Symbiotic Relationship in its Conceptual and Theoretical Challenges to Management Studies

Abstract

This paper attempts to answer two questions: how can we undo the entangled conceptual threads in the semantic jungle of management, and how can we advance our understanding and broaden our sight within that jungle? In order to answer these questions, we study the theoretical concept of symbiotic relationships and its related terms: mutualism, parasitism, and commensalism. Because this relational theory is not uniformly agreed upon by management scholars, we revisit archival texts back to the concept’s nineteenth-century origins in both biology and botany. Two historical moves are underinvested and pivotal for management study: Eugenius Warming’s plant society observation and its influence on human ecology as well as management studies. In addition to archival studies, our method includes a content analysis of word frequencies from Academy of Management publication sites in relation to the theoretical concept of symbiotic relationships. Examining the role of theory in descriptive and normative approaches, the aim of this paper is to show the biological influence on organization and management theory, specifically concerning how such concepts are transformed and reshaped.