Customer Care in a Consumer Society: Smiling and Sometimes Meaning it?

This article proposes a focus for research by drawing on two emerging and largely distinct streams of literature-on service/emotion work and organizations in consumer society. In particular, experiences of `customer care' and related `corporate culture' initiatives are examined. Here, employee ambivalence is highlighted and is typically portrayed in terms of: protecting a privileged or `real' sense of self; (re-)asserting control; and/or as...