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1 – 10 of over 30000Stuart Scheingold's The Politics of Rights provided a path-breaking theoretical analysis of what he called the “myth of rights.” Scheingold's key insight was that even though…
Abstract
Stuart Scheingold's The Politics of Rights provided a path-breaking theoretical analysis of what he called the “myth of rights.” Scheingold's key insight was that even though rights were a myth, rights ideologies nevertheless left a significant imprint on American politics. The book charted a research agenda that has now been followed by a wide range of sociolegal scholars. Looking across that diverse body scholarship, I find convergence on two points. First, scholars claim that law and legal ideology contribute to processes of legitimation and to political acquiescence. Second, and seemingly in tension with the first, most people do not appear to believe in idealized legal myths and express only qualified commitments to legal ideals. Most scholars have responded to this tension by downplaying evidence that people have doubts about legal ideals, often treating expressions of doubts as evidence of confusion. As a result, scholars still conclude that residual commitments to legal myths help to explain legitimation and acquiescence. Such moves produce accounts of legal myths that are insufficiently attentive to politics and power. Scholars would do better to return to Scheingold's more ambivalent perspective on the politics of rights in order to understand the political consequences of commitments to rights’ ideologies.
Eva Boxenbaum, Thibault Daudigeos, Jean-Charles Pillet and Sylvain Colombero
This chapter examines how proponents of industrialization used multiple modes of communication to socially construct the rational myth of industrialization in the French…
Abstract
This chapter examines how proponents of industrialization used multiple modes of communication to socially construct the rational myth of industrialization in the French construction sector after World War II. We illuminate the respective roles of visual and verbal communication in this process. Our findings suggest that actors construct rational myths according to the following step-by-step method: first, they use visuals to suggest associations between new practices and valuable purposes; then they use verbal text to establish the technical rationality of certain practices; and lastly, they employ both verbal and visual communications to convey their mythical features.
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Jack S. Tillotson and Diane M. Martin
We aim to understand what happens when larger social and cultural myths become the incarnate understanding of consumers within the firm. This paper uncovers the varied myths at…
Abstract
Purpose
We aim to understand what happens when larger social and cultural myths become the incarnate understanding of consumers within the firm. This paper uncovers the varied myths at play in one Finnish company’s status as an inadvertent cultural icon.
Methodology/approach
Through a qualitative inquiry of Finland’s largest dairy producer and by employing the theoretical lens of myth, we conceptualize the entanglement of broad cultural, social, and organizational myths within the organization.
Findings
Macro-mythic structures merge with everyday employee practice giving consumer understanding flesh within the firm (Hallet, 2010). Mythological thinking leaves organizational members inevitably bound up in a form of consumer knowing that is un-reflective and inadvertently effects brand marketing management.
Originality/value
Working through a nuanced typology of myth (Tillotson & Martin, 2014) provided a deeper understanding of how managers may become increasingly un-reflexive in their marketing activities. This case also provides a cautionary tale for heterogeneous communities where ideological conflict underscores development and adoption of contemporary myths.
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It is generally considered that the old myths were a way of explaining the origins of the world and of humanity. They also played a vital role in uniting a society. Indeed the…
Abstract
Purpose
It is generally considered that the old myths were a way of explaining the origins of the world and of humanity. They also played a vital role in uniting a society. Indeed the idea of the epic story is one which permeates history to such an extent that it can be considered to be omnipresent.
Design/methodology/approach
It is argued that this cohesive role remains crucial today and so myths remain relevant to us today. The design of the chapter is to show this relevance in business behaviour. This is explored through a consideration of corporate reporting.
Findings
It is demonstrated that these myths continue to be reinvented in modern form. For individuals these myths provide a source of strength and a sense of roots and values; they offer a mirror to reveal the source of our anxieties and the means by which they might be resolved.
Research limitations/implications
In this chapter therefore the modern myths of the hero are explored in the context of managerial behaviour in organisations. In order to explore this there is a need first to consider the psychoanalysis of managerial behaviour before considering the mythic dimension of such reporting.
Practical and social implications
This paper demonstrates that organisational stories have a vitally important role in organisational cohesion and development.
Originality/value
The psychoanalytic approach provides an understanding which is not available through other methodologies.
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Abstract
Aesthetic jurisprudence must take seriously the myth of community,1 the antagonistic of intimacy; love and death.2 Myth, however, must also be seized in its peculiarity. Rather than affirming coherence or the pattern of the past, it is a discourse that undoes itself. Indeed, myth does not provide a comforting story of belonging and foundations, it reminds us of the antagonisms of the human condition and the problematic nature of thought itself.
This paper focuses on the role of myth in group identity maintenance. It begins by looking at the occupational group, but broadens to show how subsociety and the larger society…
Abstract
This paper focuses on the role of myth in group identity maintenance. It begins by looking at the occupational group, but broadens to show how subsociety and the larger society affected the group's identity and actions. Mississippi Delta blues performers’ use of myth serves as the historical example, and this analysis shows how the group reacted to living in a segregated and racist society. Analysis of songs demonstrates how myth can play a role in tying together this subordinated group in society and perpetuate myth. How the blues subculture still employs these myths today is also addressed.
Lloyd Burton and Lisa Grow Sun
Two meanings of the word myth informed the origins of this volume and its constituent chapters: myth as an archetypical narrative that societies and cultures use to embody…
Abstract
Two meanings of the word myth informed the origins of this volume and its constituent chapters: myth as an archetypical narrative that societies and cultures use to embody value-laden lessons about both the natural world and human nature (myths to live by); and myth as a nefarious fabrication that imperils those who believe it (myths to die by). Throughout this volume, we use the Greek myth of Cassandra – the heroine of Troy who unsuccessfully forewarned her community of avoidable future disaster – as an archetype for the often heroic efforts of those in our day who seek to forewarn us of altogether foreseeable future disasters associated with both natural forces and human contrivance. We also explore the deadly myths of delusion – those which weave an illusory cocoon of invincibility around those who increasingly inhabit increasingly disaster-prone landscapes. Each chapter in this volume tells stories about what happens when these two meanings of myth collide, and of how better heeding the message of present-day Cassandras might help us to dispel the myths of delusion.
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