Critical Management Studies: An Introduction

Abstract

For many academics who might identify themselves with the aims and objectives of a journal such as Critical Sociology, the idea of a critical management studies (CMS), especially one based largely in the realm of the business school, might appear at the very best oxymoronic and at worst, well ... Of course, not all of those who view themselves, or who might be viewed as critical management scholars, find themselves based in university business schools, but this often happy band are increasingly in the minority. Additionally, what it is perhaps also important to realize is that many of those critical scholars who are in fact based in business schools have little or no formal education or training in what one might consider to be business related subjects, but rather, are drawn from a range of social scientific disciplines, most notably sociology, social psychology and history. Indeed, it has been observed that what might in part account for the rise of CMS during the 1990s – particularly in the UK – was the influx of such expertise into the business schools, partly as a result of the decline in funding for these more traditional areas of research, and partly due to a desire on behalf of business and management educators to take advantage of skills and insights which, they believed, might assist them in making sense of the challenges presented by new ways of working in an increasingly volatile global economy. Not that CMS can in any sense be considered a purely UK phenomenon, despite the view held by many that the UK represents its spiritual home. As half of the articles presented here demonstrate, CMS is very much an international affair these days with significant figures in the field residing and working across the globe. Nor is it an entirely marginal pursuit, even in the world of mainstream business education and research. While it has no single journal associated with it per se, critical scholars contribute widely to a range of journals, some within the field of business and management research and some within either associated disciplinary areas such as sociology, or more specialist sub-fields such as discourse studies, gender studies and social geography. There is, however, a biannual conference held in the UK specifically dedicated to a broad-based discussion of critical management themes, while the Academy of Management in the USA now runs a Critical Sociology 34(1) 09-14