When will he say: “Today the plates are soft”? the management of ambiguity and situated decision-making

Abstract

The article proposes a method for ethnographic studies based on “interview with the double”. This approach suggests interpreting the cognitive process of collective decision-making as a situated activity, and provides an interpretive description of “quota restriction” as management of ambiguity. The linguistic constract “today the plates are soft” emphasises the social function of this symbolic phrase, internally to Signor Rossi's occupational community as a symbol producing collective identity and social bonding, and externally as a menas to control power relations with management. For the action “quota restriction” to occur (or not) full agrecment on values and meanings is not necessary; an unstable minimal accord may be sufficient in so far as it stems from a negotiating process which manages: a) the ambiguity inherent in the social process of interpreting; b) the ambiguity of the implicature from one interpretation to others; c) the ambiguity of implementing the action.