secure control of areas of importance to the legal profession (Abbott 1988: 275).
Abbott posits that the birth of professions coincided with the rise of personal problems
(Abbott 1988: 285). Thus, the history of professions is a biography of the relationship
between problems and the tasks that seek to resolve them. The first groups that attempted
to assert professional jurisdiction over these personal problems were the clergy and
neurologists. This was the beginning of a gradual recognition of personal problems as
legitimate categories of professional work (Abbott 1988: 286). Other groups that
subsequently joined the race for professional jurisdiction were gynecologists,
psychiatrists, as well as weaker groups such as psychotherapists.
In his book, Abbott outlines the history of professional development by showing that
professions have evolved simultaneously through similar patterns of development. In
chapters six and seven he argued that professions are organizational structures made-up
of many internal components and divisions of labour. Related to this issue was his belief
that professions were interdependent structures. Abbott believed that the power of
professions lay in their jurisdictional power, which set the boundaries of what an
occupation's work embraced. Work and claims to jurisdiction over tasks for Abbott was
what defined a professions power. He illustrated this by showing that professions
struggle and compete against each other to gain control over undefined and unclear areas
of tasks, to expand their jurisdictional and overall strength. Chapters two to four
devote most of their attention to addressing these issues of work, competition, and
claims to legitimacy, which are related to jurisdictional power. The primary goal of
Abbott's book was to attempt to show that professions exist within a system, he did this
by demonstrating that changes in one affects the other, and that one profession preempts
another's work. This was shown by his outlined principles in chapter four of his book,
which posit that external and internal changes in one profession causes disturbances
through the systems of professions. For professions as he advocated constitute an
interdependent system. Therefore, relations between professions and their work determine
the interwoven history of professional development. In other words, one has helped to
transform the other, similar to the system whereby the factors of genetics and
environment symbiotically influence the direction of evolutionary processes. Abbott
wanted to address the issue that to study the evolution of professions completely and
accurately, it is not enough to study them individually, that researchers have to examine
the relationship and development of all professions to understand any of one them. For
professions are as he states interdependent systems, which influence each other
prospectively.
Part B: Discussion
The social construction of skill and its relationship to workers' autonomy and discretion
relate to Abbott's discussion for it was mentioned that workers derive their skill by
means of educational attainment and achievements of credentials. These merits are defined
and constructed by the professions, it is up to their discretion to design the skill
requirements for entry into the professional body. That being so, professions have a
structured path for its prospective employees. This would make the career pattern for
many workers quite rigid, providing them with very little autonomy and discretion in the
career choices (Abbott 1988: 129). We alluded to in class that sometimes the social
construction of skill may help to restrain the worker's ability for autonomy and
discretion. For instance, in the French system of the 1970's, the government pushed
education to be highly specific in its professional focus (Abbott 1988: 133). Thus, the
educational system produced skilled, but specifically skilled workers for society.
Workers knowledge and skill was highly specific and not broad or generalizable. The
French society socially constructed its own definition of skills needed for society and
education. However, the inevitable consequence of such actions caused the problem of low
interprofessional mobility. Workers there had very little autonomy or discretion with
regard to their work (Abbott 1988: 133). Here, we see a situation where the social
construction of defining skill has led to the restriction of workers' occupational
freedom.
Even with the social construction of skills that defined the potential autonomy for
workers, factors related to the organizational structure of professions can limit such
freedom. It was discussed in class that workers choices and freedom to choose what they
want to do is often restricted by structural factors, such as division of labour and
company size. Abbott alludes to this in his discussion of career patterns, he posits that
the career paths in professions are often quite rigid, with very little chance for
interchangeability between professions (Abbott 1988: 129). For example, a doctor cannot
move into the profession of law with his present skills, and vice versa for a lawyer. The
demands of those professions constrict the autonomy professionals within those
professions have, with regards to interprofessional flexibility. Although the case may be
that within their own prospective professions, professionals have their own forms of
discretion and occupational autonomy dependent on their skill and expertise. This
inflexibility in interprofessional and career pattern autonomy is controlled by the
factor of demographic rigidity. Some professions, due to their size and reproduction
mechanisms, prevent them from expanding or contracting, this constrains their
professionals from practicing outside of the profession (Abbott 1988: 129). This
illustrates that factors of a professions structure mediates the affect of socially
constructed skill with worker's autonomy and discretion, that the organization of a
profession can confine a professionals occupational freedom.
However, the situation of restricted freedom for occupational alternative is not always
the case, as has been mentioned in class, sometimes through conditions of an individual's
skill and by organizational forces, workers find themselves confronted with opportunities
for advancement or differentiations. Abbott illustrates that through the phenomenons of
specialization and labour division workers can increase their status and thus allow
themselves chances for expansions into other tasks areas (Abbott 1988: 128). Abbott
advocates that for some workers their professions allow them great autonomy and
discretion, this is based upon the set of socially constructed skills they obtained. For
example, the skills that society has required librarians to acquire for their
occupations, has given them more opportunity for personal autonomy and discretion
regarding their work (Abbott 1988: 123). Librarians are differentiated and restricted
only by their own diverse choice of clientele (Abbott 1988: 123). They can choose to work
in schools, industry, government, public, and even in academic areas. Their socially
demanded skills in research and knowledge allow them to move from one professional arena
to another with ease, for their skills are highly generalizable (Abbott 1988: 123).
Sometimes, an individuals credentials so happens allow him or her access into other
professions, giving him or her discretion to choose where he or she wants to work, or
what tasks he or she wants to do. Abbott argues that some credentials allow individuals
to claim jurisdiction under more than one profession, allowing them autonomy to choose
where they want to reside, and allowing them the opportunity to switch over to another
jurisdiction as they wish (Abbott 1988: 103). For example, Abbott proposes that a degree
such as a M.B.A, because of its broad coverage of diverse forms of knowledge and
training, allows its owners numerous areas for claimants (Abbott 1988: 103). Thus,
students of diverse specialties as psychology, sociology, law, economic, etc. can claim
jurisdiction in business management even though their primary study has no relations, as
long as they possess the certification of a M.B.A degree. Simply by possessing
credentials under a certain expertise and skill that society has defined as expert,
individuals can increase their autonomy of career choice by great folds. This points to
the fact that the attainment of what society constructs as expert skill, can help in
ones' achievement of autonomy and discretion.
Another process that leads to the autonomy of the individual is through the process of
degradation. Degradation leads to the explicit division of labour, which inevitably
allows workers different career directions and alternatives (Abbott 1988: 126). In his
discussion of the profession of computer programmers, Abbott illustrates that the sudden
explosion in the computerization of industry in the 1970's created a large demand for
computer programmers. This led to a division in the work between normal and specialist
programmers, and while causing the subordination of some, this created many new
opportunities for specialty (Abbott 1988: 127). Specialists in that field were presented
with total autonomy and discretion with regards to their work. They could set their own
standards and jurisdiction, for there existed no forbearers in their expertise to
restrict the creation of their own jurisdiction (Abbott 1988: 123).
As it has just been illustrated, the social construction of skill and its relationship to
workers' autonomy and discretion has not always been a positive one. In some
circumstances, workers are provided with great freedom with regards to their work, but in
others, the defined skills constructed by society help to restrict the autonomy and
discretion of workers. Factors such as government intervention, the organizational
structure of professions, individual merit and choice, and processes of labour division
and destruction all play a role in determining the occupational free choice of workers.
Abbott's book outlined many of these factors, his findings helped to substantiate ideals
related to this topic discussed in class.
Bibliography
Reference
Abbott, Andrew. The System of Professions: An Essay on the Division of Expert Labour.
Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1988.