Self-Tracking as the Mobilisation of the Social for Capital Accumulation

This chapter will investigate the ways in which self-tracking (ST) systems are presented as a means of enabling corporate wellness (CW) initiatives to mobilise the productive potential of “the social”. Critical Discourse Analysis is used to unpick how good managers and organisations are construed as those who find ways to stimulate social interactions and invest them with meaning while directing them in a way which will serve the overall interests of the employer. ST interventions are presented as a key tool for reconfiguring social networks in a productive and healthy fashion with individual subjects presented as automatic and reactive. ST CW is thus aligned with a “connexionist” philosophywhich is already prominent in management discourse.