Abstract:
This thesis contributes towards an understanding of how neoliberalism and
postfeminism have become entrenched within organisations as a gendered form of
governance. The study contributes to current debates by adopting a poststructuralist
approach to explore how discourses of neoliberalism constitute and constrain feminine
subjectivities. It is argued that these discourses act as forms of governance to obscure
inequalities by: calling on women to ‘work within’ and psychologise; individualising
strategies, which divide women and negate collective action, and finally; obscuring
inequalities through normalising discourses.
The study draws on material collected in two different organisations. First, twenty
qualitative in-depth interviews were conducted with women managers in a multinational
bank with its headquarters in the UK. Second, using an ethnographical-inspired
approach, observations and interviews were conducted with sixteen women distributors
in a beauty based networking marketing organisation. The analysis of the interviews and
field notes is organised into chapters presented in the format of peer-reviewed journal
articles. First, I offer poststructuralist reflexivity as a way to consider research practice,
research subjectivity, power and regimes of truth. The second article uses the psychic
and affective life of neoliberalism to consider how neoliberal spirituality has been co-
opted within the network marketing company as a gendered form of governance. Next, I
turn to the bank to consider what happens when women collectively mobilise, a solution
often offered in the literature to the individualising effects of postfeminism. The final
article considers how discourses of competition differ across the two organisations,
albeit framed in neoliberal terms which bind women in unique ways.
Through examining two different organisations, the thesis extends our understanding of
the ways in which fluid and adaptable neoliberal discourses are enacted within
organisations. Overall, the thesis seeks to make a contribution to debates about
neoliberalism and postfeminism as forms of governance which silence critique and
normalise women’s experiences in organisations.
