Owner-Principal:A Study Of The Affective Labor

This study is a qualitative study on the affective labor process of the owner-principal.The "Owner-Principal" is a new professional group of young people produced under the development of the community economy,which is closely related to the background of the integration and development of the cultural industry and the service industry.They embody abstract culture into individual unique aesthetics,vision,posture and distinction of taste,creating a uniquely recognizable brand.In the working process of the owner-principal,establishing and maintaining the community is the main way of working,and affective management with customers is placed in a very important position,shaping the entire working process.Therefore,research on the labor process and affective maintenance mechanism of managers can enrich the existing understanding of affective labor in labor sociology.Starting from the theory of labor process and affective labor,this study proposes the following research questions: Compared with traditional emotional workers such as housekeepers,nurses,confinement workers,etc.,what is the difference between emotional workers such as supervisors? In particular,how do owner-principal interact differently with those they work for? How is the affective labor of the owner-principal maintained?The study uses theoretical sampling and snowball interviews,selects seven cultural and creative industry owner-principals in Chengdu as research cases,and conducts participatory observations in the workplaces of each owner-principal for about half a year to understand and collect relevant case data.Starting from the comparison between Hochschild’s "Emotional labor" and Hart’s and Negri’s "Affective labor",the study analyzes the labor process and interaction mode of the owner-principal,and discusses the aspects of affective labor.Sustaining mechanisms and existential dilemmas.The study found that compared with traditional emotional workers,owner-principal are more autonomous affective workers.From the perspective of the labor process,the labor of the manager is a process of "creating meaning",including creating scenes,defining identities,creating consensus and labor games.This kind of labor breaks down the existing boundaries between workers and customers.At the same time,since the community maintained by the manager is "selected" by the owner-principal himself,this relationship is exclusive,and the owner-principal can more autonomously control the rules and obligations in the labor-client relationship.From the point of view of the interaction method,the owner-principal strategically uses "Emotional labor" and "Affective labor" to create meaning and engage in emotional investment;while the object of the owner-principal ’s interaction-the community,participates in meaning creation through emotional feedback,and then produce and reproduce the identity of the principal.Through this labor process and interaction method,the owner-principal experienced the self-motivation guided by interest,the affective stimulation of community feedback,and his own strategic response to affective labor,so that his affective labor was maintained.On the other hand,the maintenance of this kind of affective labor depends entirely on the small-scale operation of the owner-principal and the community,lacking larger-scale social and economic support,and its sustainability remains to be seen.At the same time,as far as the theory of affective labor is concerned,the study of the owner-principal in this paper is also an inspection and verification of the existing theory of affective labor.It can be seen that in the affective laborers of the owner-principal type,more passive and superficial "Emotion labor" and more active and spontaneous "Affective labor" exist at the same time.This also shows that for the current emerging occupation types,perhaps the division of the two theories can achieve a certain degree of integration.