The question of how organizations are produced has been an ongoing theoretical puzzle within organization studies. In order to explain this question an increasing number of organization theorists have turned to the structuration theory of Anthony Giddens. Indeed it has been widely used to examine a whole range of organization phenomena such as structure (Ranson, Hinings & Greenwood, 1980), control (Clegg, 1981), discourse (Heracleous & Barrett, 2001), technology (Orlikowski, 1992), and institutions (Barley & Tolbert, 1997). In this paper we would like to call into question this increasingly popular approach. In particular we would like to explore some of the limits of structuration theory. We would like to argue that social reproduction of organization involves the reproduction of space and time. By doing so, we would like to put issues of time and space right at the centre of debates about structuration and social reproduction

Academic ‘labour’ within the Higher Education landscape is changing as universities are increasingly managed as business organisations. In the contemporary neoliberal academic context, departments and individuals are required to develop forms of accountability based on quantitative metrics regarding performance, budgets, human resource management and income generation. Drawing from Foucauldian theories of power, this article explores the contentious implementation of workload allocation models in the UK Higher Education sector not only as an illustration of a superimposed managerial tool of control but also as an instrument of resistance. This article suggests that in order to counteract the systematic failure of neoliberal academia at the individual and collective level, these performance management tools can be used as forms of empowerment and resistance. Further, it is recommended that these instruments are designed in a collaborative way to ensure fair and transparent allocations of tasks and responsibilities, and to avoid unmanageable workloads.

This paper draws on literature in the fields of organizational studies, industrial relations, and industrial sociology to attempt to address 'new paradigm' managerial initiatives that espouse sentiments of unitarism in their discourse from a UK perspective. The specific focus of this theoretical investigation is the output of the proponents of the 'Learning Organization'. It is argued that in such organizations, employers attempt to control and induce behavioural change in employees through the use of reorganization and instrumental discourse. Managerial commentators and theorists have written much about what the implementing agents' expectations are of the outcomes of such organizational initiatives. Among these expectations is that the new initiative will bring about a radical change in attitudes in the workplace and that unitarism will prevail. However, an as yet underdeveloped area of study is what happens when the subjects (i.e. employees) receive the initiative, the potential for counter-ideology and resistance to the initiative, and the forms resistance may take. It is these latter two issues that this paper concentrates on. Ultimately, the paper seeks to present a conceptual investigation of pluralism within, and the nature and implications of resistance in, the Learning Organization. An allusion to Beaumarchais' `Figaro' is used to illustrate the arguments.

This paper argues that conventional patriarchal representations of the organisation reduce the notion of "organisation" to abstract relationships, rational actions and purposive behaviour which always and relentlessly presents itself as a quest for the good. In this context, regulation and control is achieved primarily via definition and location. Administration then functions in a very specific sense to establish a notion of "good"order, to establish what is "ordinary"in administrative and managerial practice. In contrast, this paper seeks to explore ways in which it is possible to restore the (m)other to the text of organisation, to restore the body. Consequently, the paper considers the possibility of a discourse of maternity and moves from this position to examine conceptions of matrix reproduction and conditions of exile. The paper concludes with a challenge to conventional notions of "good" management and a consideration of the implications of this for the political in organisational life.

Traditional structural-functional approaches to organizational change, as well as critics of those approaches, often offer overly structured and rationalised views of how change occurs. This paper attempts to build upon processual studies of change and critiques of overly hegemonic views of managerial control by seeking to capture the complex, emotive and fluid character of organisational 'changing'. In pursuit of this aim, the paper documents these characteristics of change through a personalised ethnography of a micro-incident -- a critical change meeting -- in an Australian steel making plant undergoing cultural change. In conclusion, it is argued that even the more sophisticated studies of the emergent process-like character of organisational change fail to fully capture the ambiguous, ironic, emotional, and uncertain character of events in the 'blender' of change.

Emphasizes that change, rather than stability, is the norm in organizations. Impact of change on norms; Points raised regarding anchors; Explanation of the matrix of the control process of change; Two fundamental prescriptive aspects to acid management on Mars.

Time has become increasingly utilized as a tool for organizations to increase productivity and control workers. Since the advent of the mechanical clock in the fourteenth century, time has structured organizational experience. This increased precision has lead to the standardization of efficiency. The struggle for greater efficiency creates an organizational environment where the worker is dissociated and dehumanized-subsumed by the machine. Time and technology work in concert to improve efficiency In addition to the mechanical clock, computers and the Internet have also contnbuted to the conquering of time in the organizational sense. It is the instantaneousness of communication that has lead to the initial feeling of time being conquered. Social interaction is one of the fundamental drives of humanity, and this interaction is threatened by the standardization of efficiency. Implications for organizations are discussed, followed by an exemplar involving the changing nature of investing. Finally, ideas for reclaiming the pre-modern conceptualization of organizing are suggested.

On a theoretical level, complexity theory offers an emergence-based insight into organizing. The unicity of events, the undetermined nature of creative change, and the multifarious nature of circumstances are all honored. But how can (successful or unsuccessful) self-organizing be studied? If organizing really can be self-organizing, how could a researcher perceive it? Either the observer is entirely outside of the change process and is unmoved or unaltered by it -- i.e. only able to see the change from its exterior; or the observer changes with the change process and is part and parcel of it. If one is inside the change, how can one observe it; and if one is outside, how could one experience it? If self-organization really can occur, how could self-organization organize organization without betraying emergence and becoming just another form of control? To examine these issues a case is presented and then interpreted with use of a perspective inspired by (some aspects of) Luhmann, and via Luhmann, Serres (Luhmann, 1997, 2003; Serres, 1982).

Digital technology and software networks enable large numbers of knowledge workers to incorporate themselves wherever and whenever they wish and to choose between a sedentary or nomadic lifestyle. One way of configuring these new circumstances is as the extensive power of people, products and markets to speedily overcome obstacles and span distances. However, we increasingly see nonrepresentative corporations accelerating human pace and swallowing open spaces within the rational administrative control of a new supranational “Empire”. Intensive movement, on the other hand, reconfigures the human condition in ways that politically and ethically engage with universalizing global processes. Like the traditional nomads of the steppe or the desert, for example, the movement in question is a complex, dynamic relation characterized by its immediacy and continuous variation of alliance and resistance, that remains difficult to locate, difficult to control, and even more difficult to defeat. The paper argues that nomadism can be a starting point for an opposing strategy to the global knowledge economy.

This paper examines the question of introducing the first management control system in independent professions through the case of French notary public offices. In order to provide elements of response to the research question, a qualimetric approach which combines qualitative and quantitative models has been chosen to improve the validity of observations. The qualitative approach selected was based on an action research program carried out in 350 notary public offices between 1998 and 2004. In parallel, 5 explicative variables for measuring the successful set-up of the management control system were tested and analyzed, primarily by factor analysis.

This paper explores the concept of transdisciplinarity, seeing it more as a useful framework than as a distinctly different research approach. As such it can help professionals from a full range of fields and people from all walks of life work together across the boundaries that normally separate them. The boundaries between the sciences and other fields are of the most concern. Because off this, transdisciplinarity is often equated to Mode 2 Science; i.e., science that engages with humans to solve problems together out in the world. A major concern here is with the strength of prevailing beliefs about the value of expertise and the importance of the specialized division of labor. These are viewed as important tools in the struggle to control one's own work. Of equal concern is the opposite danger that the topic will reify and become just one more academic discipline. Personal examples as well as an analysis of the literature on industrial sociology, the sociology of occupations and professions as well as that on transdisciplinarity itself are presented in this exploration.

In recent years, feminist scholars have made substantial inroads toward a better understanding of the intricacies and complexities of organizing. Through the metatheoretical lens of a “feminist communicology of organization,” gender is seen as a dynamic principle of organizing, and organizations are seen as fundamentally gendered. By looking at both the macro- and micro-level activities of gendered organizing, we obtain a much richer, organic understanding of the processes inherent in creating and sustaining organizations. Such an approach helps us to understand one of the newest forms of organization-the virtual one-that exists both discursively and materially only in the virtual world. To better understand how organizing is accomplished in the virtual world, we have chosen to focus on the postings to a “renegade” web site called “Teamster.net.” This site was established by and for members of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters but is not sanctioned by The Teamsters. Through content analysis, we studied the ongoing discussions concerning if, and how, this site should be moderated, and by whom. We found that these chat room dialogues exhibit the key characteristics of multiple discourses occurring simultaneously. Contributors are both social actors and the objects of multiple discourses that seek to normalize and control these actors, often occurring in disjunctive and contradictory ways. While contributors acknowledge the need for both social equality and respect, their mechanisms for dealing with these contradictions are most often unconscious; in psychoanalytic terms, compromise formations. Thus we offer this deeper understanding of virtual organizations through the metatheoretical lens of feminist communicology and the theoretical lens of compromise formations.

This article is a critical presentation of the discourse on US imperialism, covering the work of both pro- and anti- imperialists. It presents the contrasting theory of Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri, to who "U.S imperialism" is far from an accurate description of the current from of sovereign power . Despite the popularization of the notion of a new American imperialism our reality is becoming one of a single network of various forms of sovereignty, novel in scope and intensity, not only colonizing territory, but controlling communication, freedom of movement, knowledge and truth.

When organizations do not attend to social justice issues in a meaningful way, a pattern of covert practices and behavior distorts the concern for fairness, equity and inclusion to one of indifference, power and control. Ineffective leadership results in wounded staff and organizational dysfunction. Social justice in organizational life is a function of how well leaders and managers master six domains that influence and sustain institutional balance and self-regulation: safety and trust; boundaries and differences; accountability; communication; hierarchical power; and task and role clarity. Ultimately, leaders must do their own inner work by taking responsibility for their part in institutionalizing oppression in their organizations, and well as the outer work of creating processes and structures that implement solutions to social justice issues within their organizations

Antonio Guterres (2008), United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) characterized the twenty-first century as one of mass movements of people, within and beyond their borders, escaping conflicts and upheavals. War and human rights violations propel millions of people beyond their borders searching for safety. Climate change, environmental degradation, and economic instability prompt many to search for better life opportunities. Attempts by governments to devise policies to pre-empt, direct, manage, prevent these movements have been erratic. Australia, for example has implemented a series of laws to control movement of asylum seekers, prevent their access to Australia, while choosing a quota driven number of people from refugee camps. Uniquely in the developed world Australia ignores international human rights laws and puts all asylum seekers in mandatory detention. Some countries claim ethnic or religious conflict, national security, or upsetting the population balance due to lack of tolerance among citizens. Politicians appear to believe that being tough on refugees makes their own populations feel more secure. Whatever the reason for nonadmittance, refugees are often denied their internationally recognized human rights forced into desperate lives in refugee camps or in detention centres where they are unable to move, to work, or to enjoy any freedoms.

Through two case studies, this paper explores the role that story or narrative has upon the changing role of the entrepreneur within organizations. The literature on story and leadership is compiled and eight themes are identified. These themes are then used to take a dramatist perspective on the case study narratives. Findings show that there is a new realm of research that could be conducted to illicit a better understanding of narrative and entrepreneurship, specifically: longitudinal studies would help to illicit whether entrepreneurs do restory in face of organizational pressures and identification of the stories told by stakeholders in face of entrepreneurial changes. There is also more research to be conducted on the impact that locus of control has on narrative construction and restorying.

This article studies how a political organization begins to experiment with its identity. By use of an empirical case of the Danish Ministry of Education, I examine how a political organization supplements its identity of a legislating power with identities of a supervisor, beacon and facilitator of reflection processes. I analyse how the Danish Ministry of Education observes that its initial attempts to strengthen evaluation in the Danish public schools did not have the wanted effects because the values and professional norms of public school teachers constitute a resistance towards interference from outside the educational system. The Ministry thus faces a dilemma: the more it tries to control evaluation in the public school, the less likely it is to produce a desired effect. This paradox contains destructive potential but also causes the Ministry to reflect upon its own role in the development of evaluation in public schools. Out of a paralysis emerge new innovative strategies of governing, aimed at the schools’ self-governing capacity. The identity of the political system thus emerges as oscillations between different roles of a legislating power and a supervising coach. The case study suggests that a society of experimentalism is emerging. Thus, the relevant object of study is no longer organizational identity, but the experiments with different identities that modern organizations are performing.

This paper advances the Buddhist insight of ‗no-self‘ as a foundation for theorizing the phenomenon of lack, and how such a sense of lack is symptomatic of a more fundamental and primary repression: a fear of no-self, or egolessness. Egocentric organizations depend on the reproduction of collective lack and underlying ontological insecurity, which manifests as a desire to be real, enduring, and self-existent. Egocentric organizational dynamics bind anxiety by channeling ‗reality projects‘ which feed compulsive desires for power, territory and control. The Buddhist perspective offers a liberative path as a counterforce to dominant egocentric organizational narratives. Rather than accepting lack as cultural condition, the Buddhist path focuses the mind directly on the source of lack, which, paradoxically is a gateway to seeing through the delusion of the egocentric self.