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The Politics of Management Knowledge
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The Politics of Management Knowledge


December 1996 | 256 pages | SAGE Publications Ltd
In recent years management knowledge has seen mounting challenges to the notions of objectivity, neutrality, and universality. The Politics of Management Knowledge goes beyond broad-brush affirmations on this theme. This insightful volume explores the connections among management knowledge, power, and practice in a world where globalization highlights, rather than obscures, the localizations of generic management recipes. Central to the book is the recognition of management knowledge's political nature and the discourse produced from power processes within and between organizations. This theme underpins the various ways that management practices produce managers as particular kinds of subjects for example, man-of-enterprise, bureaucrat, heroic leader, and so on. Critical examinations of management theories about lean production and excellent entrepreneurship also highlight the myriad areas in which relationships between knowledge and power intermingle. The Politics of Management Knowledge discusses the future of management knowledge and argues that even at a time when middle management in particular is under threat, there is a need for a new understanding less attuned to the corporate world of today and more appropriate for the emerging industries of the 21st century.

Stewart R Clegg and Gill Palmer
Introduction
Producing Management Knowledge

 
 
PART ONE: PRODUCING MANAGERS
Paul du Gay
Making Up Managers
Enterprise and the Ethos of Bureaucracy

 
Klaus P Hansen
The Mentality of Management
Self-Images of American Top Executives

 
John Child and Suzana Rodrigues
The Role of Social Identity in the International Transfer of Knowledge through Joint Ventures
 
PART TWO: COMPARATIVE CULTURAL RECIPES FOR MANAGEMENT
Bengt Sandkull
Lean Production
The Myth which Changes the World?

 
Jos[ac]e Luis Alvarez
The International Popularization of Entrepreneurial Ideas
Eduardo Ibarra-Colado
Excellence at Large
Power, Knowledge and Organizational Forms in Mexican Universities

 
Jean-Fran[ci]cois Chanlat
From Cultural Imperialism to Independence
Francophone Resistance to Anglo-American Definitions of Management Knowledge in Qu[ac]ebec

 
 
PART THREE: THE FUTURE FOR MANAGEMENT
Ian Palmer and Richard Dunford
Interrogating Reframing
Evaluating Metaphor-Based Analyses of Organizations

 
Harvie Ramsay
Managing Sceptically
A Critique of Organizational Fashion

 
Harry Scarbrough and Gibson Burrell
The Axeman Cometh
The Changing Roles and Knowledges of Middle Managers

 
Stewart R Clegg et al
Management Knowledge for the Future
Innovation, Embryos and New Paradigms

 

`A valuable collection of readings which will assist both academics and practising managers who are seeking clarification on the themes and language of postmodernism as a framework for interpreting management knowledge - one most likely to assist management educators gain further insights into a field which is being recognised as extensive and complex' - Financial Times, New Delhi

`I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in critical approaches to management' - Asia Pacific Business Review

`The reader will find a number of stimulating analyses of management practices' - European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology

`The Politics of Management Knowledge explores the relations between management knowledge, power and practice within the context of globalisation.... [the book] presents open discussion on a range of issues, identification of advantages and disadvantages of various perspectives followed by the identification of possible criteria for choosing a solution. There is a constant ideology throughout that is averse to adopting one model, rather the need for flexibility and creative lateral thinking is encouraged in the reader. Overall I feel that this is an interesting read which could benefit many academics and students' - School Leadership and Management

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