Abstract
This paper examines the role of business education in producing and legitimating gendered cultures of work in the City of London. By combining research on the gendered nature of service work with Bourdieu's identification of multiple forms of capital and the role of education credentials within this, the analysis shows how business education reproduces classed and gendered understandings of appropriate and desirable workplace personas in financial services. The analysis is based on original empirical research undertaken in London's investment banking sector comprising 90 semi-structured interviews and content analysis of business education courses offered to investment bankers. Empirically, the paper focuses attention on the comparatively neglected role of business education undertaken in the workplace in shaping the cultures of work in financial centers such as London. Theoretically, the analysis shows how work on the cultural capital associated with education credentials and their role in shaping workplace identities can be used to better understand the role of education in legitimating, reproducing and sustaining gendered cultures of work more generally.
Highlights
The role of financial elites in shaping the political economy of the UK is a well-established focus of social scientific research
I reveal how while the greater emphasis placed on business education in the City in the 2000s is often positioned in policy circles as a way of advancing a more meritocratic City of London in which educational and social background is less significant, the cultural capital associated with several business education credentials serves to reinforce further the gendered cultures of work in the City in which embodying particular gendered and classed bodily and cognitive dispositions remains an important determinant of upward career progression
The research presented in this paper reveals how a range of business education experiences are used by investment banks in London’s financial district in an effort toproduce the highly skilled financiers deemed to be an essential factor in the continued competitiveness of the City as an international financial center (Z/Yen 2009)
Summary
The role of financial elites in shaping the political economy of the UK is a well-established focus of social scientific research (see, for example, Michie 1992; Thrift 1994; Leyshon and Thrift 1997; Cain and Hopkins 2002). The growing challenge to dominant gender performances of “the gentleman” in the City reflects changes to the nature of the financial services industry itself as trading functions associated with the rise of the issuance of securities at the expense of advisory services that were based on longstanding client – provider relationships (Augar 2005; Wainwright 2009; see Wojcik 2011 for an analysis of the central role played by investment banks in the securities industry) The growth of these activities is linked to the wider internationalization, and Americanization of the City, as a growing number of foreign banks increased their London operations from the mid-1980s onwards (Kynaston 2001). I reveal how while the greater emphasis placed on business education in the City in the 2000s is often positioned in policy circles as a way of advancing a more meritocratic City of London in which educational and social background is less significant, the cultural capital associated with several business education credentials serves to reinforce further the gendered cultures of work in the City in which embodying particular gendered and classed bodily and cognitive dispositions remains an important determinant of upward career progression
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