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Navigating tensions between care and surveillance: marketers' ethical subjectivity in personalised marketing
University of Borås, Faculty of Textiles, Engineering and Business.ORCID iD: 0000-0002-5631-4688
University of Borås, Faculty of Textiles, Engineering and Business.ORCID iD: 0000-0002-0018-1185
2026 (English)In: Journal of Marketing Management, ISSN 0267-257X, E-ISSN 1472-1376Article in journal (Refereed) Epub ahead of print
Abstract [en]

Personalisation is widely celebrated for delivering relevance and efficiency, yet critiqued as a vehicle of surveillance and control. This study challenges both views by exploring how marketers construct ethical subjectivity within personalisation practices. Drawing on interviews with SME marketers and inspired by Foucault’s concept of ethical self-formation, we identify four discursive subject positions: masters of data; friends and sources of inspiration; artists; and compliance-based ethical subjects. These positions reveal how personalisation is morally justified, negotiated, and at times problematised through accounts of performance, care, creativity, and compliance. Rather than simply enacting data-driven logics, marketers draw on these repertoires in situated and sometimes contradictory ways to make sense of their practices and ethical responsibilities. By foregrounding this ambivalence, the study offers a nuanced understanding of ethical subjectivity in personalisation and highlights tensions between surveillance, care, data, and professional identity.

Place, publisher, year, edition, pages
Taylor & Francis, 2026.
Keywords [en]
Digital marketing, personalisation, surveillance, ethics, subjectivity, Foucault
National Category
Business Administration
Research subject
Business and IT; Textiles and Fashion (General)
Identifiers
URN: urn:nbn:se:hb:diva-36203DOI: 10.1080/0267257x.2026.2726334ISI: 001867260600001OAI: oai:DiVA.org:hb-36203DiVA, id: diva2:2103127
Note

Funding: The work was supported by the Hakon Swenson Stiftelsen.

Available from: 2026-09-21 Created: 2026-09-21 Last updated: 2026-09-21Bibliographically approved

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Sörum, NiklasHedegård, Lars

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CiteExportLink to record
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Citation style
  • harvard-cite-them-right
  • apa
  • ieee
  • modern-language-association-8th-edition
  • vancouver
  • Other style
More styles
Language
  • de-DE
  • en-GB
  • en-US
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  • nn-NO
  • nn-NB
  • sv-SE
  • Other locale
More languages
Output format
  • html
  • text
  • asciidoc
  • rtf