Organization

This paper explores the growing critique of postmodernism within organization studies. It first outlines central aspects of this critique, such as the allegation that postmodernism tends towards a reactionary stance, its dubious epochal status and the incompatibility of postmodernist epistemology with `serious' organizational analysis. The paper pays particular attention to the conflict between postmodern epistemology and the need for action, since it is argued that this remains a central dilemma created by postmodernist debates. Feminist discourse is drawn on in order to examine the difficulties, as well as the possibilities, of squaring postmodern epistemology with action. The remainder of the paper focuses on the critique of postmodernism within organization studies, and relates this critique to the work of feminist writers.

This paper argues that contemporary organizational research and theorizing are circumscribed by the ontological commitments of being-realism. Being-realism is a fundamental ontological posture which asserts the primacy of `things', `entities', `events', `generative mechanisms', etc., as making up our material and social world. It underwrites the dominant academic predisposition which treats relatively unproblematic notions such as `the organization', its `goals', `environment', `strategies', etc., as theoretically legitimate objects of analysis. It also underwrites the preoccupations of organizational `meta-theorists' who impute an objective existence to their self-generated typologies and paradigmatic schemas and then proceed to compare them as if the ontological status of their objects of analyses were unproblematic. More recent reflexive organization theorists who draw attention to the ideological character of theories of organization do much to undermine the epistemological status of representationalist epistemology. However, they fail to address the ontological character of the problem of reflexivity. It is argued here that one way out of this reflexivity quagmire is to recognize the primacy of a becoming-realism in which the processual becoming of things is given a fundamental role in the explanatory schema. Our attention is thereby redirected to an examination of the workings of primary organizing micro-practices which generate stabilized effects such as `truth', `knowledge', `individuals' and `organizations'. In this expanded realm of organization theory the study of such reality-constituting practices becomes a central focus.

This paper seeks to use C.P. Snow's Strangers and Brothers novel sequence as a resource to demonstrate aspects of organizational life and, in particular, the social practices of managers. The paper begins with a discussion of the case for using fiction in organizational analysis. Then, Snow's novels, following an overview, are explored in two major ways. First, Snow's account of decision-making in organizations is shown to be a subtle and incisive account of group processes, which is sensitive to the dialectic of structure and agency. Second, the development of the novel sequence is shown to indicate something of the dissolution of the modernist scientific rationality which has dominated management and organization theory and practice. Thus the paper aspires to persuade that there is an interest in Snow's fiction for organizational analysis and, more generally, that it is desirable to use fictional representations within the academic study of management and organizations.

This paper suggests that the work of management gurus resembles the performance of a witchdoctor. Central to the work of management gurus is the achievement of transformations of consciousness among their audiences of managers. The view of management gurus offered in this paper has three elements: (1) the key to understanding the power and impact of gurus is to see what they do as a performance; (2) that this performance is of a particular kind-that of a witchdoctor; (3) that management gurus act as the functional equivalents to witchdoctors in modern organizations. The paper argues that at the heart of the guru performance there lies a concern for, and an emphasis on, the irrational, emotional and symbolic aspects of organization. Successful gurus have always known and exploited what this article is arguing-that success depends upon the magic and mystery of the performance.

Civil society is analysed from an organizational perspective. Many ideas about the quality of interaction in civil society are similar to ideas about how to create excellent organizations. Although there is no clear definition of civil society, it is first of all understood in contrast to the state. Organizational forms mentioned in connexion with civil society, such as voluntary associations, new social movements and networks, are analysed. None, however, has proved to be without restrictions inherent in all organizations. The quality of civil society cannot exceed the quality of its organizational forms. I conclude that the structures of civil society are not persistent. Civil society exists through the coincidence of several processes in the interaction between people and organizations, and the notion of civil society is not more incompatible with the state than with other organizational arrangements. On the other hand, there are no organizational forms to assure a permanent establishment of civil society.

This paper takes a critical look at current research on buyer- supplier relations and argues that the research to date is limited in its helpfulness in understanding contemporary changes in inter-organizational relations in three important respects. First, owing to the concentration of research effort in particular industrial sectors and cases, it is hard to extrapolate the findings to industry in general. Second, an oversimplification of the structure and dynamics of buyer-supplier relations tends to underplay the roles of perceptions, choice and action on the part of supplier organizations. And, third, there is an absence of any real consideration of the impact of intra-organizational structures and processes within supplier organizations insofar as they moderate or otherwise affect supplier dependency. The aim of the paper is to incorporate key elements of organizational and inter-organizational theory into the analysis of buyer-supplier relations, in order to help develop a more complete framework for the analysis of buyer-supplier relations than exists in the literature to date.