This is a timely and comprehensive collection of essays on professions, mainly in the fields of law and medicine, by an established academic. For the first time these hard to find or out of print papers are available in one place and are the culmination of the author's best work in the field.

Contents: Series editor's preface; Foreword; The legacy of Parsons and Hughes; Accomplishing profession; 'Atrocity stories' and professional relationships; 'In the beginning was the work...': reflections on the genesis of occupations; A respectable profession? Sociological and economic perspectives on the regulation of professional services; Closing the market: licensure and English pharmacy, 1794-1868; Herbert Spencer and the professions: occupational ecology reconsidered; Professions and social order in a global society; After the Fall...: capitulating to the routine in professional work; In memory of Eliot Freidson: is 'professional dominance' an obsolete concept?; Endnotes; Bibliography; Indexes.

Robert Dingwall is Professor of Sociology and Director of IGBiS at the University of Nottingham, UK. He has edited/authored many books including co-authoring Qualitative Methods and Health Policy Research (2003).