The transmission of prudence know-how under stress A critical look at professionalisation in the chemical industries

The paper explores the process by which a prudence know-how as a specific approach to health and safety is developed. Based on a corpus of interviews conducted with workers and technicians from two chemical workshops, the author analyses how professional rules and skills integrating the prudence know-how are transmitted. This can be facilitated or prevented by organisational factors. He brings evidence of the conflictual dimension of the professionalisation process.