COMM3960- Creative work in the Cultural

Industries
Student Number 200727571
Word Count - 3355
Assess claims that creative media work is
different from other forms of work.

In a post-Fordist era, increasing and significant scholarly and government

legislative attention has been paid to understanding the nature of creative
work and the creative industries (CI) as a whole; which is outgrowing the
rest of the economy. Whilst media depictions would often persuade us to
believe that such industries offer a highly glamourized, autonomous and
flexible work structure. But to what extent, if at all, is creative work really
so different from other forms of work? In order to address this claim, this
paper looks at three features of creative work. Specifically, it will look at;
autonomy; the organisational structure of the CI and precarious labour;
and the notion of self-exploitation. Alongside these three lines of enquiry,
this paper also draws on supporting evidence from other forms of work in
order to fully assess the question at hand. This paper finds that based on
the aforementioned features, there is in fact reason to argue that creative
work is different from other forms of work.
Although a complex and disputed concept, autonomy serves as an
important line of enquiry for this paper, in that the CI are generally
thought to be relatively autonomous, both with regard to the organisation
and the nature of the work itself (Banks, 2010; Hesmondhalgh and Baker,
2011). On these grounds, there is weight in the claim that that these high
levels for potential autonomy sets the CI apart from other forms of more
rigid, fixed structures of work. As indicated by Banks, autonomy refers to
the capacity of individuals (but also institutions and organizations) to
exercise discretion or apply freedom of choice; the autonomous subject is
one that has the ability to determine the pattern and shape of their own
lives (2010: 2). It is thus argued then that artists comprised of the full
array of creative workers such as actors, designers, musicians and such
are often portrayed and regarded in a romanticised fashion, depicted by
the media as possessing innate, self-expressive creativity, skill and talent
that is unique; and for such work to blossom, must not be constrained or
reduced to the same external structures and pressures that other forms of
industry are subject to (Ryan, 1992). This individualistic model of
creativity therefore, signals a difference in the way the CI are to be

managed (as opposed to others), with respect to the production of

creative goods, since commerce (or capital) cannot make the artist
completely subservient to economics because symbol creation remains
ideologically centred on the expressive individual artist (Ryan, 1992: 30).
In light of this, Hesmondhalgh and Baker have subsequently investigated
the means by which this workplace autonomy is managed across three
different CI; magazines, music recording and broadcasting. Workplace
autonomy is defined as the degree of self-determination that individual
workers or groups of workers have within a certain work situation (2011:
40). Taken from an interviewee who manages a team of writers at an
independent dance music magazine, said it is a
creative business and you have to manage people as creative
individuals not as office staff what that means is that people dont
get told off if they turn up half an hour late, they wont get told of if
they turn up two hours late, but ultimately the important thing is
that they excel in what they do, that they are imaginative,
passionate, informed, funny and entertaining (2011:86).
What this indicates is the respect for autonomy that is given to the artistic
individual; an informal, soft-management organisational process that has
a muted and accommodating style (Ryan, 1992: 121). It means that selfdetermination can be exercised wherein autonomy is central to the quality
of the product (Hesmondhalgh and Baker, 2011). If we are to assess this
degree of workplace autonomy against other industries, a focus on the
work carried out in call centres would be a useful site for comparison. In a
study by Hyman et al (2005), that principally aimed to investigate worklife pressures, levels of autonomy and job satisfaction in call centres,
found that workers were subjected to shift patterns that dictated their
work-life balance and thus limited the degree of control over their work. It
was also found that call centre workers (who were predominantly women
often with dependants) were subject to stringent management and
organizational controls (Ibid). Some of these controls were manifested in

the way managers could allocate shifts that made it difficult for workers to
obtain part-time hours or to job share with other employees. Likewise,
workers experience of autonomy in their roles was hindered by
managements discretion to vary start and finish times by up to two
hours within 48 hours notice (Ibid :712). On the whole, interpretation of
what the employees regarded as flexible work hours were more of an
obstacle than interpretation of autonomy (IBID).
Not only might creative workers experience higher levels of workplace
autonomy than other industries, but the degree of creative autonomy that
is available to people in the CI is also drawn to attention. Hesmondhalgh
and Baker refer to creative autonomy as the degree to which art,
knowledge, symbol-making and so on can and/or should operate
independently of the influence of other determinants (2011: 40). Indeed,
a study by Hesmondhalgh and Zoellner (2012) pointed to the possibility of
creative input, even by those working at the junior level in documentary
production for television. They found that for such workers, opportunities
could range anywhere from just an issue or problem into a full concept
for a TV program (2012: 572). However, while individuals highly value the
degree of creative autonomy that is potentially available to them, the
reality demonstrates that ultimate decisions on overall creative content or
style of a program are left to those in more senior levels of authority such
as executives or head of developments (ibid). As such, there exists a
structural hierarchy that sees those in more elevated positions or those
above the line with greater levels of a creative autonomy than those in
lower paid roles. This we might argue is reflective of other top-down,
seniority structures found generally in industry; in the union grading
system, [and] in membership of the professional and craft associations
(Ursell, 2000: 811). For work in the CI, the level of autonomy, both
creative and workplace, that is afforded, represents a ground of conflict
and negotiation in contemporary cultural-industry workplaces
(Hesmondhalgh and Baker, 2011: 111). Scholars have identified these
tensions as a power struggle between the desires for autonomy against

the demands of capitalism to commodify and control artistic output

recognisable in the pairing of creativity and commerce (Negus and
Pickering, 2004) or culture and commodity (Frow, 1996). This continual
struggle relies on a management that can adequately balance the two, for
the betterment of both (Lampel et al, 2000). However, some are more
critical, including Davis and Scase, who connote the paradox of control
and creativity, in which they claim the balancing of the two is a relatively
futile practice because openness, intuition, personal networks and
individual autonomy (which serve creative ends) with instrumental
criteria and rational business methods can never be fully resolved (Davis
and Scase, 2000: 52, cited in Hesmondhalgh and Baker, 2011: 83).
From a more theoretical standpoint, there exists a number of critiques of
autonomy in cultural work which for this paper, makes the process of
assessing the differences between creative work from other forms more
complex. The culture industry critique proposed by Adorno and
Horkheimer (1992) and later advanced by other scholars such as
McRobbie (2002) challenges the notion that autonomy can truly exist
when it is subject to the coercive ad instrumental demands of an
industrial system geared to making cultural goods more or less according
to plan (Adorno, 1991: 98, cited in Banks, 2010: 4). For McRobbie (2002),
the cultural industries have undergone an aggressive market philosophy
that prevents the concept of truly independent creative work from
happening. Nonetheless, Banks makes an important summary to the
prospect of autonomy in the CI and one that supports this paper. That is,
instead of being reduced to the demands of capital as has been
suggested, acting autonomously instead comprises of a foci for a
contestable and transformable political economy of labour wherein, as
long as autonomy serves as a foundational normative principle for
creative and cultural production, it will remain a significant catalyst for
variegated forms of identity work and social action (Banks, 2010; 14).

In a post-Fordist era, we have seen a rise in flexible work which can be

attributed to both globalization and the rapid development of Information
and Communication Technologies (ITC); coupled with the deregulation of
the labour market itself (Auer and Cazes 2000). If we look at this in terms
of the CI, it has often been explained in the shift from the studio-era
typically associated with the mass production of film, to that of flexible
specialization (McKinlay, 2009). This has thus fuelled a rise in the
abundance of freelance, temporary, short-contract/subcontracting type
labour and with it, the rise of precarious working conditions. Precarious
labour is defined as the financial and existential insecurity arising from
the flexibilization of labour (Brophy and de Peuter, 2007: 180). Although
by no means an exclusive feature of the CI, precarious labor has come to
represent how much of creative work has now come to be organized;
through which precarity aids us in naming, understanding, and ultimately
transforming the conditions of labor under post-Fordism (ibid: 180). This
is a world away from what we might regard as the standard employment
model, wherein a worker has one employer, works full year, full time on
the employers premises, enjoys extensive statutory benefits and
entitlement, and expects to be employed indefinitely (Vosko et al,
2003:1). In contrast to this, Helen Blair notes that precarious labor has
now been institutionalized in the [British Film] industry in Britain for some
twenty-five years (2001: 151). Similarly, Lees research into the UK
television production industry highlights the material reality of the
precarious working conditions faced by those in the industry. For the
participants in Lees article, precarity was signaled by insecurities over
working freelance, project-based contracts, the tensions between pain and
pleasure in the nature of the work as well as well as notions of exploitation
felt in the long working hours and blurring of work and leisure time (Lee,
2011). While precarious labor no doubt paints a particularly pessimistic
view of working in the CI, there are aspects that are favored by workers,
as has been identified by Lees study and will later be brought into
discussion in this paper.

If the nature of precarious labor involves working in insecure, temporary

positions, it is important to analyze how workers go about obtaining that
work and how this might, in contrast, differ to other sectors. The
recruitment process of workers in UK television production works on a
system of who you know and a continual exchange of reliable contacts
taken from within the family (Ursell, 2000). People are selected based on
their reputation and achievements in past work; which makes what Blair
(2001) regards as being, only as good as your last job. What this thus
means then is that workers are (with discretion from executive producers
and commissioners) free to organize their own labour market and
management are happy to let this recruitment process take place as a
means of minimizing risk and mitigating administrative costs associated
with more bureaucratized forms of recruitment like interviewing and
advertising (Ursell, 2000). This therefore, can make getting into the UK
television industry considerably difficult because jobs largely are not
advertised and thus hearing about them requires forging contacts on the
inside. According to Ursell, working in TV depends on an economy of
favours which demonstrates the necessity of working with each other on
projects as a way of helping each other out. This is opposed to seeking
money as the driving mechanism for exchange, when often the case is
that resources are in scarce and short supply (Ursell, 2000).
Based on this, there is room to argue then that the recruitment process
within the CI is largely informal. This differs for example, to the
recruitment of the food and beverage giant, McDonalds. According to its
recruitment document made available to the public on its website, crew
members are recruited through a two-step application process which
begins with an online application form. The form is open to everyone and
assesses the suitability of the candidate to the role. The next stage then
comprises of an On Job Evaluation and interview (McDonalds, 2016).
Both these features, we can reiterate, are formal and contrast largely to
the self-organised labour market of the UK television production industry.
Naturally, it is important to approach this in a critical manner in the sense

that this is the official recruitment document for McDonalds in how, by

practice, recruitment should occur. The reality, perhaps might not be quite
so transparent. This is of course merely speculative but nonetheless
should be taken as an indication of the way the recruitment process differs
between McDonalds (as an example of an alternate industry) in its
formal-like recruitment process, against that found in UK television
production and by extension, other parts of the media industries.
While we might argue that precarious labor can be helpful in assessing the
relative difference between work in the CI against those of others, it would
be fallacious to say it is unique to it. Indeed, precarious labor can be found
across multiple different sectors, comprised of completely different types
of work. As outlined by Ross, although occupying opposite ends of the
labor market hierarchy, workers in retail and low-end services and the
creative class temping in high-end knowledge sectors share certain
elements of precarious or nonstandard employment these include the
temporary or intermittent nature of their contracts, the uncertainty of
their future, and their isolation from any protective framework for social
insurance (2008:41). Indeed, it has been noted that precarity leaves little
room to successfully form collective labor politics (Brophy and de Peuter,
2007; McRobbie, 2002). This can be seen in the diminishing rates of
unionization that leave workers vulnerable to exploitative conditions. In
this, both creative workers and other industry workers share in similar
struggles. That does not mean to say that some form of resistance has not
and cannot occur. Indeed The Precriats, as Guys Standing so refers to
them, comprised of workers from multiple sectors, form a new social class
that are united in the new struggles and demands brought about by
precarious work. This can be seen exemplified by the EuroMayDay
protests (Standing, 2011; Brophy and de Peuter, 2007; Ross, 2008; 2009).
For some, these protests proved that organizing the unorganizable was
not only feasible, but that the results far exceeded expectations, and have
given fresh hope to trade unions in decline (Milkman and Voss, 2004
cited in Ross, 2008: 42).

But in terms of this paper, if we are using precarious labor to distinguish

the CI apart from other forms of work, we must acknowledge the
motivational factors behind why people (necessarily) choose precarious
work; precarity is unevenly experienced across this spectrum of
employees, since contingent work arrangements are imposed on some
and self-elected by others (Ross, 2009: 42). For many people carrying out
creative work, the motivation behind doing so rests on the emotional
attachment people have for their work, as well as the social and cultural
impact that their work has on others. (Lee, 2011; Hesmondhalgh and
Baker, 2011) This it could be fair to say, distinguishes the creative worker
- who continually choses to work in such precarious conditions - from the
migrant worker (also in precarious work), who may have no other choice
but to work on multiple different contracts just to make ends meet; this
may also be because they lack the necessary skills required to obtain
more stable, long-term employment. Thus, the notion of skill is also drawn
into the picture. Reflecting on Weberian ideas of skill as individual assets
owned by a worker, allows us to more clearly draw distinctions between
workers of precarious labour in the CI i.e. a sound technician, as oppose to
someone who say, is self-employed washing windows. The skill afforded
by the creative worker, may in one respect, grant them greater market
value than the window cleaner (McKinlay, 2009). Of course this is relative
to the environment they are working in and the demand for that particular
skill, but it nonetheless allows us to make a distinction between the two
types of worker.
Referring back to Lees research on TV production workers, it was found
that other than pursuing work in television for fulfilment in commercial
terms - or otherwise external rewards - he also found that people were
motivated by the ethical and public service values attached to the work
they were producing (Lee, 2011). Workers took pride in their work because
they had the freedom to be creative with it, as well as knowing it had the
capacity to educate and do good in society. This combined with the
passion and meaning they likewise derived from their work point to their

ability to self-actualize from it. Whats more, the fact that such workers
pursued TV production work for the intrinsic values it brought to them, ties
in with MacIntyres (1984) ideas on internal rewards sought by people as
oppose to more external rewards that arguably most people seek, such as
money or power. Given that these individuals were able to experience selfactualization, it can subsequently be classed as what HesmondHalgh and
Baker (2011) determine as doing good work.
Although these inherently positive features seem to depict a very
favorable and enviable position to be in, we cannot miss out the fact that
such intense attachment to creative work coupled with precarious
conditions create a breeding ground for self-exploitation that is rife within
the CI (Lee, 2011). Current situations see interns working for free as a
means of obtaining much desired skill and insight of the industry, not to
mention the time that current workers devote in countless hours above
and beyond the minimum requirement. This self-exploitive behavior is
according to advocators of post-Foucauldian thought, the result of a
powerful circulation of entrepreneurial and creativity discourses that work
to govern subjects (Rose, 1999). The notion of governmentality then,
suggests that workers/subjects are trained to accept and reproduce for
themselves the precise conditions of their subordination. (Banks, 2007:
42). As such, if creative workers are just as exploited (albeit unknowingly,
if we were to agree with post-Foucauldian critiques), as workers in other
industries, then there is reason to suggest that the CI are no different from
any other industry because they are all ultimately subservient to the
dictates of capitalism. However, as Lees research has shown us, people
working in the CI are more than aware of the conditions they are working
under and yet continue to self-exploit themselves as a means of achieving
self-actualization; their desire for autonomy does not blind them to the
structural conditions that determine their working experiences (2011; 3).
On this basis and for the sake of this essay, we might argue that it is selfexploitation in the CI that creates a recognizable distinction from other
forms of work.

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By way of conclusion, this paper would like to reiterate that establishing

whether creative work is different for other forms of work is difficult to do.
As this paper has demonstrated, there are considerable similarities that
make it just like any other form of work; after all it operates under a
capitalist system just like any other industry and is subject to (if not
increasingly so) commodification. Nonetheless, the CI do, based on the
argument above, appear to offer some opportunities that can be
interpreted as being different from other forms of work or at least are far
more prevalent in creative work which continue to feed the desirable,
more often, glamourous image it holds in society today. This has been
shown in the high levels of autonomy enjoyed by workers; the specific
conditions experienced by creative workers in the precarious landscape;
and the extent to which workers are willing to self-exploit themselves as a
means of achieving self-actualization in the workplace.
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