I think of "politics" as being the relations between groups of people, the matter of who likes whom in a larger sense. The other day, I heard a description of what might be called professional politics as it is between different sorts of physicians. Much of my skimpy grasp of medical and hospital life comes from watching "Scrubs". I realize that may not be the best source of understanding social and political relations between branches of medicine. I remember an episode when a dermatologist was finally able to yell "Let me through, I am a dermatologist!" There is the matter of relative and traditional prestige between specializations and that is found throughout life between all groups and subgroups that I know anything about
I do have some appreciation of social and political differences between other professional or occupational groups. I was an elementary teacher, the 5th grade. Later, over a 37 year period, I taught many undergraduates who were on their way to becoming primary, elementary, middle school or high school teachers. As they began their training, they acted as undergraduates do, college students. After they began teaching and got a few years of experience, they developed more feelings about their level and type of teaching being naturally superior, trickier, more demanding, more mature, more fun than other types of teachers. Of course, it is difficult to be part of a group and not learn some of the social ways of that group. Besides, a 4th grade teacher may have a student who is both bright and eager to learn. Meeting that same person later, say at a high school athletic event, only to find he strongly dislikes school, can't wait to be finished with schooling, rarely reads, it is easy to ask what other teachers did or failed to do to keep that bright flame seen in grade 4 burning. Natural development, home and other sources may be a cause of a change in interest in learning but some will suspect higher level teachers are at fault. Meanwhile, the higher level teachers suspect that the foundation of the kid's learning or something wasn't laid correctly.
I expect different sorts of librarians, machinists and other groups have their inner convictions about the relative difficulties of their work, public and inter-group prestige and reputation. I ran across the word "consilience" in connection with these between-group opinions and relations but it seems the word is used for many other things, too.
