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1 – 10 of 11The purpose of this paper is to explore the methodological implications of queering organizational research. The author examines three related questions: what does queering…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to explore the methodological implications of queering organizational research. The author examines three related questions: what does queering organizational research entail?; how have organizational scholars queered research to date?; and how does queering organizational research and methodologies advance our understandings of organizing processes?
Design/methodology/approach
The paper begins with an overview of queer theory, which is followed by a review of the ways in which organizational research and methodologies have been and can be queered. The paper concludes with a discussion of the value of queering organizational research and methodologies and offers research questions that can guide future research that draws from queer theory.
Findings
The author claims that methodologies are queered through a researcher’s commitment to enacting the philosophical assumptions of queer theory in a research project. Much of the value of queering methodologies lies in its disruption and critique of conventional research practices, while enabling us to explore new ways of understanding organizational life.
Originality/value
Queer theory is still nascent but growing in organizational research. To date, there has been little consideration of the methodological implications of queering organizational research. This paper discusses these implications and can thus guide future research that is informed by queer theory.
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Kingstone Nyakurukwa and Yudhvir Seetharam
The authors’ goal is to provide an overview and historical context for the various alternatives to the efficient market hypothesis (EMH) that have emerged over time. The authors…
Abstract
Purpose
The authors’ goal is to provide an overview and historical context for the various alternatives to the efficient market hypothesis (EMH) that have emerged over time. The authors found eight current alternatives that have emerged to address the EMH's flaws. Each of the proposed alternatives improves some of the assumptions made by the EMH, such as investor homogeneity, the immediate incorporation of information into asset values and the inadequacy of rationality to explain asset prices.
Design/methodology/approach
To come up with the list of studies relevant to this review article, the authors used three databases, namely Scopus, Web of Science and Google Scholar. The first two were mostly used to get peer-reviewed articles while Google Scholar was used to extract articles that are still work in progress. The following words were used as the search queries; “efficient market hypothesis” and “alternatives to the efficient market hypothesis”.
Findings
The alternatives to the EMH presented in this article demonstrate that market efficiency is a dynamic concept that can be best understood with a multidisciplinary approach. To better comprehend how financial markets work, it is crucial to draw on concepts, theories and ideas from a variety of disciplines, including physics, economics, anthropology, sociology and others.
Originality/value
The authors comprehensively summarise the current state of the behavioural finance literature on alternatives to the EMH.
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Undiscovered public knowledge is a relatively unstudied phenomenon, and the few extended examples that have been published are intradisciplinary. This paper presents the concept…
Abstract
Undiscovered public knowledge is a relatively unstudied phenomenon, and the few extended examples that have been published are intradisciplinary. This paper presents the concept of ‘facet’ as an example of interdisciplinary undiscovered public knowledge. ‘Facets’ were central to the bibliographic classification theory of S.R. Ranganathan in India and to the behavioural research of L. Guttman in Israel. The term had the same meaning in both fields, and the concept was developed and exploited at about the same time in both, but two separate, unconnected literatures grew up around the term and its associated concepts. This paper examines the origins and parallel uses of the concept and the term in both fields as a case study of interdisciplinary knowledge that could have been, but was apparently not, discovered any time between the early 1950s and the present using simple, readily available information retrieval techniques.
Javed Siddiqui and Shahzad Uddin
The purpose of this paper is to examine the state-business nexus in responses to human rights violations in businesses and questions the efficacy of the UN guiding principles on…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to examine the state-business nexus in responses to human rights violations in businesses and questions the efficacy of the UN guiding principles on human rights in businesses, in particular in the ready-made garments (RMG) industry in Bangladesh. Drawing on Cohen’s notion of “denial” and Black’s (2008) legitimacy and accountability relationships of state and non-state actors, the study seeks to explain why such “soft” global regulations remain inadequate.
Design/methodology/approach
The empirical work for this paper is based on the authors’ participation in two multiple-stakeholder advisory consultation meetings for the RMG sector in Bangladesh and 11 follow-up interviews. This is supplemented by documentary evidence on human rights disasters, responses of the state and non-state actors and human rights reports published in national and international newspapers.
Findings
The paper provides clear evidence that the state-business nexus perpetuates human rights disasters. The study also shows that the Bangladeshi state, ruled by family-led political parties, is more inclined to protect businesses that cause human rights disasters than to ensure human rights in businesses. The economic conditions of the RMG industry and accountability and legitimacy relationships between state and non-state actors have provided the necessary background for RMG owners to continue to violate the safety and security of the workplace and maintain inhumane working conditions.
Research limitations/implications
Complex state politics, including family, kinship and wealthy supporters, and economic circumstances have serious implications for the efficacy of the UN guiding principle on human rights for business. This paper calls for broader political and economic changes, nationally and internationally.
Originality/value
The study highlights the perpetuation of corporate human rights abuses by the state-business nexus, and indicates that human rights issues continue to be ignored through a discourse of denial. This is explained in terms of legitimacy and accountability relationships between state and non-state actors, bounded by complex political and economic conditions.
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Trine Susanne Johansen and Sophie Esmann Andersen
Integration is a key component within marketing‐ and corporate communication. Benefits include synergetic representations, increased credibility and transparency. However…
Abstract
Purpose
Integration is a key component within marketing‐ and corporate communication. Benefits include synergetic representations, increased credibility and transparency. However, integration may be problematic. With the purpose of re‐conceptualizing integration, this paper aims to discuss how organizational self‐understanding and self‐presentation are challenged by consumer resistance as integrative communication practices prevent organizations from fully engaging in meaningful stakeholder dialogue.
Design/methodology/approach
Framed by a cross‐disciplinary review of integration as a concept, Arla Foods' “ONE” is analyzed by way of a qualitative content analysis as an exemplary case of integrated communication. Subsequently, the case is approached from a critical consumer perspective, drawing on empirical studies of consumer responses to and conversations with Arla Foods.
Findings
An alternative approach to integration is presented replacing the notion of “one voice, one sound, one story” with an emersion of the organization into consumer narratives and market cultures. Integration is re‐conceptualized as moving from an intra‐organizational perspective towards a co‐creative perspective.
Research limitations/implications
There is a need for further re‐conceptualization of integrated communication in order to develop a theoretical framework and definition that articulates a co‐creative view on integration.
Practical implications
Re‐articulating integration based on co‐creation carries different potential consequences for communication management, e.g. listening to consumer voices, self‐reflection and co‐development.
Originality/value
The original contribution lies in re‐conceptualizing integration as moving from an intra‐organizational perspective towards a co‐creative perspective with both practical and research implications.
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Alka Gupta, Christoph Streb, Vishal K. Gupta and Erik Markin
Acting entrepreneurially in nascent industries is a complex endeavor characterized by uncertainty and ambiguity. Nevertheless, entirely new industries do emerge, often as a direct…
Abstract
Acting entrepreneurially in nascent industries is a complex endeavor characterized by uncertainty and ambiguity. Nevertheless, entirely new industries do emerge, often as a direct result of entrepreneurial behavior. We extend and apply discovery and creation approaches to study entrepreneurial behavior during industry emergence by means of qualitative analysis of a film about the personal computer (PC) industry℉s formative years. We find that discovery and creation behavior are fundamentally interrelated and share a common element: bricolage. Moreover, ideological activism is a major component of entrepreneurial behavior in a new industry℉s formative years during both creation and discovery processes. Implications for research and practice are discussed.
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This article aims to analyse how environmentalist NGOs build the figures of guilty and evil businesses in texts published on the web sites of two ironic prizes. These texts are…
Abstract
Purpose
This article aims to analyse how environmentalist NGOs build the figures of guilty and evil businesses in texts published on the web sites of two ironic prizes. These texts are good examples of criticism based on reversing and analysing semiotic productions of organisations, like advertising and environmental reports, as a part of on‐line environmentalist campaigns.
Design/methodology/approach
The article is based on textual semiotics and a semiotic‐based approach to rhetoric; the methodology is qualitative and exploratory. A part of the text published on the web sites of the two ironic prizes (Pinocchio and Angry Mermaid) are analysed in order to identify different models and strategies of criticism.
Findings
The article identifies a series of critical strategies: semantic/paradigmatic, syntagmatic/meta‐textual, referential, narrative and inter‐textual criticisms. It underlines the fact that on‐line criticism is an anti‐ideological semiotic action, which can be compared to some forms of ecological thought. Nonetheless, it is based on some forms of rhetoric and ideology, which can be analysed with semiotic tools.
Research limitations/implications
This paper presents a qualitative, exploratory analysis of two cases: results cannot be directly generalized, but methodology and findings can be transferred to other cases (epistemological principle of transferability).
Practical implications
Methods and results of this paper can help in enriching research on the rhetoric of environmental communication, and can integrate more quantitative approaches. Results can suggest new approaches to business communicators, in order to avoid environmental criticism and “boomerang effects”.
Originality/value
The attempt to apply semiotics to the analysis of communication campaigns is rare and perhaps quite innovative. The approach can enrich the fields of PR and business communication studies, of rhetoric analysis and of environmental communication analysis.
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The purpose of this paper is to clarify the relationship between embodiment and the experience of self, body, and work as mutual organisational relationships by focusing on the…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to clarify the relationship between embodiment and the experience of self, body, and work as mutual organisational relationships by focusing on the author's bodily experiences as a nurse, mother, educator and researcher living with Multiple Sclerosis (MS). The use of an autoethnographic framework contributes to work on embodiment and experience supporting the development of a self‐reflexive praxis of human action. It specially focuses on life experiences that become my stories as autoethnographic representations depicting the difficulties and challenges of living and working with chronic illness. It proposes the use of stories, specifically ante‐narratives, to highlight how making the invisible aspects of chronic illness visible; and contributes to work on organisational learning whereby knowledge drawn from the body can serve as a prospective sense‐making activity to help answer: Where is all this change and complexity heading? The paper aims to expand the domain of narrative paradigm that is normally found in the literature relevant to sociology, ethnography, and critical management studies, by gently extending the boundaries of understanding how to learn and respond as ways of inquiry.
Design/methodology/approach
The paper uses Ellis's research approach of autoethnography as a means to enhance the representational uniqueness and reflexivity in qualitative research. A personal story capturing lived experiences of living and working with chronic illness is used to illustrate how stories, specifically ante‐narrative, can provide access to bodily knowledge and glimpses into what Van Maanen calls the ethnographer's own taken‐for‐granted understandings of social world under scrutiny. My stories become the data that are the autoethnographic accounts, which include rigorous critical reflection and review through an autoethnographic lens, and, importantly reflexively shape the author's analysis of social and cultural practices of my being and becoming in the world.
Findings
The paper provides insights about how personal change is brought about as result of a confirmed diagnosis of MS. It suggests that storytelling contributes to the transformational process to learning about new routines in the management of MS, outlining how and why the development of leadership is important throughout the story‐telling process.
Research limitations/implications
Because of the chosen research approach, the research results may lack generalizability. Therefore, researchers are encouraged to seek further ways of developing the methodological art of how to tell good stories.
Practical implications
The paper includes implications for the development of organisational learning activities, whereby qualitative researchers, particularly those undertaking autoethnographic studies, can seek to enhance the reflexivity of their own work, and for managing the dynamic balance between stability and change as being central to individual wellness.
Originality/value
This paper fulfils an identified need to study the benefits of living life as inquiry, as methodological process can enable and help clarify important issues about human development, growth and potential, both personally and for the caring professions. The value of this autoethnographic inquiry is that it provides an ongoing continual process of original inquiry, reflection, and action learning.
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This paper aims to develop a methodology of business knowledge creation based on a synthesis between the perspective of reality informed by pragmatic constructionism (PC) and…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to develop a methodology of business knowledge creation based on a synthesis between the perspective of reality informed by pragmatic constructionism (PC) and critical approaches to narrative analysis informed by antenarrative concepts.
Design/methodology/approach
The paper identifies commonalities and contrasts between narrative and PC. Interpreting an original case study of a hotel by deploying both methodologies, the paper shows how a synthesis of the two approaches can help to construct management control knowledge.
Findings
PC and narrative have many overlaps and complementarities. Practitioners like stories both to make sense of their own roles and to develop personal strategic agendas. Antenarrative concepts demonstrate the potentially generative properties of organizational storytelling. The PC approach also constructs corporate narratives but, additionally, provides a set of criteria against which we can evaluate the stories of practitioners on the basis of “does it work?”.
Research limitations/implications
More interpretive field study processes are called for as a way of testing the robustness of the research design developed in the paper.
Practical implications
A successful management control topos has to be business-specific and co-authored with contributions from participants both inside and outside the organization. Narrative and PC research methodologies both encourage reflexivity, in which the researchers explicitly explore not just the positions of their interviewees, but also their own position and reactions. The creation of business knowledge is seen as a co-production between the researchers and the researched, as they share concepts and reflections during the fieldwork process.
Originality/value
The paper compares and contrasts two interpretive research methodologies, narrative and a pragmatic constructivist perspective. Especially when the concept of antenarrative is deployed, the two methodologies offer fruitful possibilities for dialogical conversation, as they espouse slightly different views on the nature of actor reality.
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Marketing academics have recently been exhorted to embracepostmodernism, the so‐called “new perspective on life and the humancondition that is sweeping across the globe”. Using…
Abstract
Marketing academics have recently been exhorted to embrace postmodernism, the so‐called “new perspective on life and the human condition that is sweeping across the globe”. Using postmodernism′s own tools of playfulness, paradox and irreverence – in the shape of the multiplex cinema as a metaphor for marketing – attempts to clarify some of the confusion surrounding postmodernism. Argues that much of what passes for postmodern marketing, is not, and draws attention to several shortcomings in the postmodernist position. Concludes that, although the concept has much to contribute to marketing discourse, the adoption of postmodern perspectives is not without penalty.
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