| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
European Sociological Review 16:9-26 (2000)
© 2000 Oxford University Press
The professionalization of everyone? A comparative study of the development of the professions in the United Kingdom and Germany
0 Organisation Research Group, Aston Business School, Aston University, UK
1 Germany
The concept of 'professionalization' is commonly used to describe how occupations become recognized as 'professions', and how they go about consolidating this status and improving their services. Contemporary debate often glosses over the historical development of the professions. Indeed, professionalism is often discussed and debated in a way that treats professionalization as a recent and uniform phenomenon. Taking a comparative historical perspective this paper identifies the stages through which occupations in the UK and Germany developed into the recognized professions of today. In doing so, it demonstrates that the process of professionalization has been radically different in the two countries, in particular with regard to the role of the state in initiating and administering professional bodies. Overall the study demonstrates that the process of professionalization in the UK has been 'bottom up', in that professional bodies have resulted from spontaneous activities at the occupational level to secure professional status. By contrast, professionalization in Germany has been 'top down' in that the state has played an active interventionist role in the initiation and administration of the professions. In detailing these different patterns this paper aims to provide an empirical resource for researchers in the field, and to contribute to the understanding of the differences in the organization and administration of professional services in the UK and in Germany. Finally, the emerging role of the EU in the administration, training, and licensing of professionals is discussed. The point is made that while particular EU directives have changed the relationship between the professions and the state in both countries, large-scale intervention by the EU has resulted in a new form of Euro-professionalization, typified by the establishment of the new profession of 'eco-auditors'.