A City of Professions
A City of Professions
Jordi Ludevid
To those who have said and continue to say,
«We aren’t heroes, we’re professionals.»
And of course to Roser,
my good luck charm.
Acknowledgements
Asemas, Consejo Superior de los Colegios de Arquitectos, Diputació de Barcelona and Unión Profesional. Also Eloy Algorri, Sandra Bestraten, Ivan Cabrera, Josefina Cambra, Victoria Camps, Ricard Domingo, Celestino García Braña, Arcadi Gual, Manuel Guirao, Josep Maria Llop, Marc Longaron, Marcel Ludevid, Joaquín Mañoso, Cristina Murta, Gonzalo Múzquiz, Juan José Rodríguez Sendín, Joaquim Sabaté, Eva Serrats and Antoni Solanas.
With support from:
With the collaboration of:
© Jordi Ludevid Anglada, for the text
© Cristina Murta and Jordi Ludevid Anglada, for the plans
© Angela Kay Bunning, english proofreading
MY16 EDIT, for the edition
© Jordi Ludevid Anglada, for the edition
Jordi_Ludevid@Coac.net - www.jordiludevid.com
Graphic production: Edito
Editorial direction: Ignasi Torras
Graphic design: +3
First edition: November 2020
ISBN: 978-84-09-32050-9
Legal deposit: B 12414-2021
No part of this work may be reproduced, incorporated into a computer system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the copyright holder.
A democratic, equitable and sustainable city
A City of Professions, comes at a time of intense concern when the Covid-19 crisis calls into question some of the prevailing assumptions of recent decades about the role of urban density and its economies of agglomeration. The health crisis comes on the heels of the major impact of the 2008 crisis, so the sum of these two impacts is likely to have important effects on paradigms and theories of urbanization. For its part, the New Urban Agenda that emerged from Habitat III proposes a paradigm shift in urbanization based on a systematic review of the regulatory framework, urban design and financing, in order to achieve socially, economically and environmentally sustainable cities. The two crises mentioned above, in addition to climate change, will challenge the current model towards a more acceptable one, capable of articulating a new social contract. However, this transformation will not be easy given the highly diverse and complex interrelationships inherent in the modern social structure.
Professor Jordi Ludevid’s book describes with special interest the contribution of the professions that contribute directly to urban construction, in its physical, civic and regulatory aspects. With an extensive professional, institutional and intellectual background, Jordi Ludevid has constructed this innovative reflection on the link between the professions and cities, which is undoubtedly of special interest in the current difficult and delicate circumstances, proposing a radical regeneration of the professional fact, betting in a clear way on their commitment and link with the cities, thus promoting the “new social contract”. The knowledge developed and managed by the urban professions, in close relationship with the universities, has been a fundamental part of modern knowledge. If in the Middle Ages, convents were the guardian institutions of classical knowledge, since the 16th century the baton has been taken over by cities. This is how the author’s thesis on the relevance of the professions resonates strongly when it comes to creating and reproducing cultural and knowledge goods and to recognizing their positive impact on urbanization.
By reflecting on the collegiate professions and trades, but also on the professionals linked to municipalism and public institutions, and beyond that, by considering their relationship with universities and educational establishments, this book is of interest to a very broad and diverse public. It will undoubtedly be of interest to the professionals of the world, but also to all citizens committed to social and collective issues and who aspire to a democratic, equitable and sustainable city. A City of Professions will undoubtedly participate in a remarkable and significant way in the existing international debate on the present and future of professions… and cities...
JOAN CLOS
Medicine Doctor
Former Mayor of Barcelona
Former Executive Director of UN Habitat
A Social Category, an Alliance
Today, professional associations are a recognised social category, the result of a long historical evolution, which achieved its status in Europe with the Treaty of Rome (1957) and which has been reflected in different regulations and customs in the different countries across Europe. Subsequently, our country promoted extensive legislation on the professions, including the Law on Professional Associations (1974). Special mention should be made of the 1978 Constitution; Article 36 recognises the peculiarities of professional associations and the practice of the professions. Moreover, this social category has taken on meaning in specific areas: internationally, through the World Union of Liberal Professions (UMPL); in the European Union, through the European Council of Liberal Professions (CEPLIS); and in Spain, through the Unión Profesional (UP), an institution over which – here, I concur with the author – it is a privilege to preside. The different professions grouped together in UP thus share international, European and national space, but also regional space, forming an inter-association network of great social utility.
We can affirm, especially after having read A City of Professions, that the history of our professional culture can be built in parallel to the rise of cities. To this end, each and every one of the regulated professions needs a mission that «develops in the urban world», as the Catalan author describes it.
If the pandemic, which has shaken our socio-economic model, has taught us anything, it is that, as this book explains, «in the face of social emergencies, the professions always rise to the challenge», on behalf of citizens who, for their part, trust in professional work insofar as it is an act of doing good, a continuous pursuit of personal and social well-being. A commitment to society that is evident throughout the pages of this work, in which the inseparable relationship between the professions and human rights is alluded to on many occasions. In this sense, as the former president of UP, Jordi Ludevid, is well aware, the organization states that «human rights will only become a reality if there is effective access for all people to basic professional services, on a universal basis». Seventy-two years after the Declaration of Human Rights (1948), the commitment to the protection of these rights is still valid for all the regulated professions, which are first and foremost human professions, because of their capacity to feel affection, understanding and solidarity towards others.
That commitment extends to global challenges, cited with well-aimed conviction in A City of Professions, such as the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), which are inherent to the essence of the liberal professions, as specified by UMPL President Eric Thiry at the second edition of the National Congress of Professions (2020).
With this book, the architect Jordi Ludevid reflects with academic rigour, laudable enthusiasm and profound hope on the need to rethink the relationship that exists today between cities and the professions, highlighting the Greco-Roman origins and the ties that once existed between the burgs and the guilds, and proposing a roadmap to achieve the participation of our subsector in the decisions that both governments and public authorities have taken in the past and, unfortunately, are still taking in the present without taking into account the expert opinions of the people who dedicate their professional lives to safeguarding the general interest, protecting health and guaranteeing people’s safety.
As a masterful thinker of our times, Jordi Ludevid does not remain anchored in the immediate future. After diving into the profession he knows best, architecture, he looks toward the horizon using the longest zoom lens, in order to recommend a more than likely antidote to the de-professionalisation that is creeping up on us: the alliance between professions. With social agents. With public and private institutions. All of this, to promote the foundation of a citizenry with critical thinking and, above all, with robust rights. The kind that the 21st century and the ever-changing world in which we live deserve.
Victoria Ortega
President of Unión Profesional
Vice-President of CEPLIS
Vice-President of UMPL
Our Common Space
Jordi Ludevid, my predecessor, a good friend and colleague, asked me as dean of the Architects’ Association of Catalonia to write a foreword for his book A City of Professions. For me, it is both a duty and a pleasure. There is no doubt that one of the association’s objectives is to give visibility to its professionals and their research. It is also a pleasure because Jordi Ludevid, an architect who has held every possible institutional post over 20 long years, and I have long shared a firm commitment to our beloved profession: architecture.
The structure and the summary of the book demonstrate the immense and original work it offers to us all. Where words bridge gaps and silences undermine, we have been silent for too long. From Hippocrates to Max Weber, understanding our origins has made us more human. Professional practice today shows us how the boundaries between different professional disciplines are blurring. And it also shows us how transversality is taking place in neighbourhoods and cities. And how professionals are joining forces, sharing and generating knowledge to respond to the needs of the present and, especially, of future generations.
In parallel, Jordi Ludevid describes a positive and important story for our profession as artisans of habitability: the main guarantor of the development of a modern institutional and professional project. Through a very detailed, in-depth and global analysis, he gives visibility to the professions, vindicating them as an integral and indispensable part of society – a part that is often invisible, forgotten or simply unrecognised. He describes six missions that support the participation of professionals as essential to the proper functioning of society because they provide practical knowledge and civic responsibility.
The analysis of the current reality of professional associations provides concepts to be debated in order to define the future of professional organisations in our current context. The tools are deontology, self-regulation and prescription at the European level. And it falls to all of us to recognise the process of individualisation that is resulting, among other effects, in the diversification of the modes of professional practice. The underlying problem is the «real» reality, the civic knowledge that professionals represent; it is the citizenry, it is the city.
Professions and progress, as this book shows us, go hand in hand. From this convergence we discover how the role of professionals is and will remain key in the definition of medium and long-term social strategies characterised by innovation, creativity and the contribution of added value in a world that is facing pressing challenges.
The fight against climate change, social inequalities or the creation of sustainable communities are some of these challenges, already recognised among the Sustainable Development Goals. And the professions have a very important role to play in solving them. Cities are the setting and the point of intersection where all the resources must be employed with maximum agility and precision, with maximum efficiency. Today, as humanity is immersed in the struggle against the COVID-19 health crisis and the associated economic crisis, this book offers an exciting narrative and lays out paths that give us hope.
Thus, we should applaud it and give thanks for the generosity of the effort that went into this book and its content, which is unprecedented and original – and also necessary. In response, the COAC is reasserting its commitment to continue building bridges of collaboration with all the professions. After all, architecture is a spatial art, an art of space, where we all come together, where human rights and global challenges are decided and substantiated: the city. As we are all a part of the necessary change, there is no time to lose. Thank you, Jordi.
Assumpció Puig i Hors
Dean of the Architects’ Association of Catalonia
Filling a Gap
There are hardly any studies on the history, nature and function of the professions, despite the fact that the subject is of the utmost theoretical and practical importance. The professions are, from a private perspective, the way most people earn their living; and from a public perspective, the system of professions is what shapes a modern and prosperous country. This gap is brilliantly filled by Jordi Ludevid’s book, which is particularly welcome for this reason. It is also on target in presenting its subject in the sphere that is most appropriate to it, the municipal sphere, hence the title A City of Professions. Moreover, it does not limit itself to an isolated presentation of the subject matter but links it to another issue that is of the utmost interest, the citizenry. Because the members of a community must aspire to be citizens as well as professionals: professionals who carry out a trade, in which they provide a service and receive remuneration and, at the same time, or even before that, citizens who are aware of their dignity, which is priceless. And this book does not merely lay the groundwork for a definition the professional fact and its characteristics; by connecting professional activity with the duties of citizenship, it creates the context for a civic vision of the professions.
Javier Gomá
Philosopher
Director of the Juan March Foundation
An Unprecedented Contribution
Jordi Ludevid’s book is an unprecedented and original contribution to the study of professionalism as the constitutive virtue of a new citizenship, demanding and committed to the needs of our time. In the analysis of professional excellence, the usual approach is to focus on aspects related to expert or technical knowledge, not on the exercise of an activity that takes place in democratic contexts, and which answers to the common good. Beyond developing the specialised knowledge that attests to their competence in their field of work, good professionals contribute to generating an ethos, a way of being and doing, which lends a special character to the space in which they carry out their activity. That space is the city, the place where people with diverse interests live together under a shared commitment, by virtue of which, in addition to acquiring an identity as lawyers, journalists, architects or doctors, they assume their responsibilities regarding what we have come to call civic duties.
As an architect and a connoisseur of professional associations, the author of A City of Professions offers a reflection on the mission of professionals as the backbone of contemporary cities. Now more than ever, in the midst of the coronavirus crisis, we need texts like this one that force us to rethink the various missions of professional life as a whole, from a perspective that aims to show the values of interdisciplinarity and the ethical dimension inherent in human beings, whatever their profession and the work they do.
Victoria Camps
Philosopher
Justification
The images that precede each of the 10 chapters of this book correspond to the design panels for the 10 facilities included in the Heritage Park Project of the Sèquia de Manresa (2002). The director of the project was Jordi Ludevid, architect, and the author of the design panels was Cristina Murta, architect.
The Sèquia de Manresa is a medieval canal that has been carrying water taken from the Llobregat River from Balsareny to Manresa since the 14th century. It is 22.2 kilometres long and has a small difference in height of 10 metres; it has now been transformed into a scenic trail and a linear park. The 10 facilities, which were designed in collaboration with the architect Álvaro Siza Vieira, invite visitors to observe and appreciate the current complex landscapes through a detailed discovery of their structure, morphology and heritage. They form 10 stages of a single trail and a single journey. By the end of the route, they convey and fully explain the creation and meaning of the city at its heart, Manresa.
A City of Professions is also conceived as an itinerary and as a journey through the professional world, which ultimately leads to cities. In our case, the 10 chapters of the book are the 10 facilities. Each of them lets us approach a different layer of the varied and complex landscapes of professional activity. A professional fact that was born in the polis and that only makes sense within it.
Jordi Ludevid
I. La Resclosa dels Manresans (13th century)
The origins, the zero point, the source of the canal and the path
of the water, an initial control and a transverse route.
I. Introduction
Today, professional activity directly affects more than two million members of professional associations in Spain, more than 350 million in the world. They make up 4.3% of the total Spanish population and 25% of the working population. If we add those professionals who are not members of a professional association, the figures double. And if we also consider those working in the many trades that are now considered professionals, the figures are even higher. Thus, the group ultimately makes up a very large, unsuspected, decisive majority, which easily exceeds 50% of the working population – and of voters – in large cities all over the world.
Professionals are not, therefore, a minority; they are a central core component of the middle classes and of society as a whole. As Talcott Parsons states, «the professional complex, although incomplete in its development, is already the most important component of the structure of modern societies.»1 And yet, despite all this, the professional complex is still largely being neglected, if not blatantly ignored or even undermined.
In recent decades, there have been very few studies undertaken from within the professional world itself. In fact, they have been practically non-existent.2 However, it seems clear that reflections «from the inside» would offer a less disciplinary or academic vision; and although it might be less specialised, the perspective would be inspiring and much more practical and holistic, and more political.
In any case, if professionalism as a democratic virtue were recognised as a crucial, truly essential social need, as no doubt it should be, this recognition would soon be extended to professionals and professions, leading to a reconsideration of the professional fact as a whole.
However, a number of disturbing questions come to mind, chaotically and in droves, in the face of this panorama: Do governments today guarantee the economic, social and educational rights of their professionals? Aren’t the serious problems they are facing today also urban and global problems, social and political problems? Aren’t the same problems experienced in other similar realities such as by the self-employed, small and medium-sized businesses, and civil servants? And, besides, isn’t every city and every neighbourhood a site for the action, interaction, and amalgam of the practice of the different professions? And aren’t the professions today practised within a globalised network society and in a completely different context? Finally, have national governments and cities around the world ensured the continuity of know-how and craftsmanship, trades and professions during the period from the 19th century to the present day?
One thing is clear: in the face of social emergencies and pandemics, the professions always rise to the challenge. But why do we only remember them in a crisis? What is a profession? How does a mere technician or expert differ from a professional? Is the professional fact relevant today in a world of cities and at a time that is completely conditioned by digital disruption and a public health crisis? What does it mean to say, «We are not heroes, we are professionals»?
Curiously, seeking out and finding answers to these troubling questions requires an unknown, long, uncertain and intense journey of discovery, not only into the past, but also into the very different, and sometimes dramatic, context in which professions and trades are practised around the world today.
1 Talcott Parsons (1902-1979) was an American sociologist who continued the work of Max Weber and Émile Durkheim, arguing that professional activity fundamentally shaped modern liberalism.
2 A recent reflection, somewhat difficult to categorise, seems to have been come from close to the professional world, although it does not have great faith in its future: The Future of Professions, by Daniel and Richard Susskind, Oxford University Press, 2015. In response, the psychologist Howard Gardner opened an interesting debate at Harvard University: Is There a Future for the Professions? An Interim Verdict, Harvard University, 2015, available at: https://howardgardner.com/2015/12/11/a-future-for-the-professions/.
II. The Conangle aqueduct
14th-century heritage element, masonry structure,
a car park, a belvedere.
II. Recovering the Words
Since the end of the 19th century and throughout the 20th, the professional fact has been studied extensively from the perspective of sociology and moral philosophy, from ethics and from the world of law. Herbert Spencer, Max Weber, Émile Durkheim and, more recently, Miguel Herrero y Rodríguez de Miñón, Richard Sennett, Donald Schön, Victoria Camps, Adela Cortina, Javier Gomá and Augusto Hortal are just some examples.
However, from the beginning of the 20th century to the present day, the period in which the professional phenomenon has grown exponentially, there have been practically no reflections that have come from within, and there have been very few congresses or colloquia on the subject. As a result, the professional phenomenon is, in reality, ostensibly unknown, even from within its own institutions.
In order to examine it, we will need to put together a puzzle of elements that are completely scattered, in order to construct a coherent and contemporary overview, which can offer a certain contrast with the academic studies that are currently available, developed mainly from the fields of sociology and moral philosophy. Reflections that will support dissemination and debate in a language that is much closer to the daily reality of professionals and citizens. It is as though sociology and philosophy were never discussed by sociologists and philosophers, but only by others. It is odd.
The interpretation of this institutional silence regarding the professions is by no means self-evident. One should not assume that it is part of a decline, a dearth of proposals, a perplexity or an absence of enthusiasm and conviction that needs to be remedied. On the contrary, it is preferable to believe that the reason is not that institutions have nothing to say, or that they are afraid to say it, but that they are waiting for an opportunity to do so.
And yet, while all this is happening, the key words professional, professionalism, professions, seem to have been lost or overshadowed. These pages are a reflection that posits a possible, though by no means certain, recovery.
Thus, in the face of such a far-reaching challenge, it is inspiring to recall George Steiner3 and Paul Virilio4 in their shared answer to the question of how to regenerate democracy: «recovering the words». And furthermore, according to the urbanist Virilio, «by recovering the city». However, recovering the words is, in this case, a long and uncertain journey, a drawn-out exercise, which of course involves specific challenges.
3 George Steiner (1929-2020), humanist, writer and philosopher of language.
4 Paul Virilio (1932-2018), urban planner and philosopher.
The Challenges
Maps
The first challenge is precisely the complex nature of the professional fact, its variable geometry and its variable intensity, behind the three key words in question. Indeed, we must take into account the commonalities, but also the differences, between professionalism, professionals and professions, three words that define the professional fact as a whole, even if they evoke different worlds and have a bearing on different groups. And yet, in order to have a complete and sensible, useful and wide-ranging, meaningful vision of the professional fact, it is advisable to refer to all three, because as they are essential, they stand as complementary, interdependent and united.
Simplifying notably and following Victoria Camps and Donald Schön, professionalism would be «a democratic virtue available to all, but also an art»; a professional would be «an expert with values (virtues), committed to practical knowledge and to people and who does not act alone»; and, finally, a profession, «the set of professionals at the service of the same internal good or public mission, who share an institution and end up also sharing a common character (ethos)». The three words are certainly related and interdependent, but their actual sociological scope, their objective and subjective audience, is different. Who are we addressing, then? What and who are we really talking about?
To help us we can turn to maps. Although, as Paul Valéry argued, «the simple is false and the complex unusable», thinking by mapping has been established as beneficial in an intermediate space. Maps provide an interpretation of reality which, without exhausting it, also describes it. Often, a new and surprising vision appears before our eyes. Thus, reflecting on the professional fact would be based, first of all, on the maps corresponding to these three key words: professionalism, professionals, professions.
The map of professionalism would reflect the enormous potential importance of the professional fact, far beyond academia, with a greater quantitative scope and a greater sphere of influence than the number of members of professional associations – and even non-members, who are, evidently, much larger in number than the professions. Professionalism, a job well done, encompasses much more than just professionals and professions.
A second map would correspond to the recognition and location of professionals, which includes, as we stated before, more than two million members of professional associations in Spain alone – around 4.3% of the national population. If we extrapolate this percentage to the world population, we would be talking about some 350 million professionals in the world, all of them linked institutionally in a complex system, which is very much in need of improvement, but which is real and global. Furthermore, and although not all university graduates become professionals, university enrolment in the world increased by 53% during the period 2000-2009 according to UNESCO, with 262 million students expected by 2025. With the number of university students in the world standing at 153 million in 2009, we can deduce that the socialisation and massification of professionals is an evident and growing, proven fact. To give an example, there are around 3.5 million architects in the world, and around 70,000 in Spain.
Moreover, according to some sociologists this 4.3% of the total population represents around 25% of the active population, a spectacular figure. This percentage is even higher in cities and much higher in large cities or global cities. In fact, in large global cities all over the world, professionals already make up a majority of the working population and also of voters. We are not talking, therefore, about a minority, but rather, as Talcott Parsons states, «the most important component of modern societies». It is not brash but reasonable to affirm that cities are mainly and hegemonically made up of professionals, thus embodying true cities of professions.
Finally, there would be a third map, which would be a list of all the existing professions in the world. Depending on the criteria and the strictness of their recognition, which is not standardised, this list would be difficult and variable, debatable and complex: some 530 professions in Europe; some 320 in Spain; but only 40 professions that are certified, licensed and regulated in our country and in the European Union.5 This third map would reflect the enormous diversity and internal institutional complexity that characterises the world of professions and trades. If we also take into account the fact that the engineering professions in Spain have specialised by subdividing, and that there are now 18, nine short-cycle and nine long-cycle, then we are talking about something much more specific and limited. There are 40 regulated professions, and if we considered engineering as a single profession, there would be 23. A chart produced by the technical services of Unión Profesional in 2017 further clarifies the reality of regulated professions in Spain. According to this study, there are 300 or more certified professions in Spain: 125 professions regulated under Annex 8 of Royal Decree 2006; 80 licensed professions; 44 with the dual status of regulated and standardised; 50 chartered professions with a recognised professional charter; and, finally, 33 professions associated with Unión Profesional.
Legal Cultures
A second difficulty and a second challenge stems from the fact that there are different legal cultures in the world, which greatly affects the treatment of the subject that concerns us.6 And although a subsequent in-depth analysis relativises these differences, the starting points, the common clichés, the initial «assumptions», are different and constitute a certain impediment, a difficulty. At least in Europe, we might say that there are two main cultural and popular models in this respect: one running from public law to private law (Southern, Latin countries, influenced by the Napoleonic codes and Roman law) and the other running in the opposite direction, from private law to public law (Northern countries, Anglo-Saxon culture). In both cases, professional institutions assert themselves and always see themselves as conspicuous members of civil society, but the fact is that they all have, or aspire to have, a public mandate and a special relationship with the State.
«Without the ‘What’ There is no ‘How’»
Finally, within the professions, a third difficulty is the dichotomy between the «what» and the «how» of the professional fact. In the world of professional institutions, reflections are generally focused on the «how» (legal and economic realities, legal and institutional problems), but very little on the «what» (the components of professionalism, professional autonomy, a job well done, its artistic foundation,7 craftsmanship, personal self-determination). A «what» that, due to its importance (without the «what» there is no «how»), must be clearly recognised and claimed, updated and promoted, in the wake of the «triumph of the markets», to quote Howard Gardner’s well-known expression, in the wake of the digital revolution and, above all, in the wake of individualisation,8 job insecurity and bureaucratisation. Our response to the clash between two worlds – that of the new economy and cybernetics on the one hand, and that of the aretè9 and craftsmanship10 on the other – seems to be individual, silent or aggressive depending on the circumstances; we are often indignant, nearly always dejected and pensive.
The Debate
There are currently too many unanswered questions in our workplaces and in our professional institutions. And it is a fact that most university students or graduates, if they were asked, would not have an answer either. There has been an obvious «eclipse», an «overshadowing» of the professional fact. It is true that the terms professionalism, profession and professional are used profusely, but in general with a lack of knowledge of their meaning and history, their legal regime and the profound reality of their rights and obligations. And, above all, it is a failure to recognise their powerful capacity to articulate and structure society, cities and the network society.
Given the present circumstances, therefore, it is significant that there is no lively debate and no flow of this information in universities,11 schools, faculties and professional bodies. With notable exceptions, the academic world lives in its own bubble and so does the world of professional associations. There has been no systematic, productive and clearheaded dialogue between them in order to educate and train not «experts, theoreticians, academics» but professionals, i.e., citizens specialised in a practical, people-oriented knowledge.
During this possible debate, we will need to pay close attention to some fundamental aspects of the context, regarding which there is still little awareness and limited reflection, and which have a decisive influence on the present and future of professional activity: namely, cities and the network society. Exploring the profound and strategic relationship, if any, between the professional fact and cities and the network society would undoubtedly offer a more precise and up-to-date picture of the professional fact and of the professions, which would of course also be absolutely fundamental in the effort toward recovering the words.
Finally, it is remarkable, and at the same time little known, unrecognised, that some very important and significant voices from the academic and cultural world have clearly positioned themselves in favour of the professional fact. Surely the time has come to take a step forward and publicly align with them, facilitating and proposing the foundations for a debate that is entirely necessary for regeneration.
5 Not all specialised social collectives have organised themselves into professions. Some have organised themselves into guilds, trade unions or other forms of organisation.
6 This is a significant difficulty. See, for example, Jordi Ludevid, «Madrid-Barcelona», La Vanguardia, 14 July 2018. https://www.lavanguardia.com/local/barcelona/20180714/45879395252/madrid-barcelona.html
7 In the sense of creating and responding to new and uncertain situations.
8 The concept of individualisation, introduced and discussed in sociology by Castells, Bauman, Beck and others, is key to describing the current moment, the network society and the new citizenship.
9 Greek for ‘excellence’, ‘virtue’.
10 The contributions of the American philosopher and educator Donald Schön regarding the training of professionals are fundamental. See La formación de profesionales reflexivos, Barcelona: Paidós, 1992.
11 «Research has distanced itself from professional practice. The crisis of confidence in the professions and their training institutions is rooted in the prevailing epistemology of practice» (Schön, Ibid.).
III. The Sallent dump
The landscape of salt mining, of industry, the 20th century,
the valley ends, the plain begins... A crossroads.
III. A Long History
The poet expressed it in a single verse: «He who loses his origins, loses his identity». Indeed, in order to understand the professional phenomenon and to engage in a reflection based on a relatively solid foundation, we need to situate the professions in their historical context, to understand their past and their evolution in order to assess and analyse them before interpreting their future. Where do we come from? What is the professional phenomenon and what has it been historically? What is its legal and conceptual nature?
We have come to call thoughtful remembrance historical memory or collective memory. Knowing the past empowers us. In today’s world, recovering our memory, and with it the meaning of the professions, is a potentially enlightening exercise for everyone, and in a special sense for cities too. Although it is little known or has been forgotten, the professional fact was born in cities, in the Greco-Roman polis, and to support them – a public connection which continued up until the 19th century.
Curiously, and all too often, we have taken on responsibilities in institutions or associations with a certain historical and conceptual ignorance of the essence of what we were dealing with. This has undoubtedly weakened our leadership performance. However, we can make up for this lack, brought about by the absence of an updated and contemporary historical narrative, by investigating a reality that often is not what it seems or what people say about it. We need to disseminate a contemporary narrative on a regular basis, perhaps in a regulated manner. As things stand, failing to recover our historical memory is tantamount to denying it. For, indeed, «he who loses his origins, loses his identity».
More than 100 years have passed since the sociologist Max Weber wrote his well-known theses on professionals in 1905: The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism.12 Since then, the world has changed a lot, it goes without saying. So, too, have the professions, of course, although that may not always seem to be the case due to the prevalence, in certain fields, of some poorly understood, vaguely «Weberian», theses. A profession is more than just a way of earning a living.
The following brief historical journey takes us from Hippocrates to Cicero and from Cicero to Max Weber, through the Middle Ages and the Napoleonic university to the present-day network society. In other words, from Greece to Rome, from Rome to the Middle Ages and from the Middle Ages to the Protestant Reformation, the nation state and industrialisation. And through outsourcing and digitalisation to the present day.
12 Max Weber, The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism (Penguin, 2002), first published in 1905.