Woman, manage your life! The Life-Work Balance Discourse in Popular Management Literature Aimed at Women

Authors

  • Maria Medina-Vicent UNIVERSITAT JAUME I

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.28939/iam.debats-en.2019-5

Abstract

Management posts have traditionally been held by men. Consequently, the business management normative model has dictated the rules women should follow. Among other reasons, this is why the issue of work-life balance has been sidelined in popular management literature. In keeping with these male-dictated rules, it was always blithely assumed that the manager's role was exclusively linked with his public presence — in other words, family and care issues were left out of the equation. However, as more and more women have become managers, new issues have shaped the management agenda. In this paper, we study how the issue of work-life balance has been incorporated in popular management literature for women. We are particularly interested in identifying whether the discourse on women’s presence in management enshrines: (1) a transformative, egalitarian vision (requiring policies fostering work-life balance), or (2) a view that sees women’s traditional household roles as something belonging to the private sphere, leaving them disadvantaged
and bereft of support as they pursue their management careers.

Downloads

Download data is not yet available.

Downloads

Published

2019-12-25

How to Cite

Medina-Vicent, M. (2019) “Woman, manage your life! The Life-Work Balance Discourse in Popular Management Literature Aimed at Women”, Debats. Journal on culture, power and society, 4, pp. 59–70. doi: 10.28939/iam.debats-en.2019-5.

Issue

Vol. 4 (2019): Annual Review 4

Section

SPECIAL ISSUE 1

License

Without prejudice to the provisions of article 52 of Spanish Law 22/1987 of November 11 on Intellectual Property, BOE (official state bulletin) of November 17, 1987, and pursuant to said legislation, the author(s) surrender(s) free of charge its rights of edition, publication, distribution and sale of the article, for its publication in Debats. Journal on Culture, Power and Society.

Debats. Journal on Culture, Power and Society is published under the Creative Commons license system in accordance with the «Recognition - Non-Commercial (by-nc) modality: The generation of derivative works is permitted provided that commercial use is not made. Nor can the original work be used for commercial purposes».

Thus, when the author submits his/her contribution, he/she explicitly accepts this assignment of publishing and publishing rights. Authors also authorize Debats. Journal on Culture, Power and Society to include their work in an issue of the journal to be distributed and sold.