Convenors:

Alistair Mutch (lead)

Bernard Leca

Giuseppe Delmestri

Ideas drawing on the philosophical tradition of critical realism have been making steady progress in the study of management and organizations. A highly successful seminar series on critical realism in action has won research council funding in the UK and has attracted significant numbers of researchers, especially PhD students, interested in what this perspective can offer them. While the ideas have found most purchase in the UK, researchers in other parts of the world have also started to draw upon these ideas (Van de Ven 2007). And yet in recent publications focused on critical management studies critical realism has merited only a passing mention (Brooke 2009; Kelemam and Rumens 2007). This stream aims to tease out the relationship between critical realism and the critical management tradition in the belief that there is much to be gained on both sides.

Accordingly, papers are sought which, consistent with the broader themes of the conference, tackle one of the following three broad themes:

What barriers are there to using critical realism in practice?

Ideas drawn from the critical realist tradition are often deployed in theoretical arguments and make claims for their efficacy in understanding the world of management and organizations, but even those who have used them to address concrete situations have expressed their concern about how such ideas can be operationalised effectively (Horrocks 2009). We believe such empirical use needs more examples that would clearly show what sort of insights empirical researchers might anticipate from using CR. To do so, we seek papers which reflect on the use of ideas derived from critical realism, especially notions such as causal mechanisms, emergent properties, and processes of morphogenesis and morphostasis to explore issues of management and organization from a critical perspective. We are particularly interested in empirical studies using critical realism that articulate its concepts with method.

How does critical realism relate to other theoretical traditions?

Strictly speaking, critical realism sees itself as a philosophical tradition committed to ‘under-labouring’ for substantive theories, for example by helping to clarify concepts. Accordingly, under this theme we seek papers which consider how extant theories which might shed light on critical management themes might articulate with ideas drawn from critical realism. So, for example, there has recently been a call for those in the neo-institutionalist tradition to engage more with critical management (Lawrence, Suddaby and Leca 2009). How might critical realism facilitate such an engagement, or how might it help develop other approaches?

 How critical is critical realism?

The focus on under-labouring suggests that critical realism’s contribution to being ‘critical’ is about conceptual clarification. Indeed, the term was first applied in the context of philosophical debate (in opposition to Kant’s critical idealism). This means that critical realism might in theory be consistent with a range of approaches (as Collier (1994) has argued). However, there is a strong affinity to emancipatory concerns within much of the critical realist tradition, but one which is also accompanied by doubts. Specifically, internal critics have argued that the tradition needs to engage more with how ideas are articulated with practical political action. Papers are sought which engage with this debate and with what critical realism can bring to the broader project of critical management, including emerging issues such as the performative potential of the critical agenda and the way it can be released (Spicer, Alvesson and Kärreman, 2009).

 For all papers, the convenors will be looking for fit with the broader concerns of the conference as well as their contribution to the ongoing debates about the nature of critical realism. They will also be looking for an open and reflexive stance which is not afraid to question cherished assumptions.

 Submission of abstracts

 Abstracts should be no longer than 1,000 words including references. They should be submitted as an email attachment to the lead convenor. Abstracts will be reviewed by the convening team drawing upon external expertise as necessary. The deadline for submission is November 30 2010, with decisions on acceptance being notified to conference organisers by 31 January 2011.

Lead convenor: Alistair Mutch, Nottingham Trent University, UK

Alistair is Professor of Information and Learning. He is widely published in the domains of information systems and organization theory, seeking to deploy ideas derived from Archer’s morphogenetic approach. His ‘Technology, organization and structure - a morphogenetic approach’ was published in Organization Science in 2009, showing the application of ideas drawn from social theory to the substantive domain of information systems. Alistair.mutch@ntu.ac.uk

Bernard Leca, Rouen Business School, France

Bernard is Associate Professor in the Department of Management and Strategy at Rouen Business School. With Phillipe Naccache he contributed an article on ‘A critical realist approach to institutional entrepreneurship’ to the influential 2006 special issue of Organization. More recently, he has engaged with the institutional work approach, co-editing a collection of papers with Tom Lawrence and Roy Suddaby. blc@rouenbs.fr

 
Giuseppe Delmestri, University of Bergamo, Italy

Giuseppe is Associate Professor for Organization Theory in the Faculty of Economics and Business Administration of Bergamo University. His interest in conceptual clarification and emancipatory concerns found recent expression in the article ‘Institutional streams, logics, and fields’ published in the 2009 issue of Research in the Sociology of Organizations on ‘Institutions and Ideology’. giuseppe.delmestri@unibg.it

Joe O’Mahoney, University of Cardiff, UK

Joe is Lecturer in Organization Studies at Cardiff and a Fellow of the Advanced Institute of Management, and has a particular interest in the application of ideas drawn from critical realism to the study of identity and the self. He organized the ESRC supported seminar at Cardiff on ‘realism, identity and the self’ in March 2010 and has recently finished a book for Oxford University Press on management consulting. joeomahoney@gmail.com

References

Brooke, Carole (ed) (2009) Critical Management Perspectives on Information Systems, Butterworth-Heinemann, Oxford.

Collier, Andrew (1994) Critical Realism: An Introduction to Roy Bhaskar's Philosophy, Verso, London

Delmestri, Giuseppe (2009): Institutional streams, logics and fields. Research in the Sociology of Organizations, 27, 99–128.

Frauley, Jon and Frank Pearce (eds), (2007) Critical Realism and the social sciences: heterodox elaborations, University of Toronto, Toronto,

Horrocks, Ivan (2009). ‘Applying the morphogenetic approach: outcomes and issues from a case study of information systems development and organisational change in British local government’. Journal of Critical Realism, 8(1), pp. 35–62.

Keleman, Mihaela and Nick Rumens, (2007) An introduction to critical management research, Sage, London.

Lawrence, Thomas,  Roy Suddaby and Bernard Leca (eds) (2009) Institutional work: actors and agency in institutional studies of organizations, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge

Spicer, André,  Mats Alvesson and Dan Kärreman (2009) Critical performativity: The unfinished business of critical management studies. Human Relations. 62(4): 537–560.