Abstract
It is not uncommon, at least since the classical work of Burrell and Morgan (1979) entitled Sociological Paradigms and Organizational Analysis (SPOA), to see terms such as philosophical, meta-theoretical, etc. alongside terms such as management, organizational studies and so on. However, it is the first time that we see philosophy together with OT, as two distinct disciplines, in the title of the book, Philosophy and Organization Theory (edited by Tsoukas and Chia, 2011; after this called POT). As the editors confirmed themselves, it is the first volume devoted explicitly ‘to questions relating to philosophy (rather than merely epistemology) and OT’ (p. 17).
Haridimos Tsoukasis is a Greek (given this nationality, publishing POT was not unexpected!) Professor of Organization Studies. He holds the Columbia Ship Management Professor of Strategic Management at the University of Cyprus, Cyprus, and Professor of Organization Studies at Warwick Business School, University of Warwick, UK. He is the editor (with Christian Knudsen) of another famous handbook in OT entitled The Oxford Handbook of Organization Theory: Meta-theoretical Perspectives (Oxford University Press, 2003; after this called OHOT). Robert Chia is the Professor of Management at the University of Strathclyde Business School and Emeritus Professor of Management, University of Aberdeen. Chia is becoming famous for his becoming ontology (e.g. Chia, 2002, 2003a, 2003b; Tsoukas and Chia, 2002).
POT is an original handbook written for scholars and thinkers who are concerned with macro-level analysis (i.e. philosophical) rather than substantial issues. Therefore, it goes without saying that you need adequate philosophical background (perhaps more than OT knowledge) to understand POT. Practically speaking, POT’s audiences are neither managers (or practitioners) who want ‘actionable knowledge’, nor students who want straightforward educational materials. POT implies the serious concern and the innovative effort of a circle constituted of OT theorists and scholars who try to combine philosophy with OT analysis.
POT consists of 13 articles (taking into account the first chapter) that each ‘explore connections between certain streams in philosophy and OT’. There is, as the editors acknowledged themselves, a ‘certain bias towards non-rationalist philosophical accounts’ in the selection of chapters, that is a limitation for a complete philosophical reflection. However, the editors have an acceptable defense for this (i.e. limited ‘availability of philosophically minded organization theorists who would be willing to write about a particular philosophy and OT’). The book begins with an analytical philosophy (Chapter 2) followed by continental philosophies (e.g. Chapters 7 and 8) and concludes with chapters (e.g. Chapter 12) that have a different approach (i.e. aimed at identifying benefits that particular philosophies can bring to organizational analysis). The majority of chapters (except Chapters 6 and 11, written by Scherer and Patzer; Shotter and Tsoukas, respectively, which are particularly concerned with praxeological issues) are devoted to more ontological and epistemological issues; and the last chapter is a distinct narrative account of Richard Rorty’s philosophy as evidenced in the work of Barbara Czarniawska.
We do not want to review the chapters in detail here; our review is aimed at assessing more fundamental aspects of POT. In this way, we try to achieve two objectives: (1) to compare POT with another valuable and meta-approach work of Tsoukas (i.e. OHOT) and (2) to evaluate the coherence and structure of POT with the focus on the first chapter (i.e. the organizing chapter).
In 2003, we witnessed a precious handbook in OT, namely OHOT, edited by Tsoukas and Knudsen with a meta-theoretical approach. In fact, after SPOA, which served as a cornerstone for the meta-approach in OT, several works were published in this challenging arena (Astley and Van de Ven, 1983; Hassard, 1993; Hassard and Pym, 1990; Pfeffer, 1982, to name but a few). Given the meta-approach adopted by Tsoukas (and his co-editors) in both OHOT and POT, we should treat them as members of the SPOA family and separate them from similar works such as Debating Organization (Westwood and Clegg, 2003) and Postmodernism and Management: Pros, Cons and the Alternative (Locke, 2003) that have a narrow and more substantial approach. OHOT was a further and deeper step towards meta-analysis in OT that went beyond SPOA, in the sense that it adopted a higher level to analysis sociological paradigms. However, there is something different with POT since it elevates the level of OT analysis to a new and somehow unknown one, where we can evaluate every paradigm, framework or theory related to OT (not merely paradigms derived from sociological school). As we will say, it seems that this philosophical vastness has caused the editors to fail in providing an organized handbook like OHOT.
In OHOT, Tsoukas and Kundsen tried to deal with five meta questions in five parts (each part addressed to a different question): (1) What is the status of OT as science? (Part I); (2) How has OT developed over time, and what structure has the field taken? (Part II); (3) How have certain well-known controversies in OT been dealt with? (Part III); (4) How, and in what ways, is knowledge generated in OT, related to action and policy? How have ethical concerns been taken into account in OT? (Part IV) and (5) What is the future of OT? (Part V). These major meta-level questions are related to exploring different aspects of OT as a scientific theory or discipline. On the contrary, POT’s main meta-question (i.e. ‘what does a particular philosophy contribute to OT?’ (p. 16)) is related to a deeper level of inquiry (i.e. philosophical inquiry) aimed at probing more foundational aspects of OT (i.e. ontology, epistemology, and praxeology). Tsoukas and Chia want to identify and enhance the connection between certain streams in philosophy and OT. However, unfortunately (as will be mentioned later) the editors limited this new valuable adventure largely to historical analyses of the connections between particular philosophies and OT and to a less extent, to benefits that particular philosophies can bring to organizational analysis.
As already mentioned, POT, perhaps because of the vastness and diverse nature of the arena, does not have a powerful organizing framework. As a matter of fact, unlike OHOT, in which the editors provided a well-structured framework in the first chapter for the rest of the handbook, there is no such great organizing framework in POT. There are no five big questions by which we can trace the sequence of the chapters. In other words, we do not know clearly what the editors want to tell us. However, if you want to find something like a (less powerful) framework in POT, the two first sentences of the introduction chapter (written by Tsoukas and Chia) are helpful, particularly the second, which explains the task of philosophy according to Whitehead. For Whitehead, ‘Philosophy is the self-correction by consciousness of its own initial excess of subjectivity’ and ‘the task of philosophy is to recover the totality obscured by the selection’. This quotation reveals the editors’ nominal approach to philosophy as well as an axis around which they organized the chapters—that is philosophy as a method of reflection. Accordingly, we can conclude that the overall mission of the chapters is to reflect philosophically on ontological, epistemological and praxeological aspects of OT in order to correct OT theorists’ ‘excess of subjectivity’. However, as will be noted, it seems that there is a kind of incongruity between the task of philosophy which the editors advocate and the way they adopted (i.e. exploring connections between particular philosophies and OT) to proceed with this task. In other words, the editors failed to remain committed to their original plan.
To clarify this point, it is worthwhile mentioning that there are two ways by which we can infuse philosophy in OT: reading philosophy and (and more important) doing philosophy. Reading philosophy does not necessarily lead to doing philosophy; an important distinction that is not considered in POT. In spite of the valuable quotation, ‘the continuation and renewal of reflective activity – not for the sake of “renewal” but because this is self-reflective activity—entails therefore the putting into question of previous results’ (p. 16) that implies doing philosophy, the main meta-question of POT indicates reading philosophy in the sense that the chapters bounded themselves to a ‘particular philosopher or philosophy’ (not to philosophical method or doing philosophy).
Obviously, we, as organizational theorists, need to study philosophy, as a discipline, but more importantly, in order to be reflective and reflexive, we need to use philosophical method rather than merely reading and using philosophers’ ideas and products. To put this in more technical terms, we can look at philosophy in two different ways: the first is to see philosophy as a product (or distinct discipline) of philosophers that we can study to infuse OT with its ideas; the second is to see philosophy as a method or process of reflection that ‘begins in wonder’ (Plato, Theaetetus, 155d and Aristotle, Metaphysics, A2 982b14ff; cited in Matthews, 1997: 213) and continues with its own method (i.e. sit and think) to reach a systematic world view. We call the first, a passive approach and the latter, an active approach. ‘Continuation and renewal of reflective activity’ requires doing philosophy (i.e. process) rather than reading particular philosophies (i.e. products). Chapter 10 is about process philosophy, although we clarify that process philosophy is a product of doing philosophy, not doing philosophy itself. That is to say, in order to be reflective, philosophical method is of essence, not philosophers’ products. In contrary to the active approach that the editors originally committed to, however, in general it seems that POT paid more attention to the passive approach.
It is not fair, however, to expect the first valuable work in this new arena (POT) to be a perfect one, encompassing all the issues and approaches. We admire the groundbreaking and innovative work of Tsoukas and Chia and recommend it to everyone who has a preoccupation with more foundational questions about OT. We are not philosophers, but we necessarily need philosophy (both as a product and more importantly, as a method). As a young field, OT has to accept philosophical method to refine and correct its mental products and to ‘keep [its] meaning open’.
We conclude this review by suggesting an active approach by which OT theorists as well as practitioners, managers, and everyone who engages with OT, can gain more benefits from philosophy in their analyses. By taking on the passive approach to philosophy, we have to accept one side in philosophical controversies for our purpose in OT analysis and inevitably reject others. In this sense, we try to adjudicate our field’s controversies by a philosophical position that seems more acceptable for the present. This is directly against the essence of true philosophy in which there is no means for terminating a philosophical controversy, unless reason (not appealing to a particular position, person, theorist or philosopher). In contrast, in the active approach, philosophy is essentially a method that we can use in our OT reflections independently from philosophical products (i.e. particular philosophies or philosophers). In this approach, philosophy is a meta-method that can apply to philosophy itself (for this reason, we can speak of metaphilosophy or philosophy of philosophy). We should sit and think about whatever we have done so far in the OT field.