Critical Complexities.pdf

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Critical complexities

(From marginal paradigms to

learning networks)

Slawomir Magala

Erasmus University Rotterdam, Rotterdam, The Netherlands

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312

Keywords Paradigms, Research, Networking, Organizational learning

Abstract The concepts of critical theory and complexity merit criticism. Growth of knowledge

merits paradigmatic sacrifices. The erosion of orthodox establishments and an on-going re-

structuring of research communities make the sciences of management susceptible to the

influences of critical social scientists. A change of paradigms ceased to be a threatening

emergency so vividly evoked by Kuhn. The new complex world of overlapping research networks is

less hierarchic, more mobile, and not easily centralized. In boundary-less correlations all critical

research paradigms are subjected to a networking and re-networking at all times. Postmodernist

anarchism (``anything goes'') is presently giving rise to the theories of organisational learning.

The latter express a methodological compromise with respect to the paradigms and a political

compromise with respect to the governance structures. The underlying tensions motivate an

ongoing search for a sustainable compromise between a critical thrust of research and a

managerial need for governance, accountability and control.

The only people who see the whole picture are the ones who step out of the frame (Salman

Rushdie).

Relevance of a ``critical theory''

Criticism and the growth of knowledge are firmly connected in the

methodological mind. No theory can be accepted if it has not been subjected to a

fair criticism. One does not have to be a falsificationist to adhere to this view. A

critical theory is always relevant since it allows for less trivial insights into the

underlying mechanisms of social processes than a mainstream one. However,

the limits of legitimate criticism are being continuously renegotiated within the

research communities. Groomed in the philosophy of science overshadowed by

Popper and Kuhn in the 1960s and 1970s, most social scientists and scholars

tend to think that the mainstream ``normal science'' is still run mainly by the

modified neopositivists. They are the principal gate-keepers guarding the gates

of scientific journals, research grants, academic promotions and other Bastilles

of the Kingdom of Rational Knowledge flying the flags of Enlightenment. When

Lakatos and Musgrave edited one of the first volumes of papers on the

philosophy of science after the publication of The Structure of Scientific

Revolutions by Thomas Kuhn, they gave it a title ``Criticism and the growth of

knowledge''. Lakatos believed that scepticism should be kept in check, and

never allowed to subvert scientific rationality with the extreme relativism. In an

unpublished comment on Paul Feyerabend's ``dadaist'' treatise Against Method,

he warned against radical sceptics (including, for instance, his above-mentioned

friend and a fellow-Popperian), claiming that:

Journal of Organizational Change

Management,

Vol. 13 No. 4, 2000, pp. 312-333.

# MCB University Press, 0953-4814

Critical

complexities

for them, happiness and welfare replaced truth: truth was what increased happiness. They

argued that the betrayal of reason (or rather ``reason'') by man was better than betrayal

of man by reason . . . Ultimately, there is only one type of political philosophy consistent

with radical scepticism: the philosophy which equates right with might (Lakatos, 1999,

p. 396)[1].

Therefore, a modified Popperian philosophy of science (which itself was a

response to the crisis of the neopositivist methodology) must counter the

excessive scepticism and criticism of a ``normal science''. In spite of the

influence exerted by the Popperians in the philosophy of science, Lakatos did

not think that modified neopositivist methodological doctrines were still

dominant, while the Popperian one was limited to the professional philosophers

of science. Moreover, those who have tried to apply the neopositivist research

program in social sciences, as did, for instance, the father of sociobiology,

Edward O. Wilson, encountered the opposition, which made them remark

bitterly that: ``postmodernism . . . has seeped by now into the mainstream of the

social sciences and humanities'' (Wilson, 1999, p. 44)[2].

One of the ways to test the conflicting claims about the ``mainstream'',

``establishment'', ``dominant'' scientific research programs is to study the role of

historically acknowledged ``outsider'' research programs and their influence

upon the subsequent generations of researchers. The critical theory of the

Frankfurt School is a case in point. It grew out of a marginal initiative of the

leftist thinkers prevented from following a regular academic career. The

Marxist theoretical inspiration coupled with the methodology of empirical

studies of the working class movements and daily life (sociology of the family)

gained a new twist after a forced immigration of the school's representatives to

the USA. The most significant contributions of the Frankfurt School to the

criticism of modern society and modern social sciences include their empirical

studies of the authoritarian personality (the ethnocentric syndrome) and

their philosophical critique of mass culture (cultural industries). The

questionnaires developed in the USA allowed them to study the willingness of

individual citizens to follow non-democratic leaders and to espouse

ethnocentric views (a critique of which provided a starting point for a

democratic citizens' education). Their critique of the cultural industries

legitimised by the Enlightenment allowed them to demonstrate the necessity of

an ongoing revision of ideologies, programs and paradigms (which provided a

starting point for a re-definition of scientific rationality and its sociopolitical

boundaries).

Can modern sciences of management find any inspiration in the critical

tradition of the Frankfurt School? Can contemporary philosophers, sociologists,

social psychologists, historians, economists and theoreticians of organisation

pick up relevant themes and discoveries? In 1988 an international congress

entitled ``The Frankfurt School: How Relevant Is It Today?'' has been organised

by two members of the faculty of the Rotterdam School of Management of the

Erasmus University in Rotterdam[3]. An interdisciplinary approach practised

by the representatives of the faculty of business management attracted many

313

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researchers with different academic backgrounds. They tried to look for the

relevance of the ``leftist'' research community from the 1930s for the critical

researchers of the 1990s. Critical researchers of the 1990s do not have a

recognizably ``leftist'' political stand. There is no scientific research program

which can be compared to a particularly critical, identifiable platform ±

resembling the political ``left'' within the academic community, or even carrying

leftist philosophy from politics to science (which was still the case with the

Marxism of the Frankfurt School).

Critical research communities cannot be easily labelled as either ``leftist'' or

``rightist'' today. They are servicing both revolutionaries and consultants, both

managers and students, both paid public officials and free virtual networks,

both identifiable clients and potential audiences. Historians ± Rolf

Wiggershaus and Martin Jay[4] agreed that there was a recognisable link

between the first generation of the Frankfurt scholars ± Adorno, Horkheimer ±

and their disciple, Habermas, who has also established a critical research

program built around a theory of communicative action (recognised and used

by the US sociologists ± Thomas McCarthy, Andrew Arato and Jean Cohen)[5].

One should also add, on a generational note, that Habermas, as opposed to

Adorno, fared much better with the rebellious students of 1968 and maintained

long-term contacts with the red-green politicians who emerged from this

generation (for instance, with Joshka Fischer and Daniel Cohn-Bendit).

The congress on the relevance of the critical theory for the sciences of

management found place 12 years ago: these 12 years have witnessed an

emergence of a number of theories of flexible, learning, innovative, flat, agile

and knowledge creating organisational form (see Nooteboom, 2000)[6]. Are any

of the views expressed by the participants in the congress relevant for the

present-day concerns of researchers in the sciences of management?

Mats Alvesson and Hugh Willmott claim that the tradition of the critical

theory includes at least two constitutive elements; a rational reconstruction

(which should reveal the ``distortions'' caused by powers that be in the social

construction of organisation, management, research, in brief ± in the ongoing

social construction of reality) and what they call a critical self-reflection. They

define the latter quoting Habermas, according to whom a critical self-reflection

``involves a practical translation of the insights of reconstruction into some

form of emancipatory action''. Both are relevant for contemporary studies in

organisation theory ± for Wood, Urry, Knights, Giddens, Burrell, Morgan,

Smirchich, and, needless to say, for Alvesson and Willmott. The latter notice

the relevance of the critical theory for modern sciences of management in four

broad areas:

(1)

314

potential development of a methodological research program (although

no representative of the critical theory actually ventured so far as to

elaborate a complete methodological framework, a number of recent

critical studies ± e.g. by Guba, Lincoln, Erlandson, Clegg, Aldrich, or

Gergen clearly demonstrate this possibility);

(2) a critique of prevailing ideology (critical analysis of the one-

dimensionality of the managerial ideologies, especially in operations

research, e.g. Jackson, Sievers, Boje, Burrell, Harvey);

(3) empirical studies of organising (especially focussing on the asymmetries

of power in companies ± Alvesson, Czarniawska, Ingersoll, Adams), and

(last not least);

(4) methodologies of change, with a focus either on a local planning practice

(see Forester, 1989) or on a broader concern for developing a ``conceptual

framework that could transform critical theory from a mere research

program into a practical tool of critical social inquiry and design''

(Alvesson and Willmott, 1990, p. 49, see also Marion, Esterby-Smith,

Flood, Morgan, or Rickards for recent critical methodologies of change).

Due to the impact in these four areas, the critical theory of the Frankfurt School

is still relevant for contemporary social sciences in general and for the sciences

of management in particular. The latter, if pursued by those research

communities, which had been influenced by the tradition of the critical theory,

stand to win in critical insights and intellectual respectability. Alvesson and

Willmott quote J.K. Benson, who claims that the critical theory's contribution to

the shaping of actual practice of organising consists of: ``dereifying established

social patterns and structures ± it points out their arbitrary character,

undermines their sense of inevitability, uncovers the contradictions and limits

of the present order, and reveals the mechanisms of transformation'' (Alvesson

and Willmott, 1990, p. 59).

Other contributors to the above-mentioned volume of proceedings of the

1988 congress on relevance of the critical theory for the sciences of

management shared this view. They included, to mention just a few, J. Forester

of Cornell University, B. Czarniawska-Joerges of Stockholm School of

Economics, Jean Cohen of Columbia University, Lolle Nauta of the University

of Groningen, Dick Howard of SUNY at Stony Brook and Brian Turner of

Exeter University. Some of the above-mentioned researchers changed their

academic environment and affiliation, but most of them maintained their level

of participation in highly interactive networks of virtual research communities.

It should come as no surprise that most of them reconvene ± virtually or

physically ± every year at the annual SCOS (Standing Conference on

Organisational Symbolism) conference[7]. The processes of organising of the

annual SCOS conference stand in a marked contrast to the processes of

organising the equivalent EGOS conference; they are much more informal and

based almost entirely on flexible, individually maintained virtual networks.

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Virtual networks and the relativist view from nowhere

Postmodernists have often been suspected of occupying an epistemologically

comfortable (but ethically suspect) relativist, or extremely sceptical position.

They were found guilty of rejecting any privileged language game, any

privileged grand narrative, and any model dominant enough to ``orientate''

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research. According to Martin Parker, who considers ways of

``postmodernizing'' the sciences of management, there are advantages to this

relativist position. They have been noticed by Terry Eagleton, whom Parker

quotes as saying that: ``It allows you to drive a coach and horses through

anybody else's beliefs while not saddling you with the inconvenience of having

to adopt any yourself. Such deconstruction is a power game . . . the winner is

the one who manages to get rid of all his cards and sit with empty hands''

(Parker, 2000, p. 45)[8]. If we agreed, we would have to assume that

postmodernists are basically opportunists, whose lack of principles makes it

easier for them to adapt themselves to the shifting constellations of power both

in the academic communities and beyond. However, there are problems with a

mechanical comparison of the standards of commitment to a ``progressive''

social and political change maintained by the representatives of the critical

theory of the Frankfurt School on the one hand, and the standards of

commitment to a ``progressive'' organisational change by the postmodernist

researchers (nowadays) on the other. To put it bluntly: for the Frankfurt

researchers definitions of political left and political right were as clear as

differences between a communist and a nazi party. For the present researchers

a support for some political position on the ecological or gender issues does not

automatically allow to select either a left or a right political party, or any

political party (which may be considered irrelevant in the solving of an issue at

hand) at all.

There is also a methodological and ethical problem of distinguishing

between an empirically and theoretically progressive problem shift (which is,

according to Lakatos, symptomatic for a progressive methodological research

program) and a theoretically and empirically degenerative one. The problem is

both historical and methodological. Historically speaking, a critical research

program which inspired both the researchers from the Frankfurt School and

moulded a significant generational experience of the postmodernist researchers

(most of whom took part in the student rebellions in the years 1966-1975), the

Marxist one, has become an official state ideology in the socialist states.

Practical activities of the power Âlites of the communist parties (1945-1989)

provided a historical falsification of the emancipatory claims of the Marxist

ideology[9]. Scientific research program used as an ideological legitimation for

a ruling party degenerated rapidly. State policies ostensibly based on and

certainly justified with Marxian theory did not contribute to the construction of

superior and sustainable societies. Marxian paradigm did not make all the

other paradigms in social sciences obsolete, theories produced by the Marxists

failed to overshadow all the other theories. This means, to put it in a nutshell,

that critical and politically committed researchers rejected the idea that their

struggle should end with the overthrowing of the ``dominant paradigm'' and

with replacing it with their own, more progressive one (which would have to be

defended in order to maintain the dominant position, thus placing them in the

position, which would merit the same critique they had launched against their

paradigmatic enemies). They have introduced the idea of a ``self-limiting

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