Module overview
This module introduces students to philosophical approaches in understanding organisations and their management. The module will consist of three interrelated themes. The first will comprise the attempt to familiarise students with the essential problems at the heart of philosophical debate and expose them to different ways of dealing with them. The second theme will be organised around contemporary schools of thought and thinkers (e.g. logical positivism and Foucault), and founding intellectual fathers of economic thought (e.g. Marx). During these sessions we will be preoccupied with utilising various philosophical lenses in order to make sense of organisational phenomena, gain a better grasp of the intellectual origins of our extant understandings, and critically reflect upon taken-for-granted views about managing. The final theme will concentrate more sharply on organisational settings by studying how advances in organisational theory have afforded important philosophical insights into organisations and (the possibility of) their management.
Aims and Objectives
Learning Outcomes
Subject Specific Intellectual and Research Skills
Having successfully completed this module you will be able to:
- recognise the intellectual foundations of core management theories and practices;
- identify different schools of thought;
- explain basic philosophical concepts;
- evaluate the appropriateness of different thinking tools for tackling diverse problems.
Knowledge and Understanding
Having successfully completed this module, you will be able to demonstrate knowledge and understanding of:
- the indecisive nature of managerial knowledge;
- the salience of using alternative philosophical lenses in evaluating managerial problems and developing balanced and undogmatic understandings.
- the immense complexity of organisational worlds;
- the existence of multiple dimensions affecting organisational entities (especially ones that typically tend to go undetected in conventional managerial thinking);
- the value of transparent thinking in gaining charge of our beliefs and decision making processes;
Transferable and Generic Skills
Having successfully completed this module you will be able to:
- write well-crafted essays and present them in a well-structured manner;
- conduct independent bibliographical research.
- use a wide range of tools in order to refine your thinking processes and write more compelling arguments;
- use a wide range of intellectual ideas in order to enrich your arguments;
Syllabus
Basic philosophical concepts, problems and ideas:
- Problems of administration and social organisation since Ancient Greece;
- The problems of knowledge, existence and virtue: Dominant perspectives.
Modern answers to core philosophical questions:
- The philosophers of economics: Marx, Smith, Veblen, Keynes and Schumpeter;
- Contemporary schools of thought and unresolved problems;
- Views on the nature (and possibility) of (social) scientific knowledge;
- Eastern critiques of Western philosophical traditions: The rise of mindfulness.
Philosophies of organisations through philosophical lenses:
- Towering figures in organisational thought: Max Weber et al;
- Economic systems, varieties of capitalism and organisational forms;
- The neoclassical paradigm and the realist critique;
- The Darwinian legacy: Evolutionary approaches in the study of organisations;
- The psyche of organisations: Psychoanalytical and existentialist perspectives;
- Economic and organisational utopias.
Learning and Teaching
Teaching and learning methods
Teaching methods and learning activities:
Lectures will set out the background in familiarising students with topics in intellectual history. The second hour of each session will typically involve the drawing of links between various (typically abstract) approaches with more down-to-earth problems at the heart of contemporary management. Towards the end of each lecture students will be given an assignment for the class of the upcoming week. All assignments will converge in encouraging students to utilise philosophical perspectives and modes of thought in order to address quite concrete problems. Students will often have to take sides on a debate of a well-rehearsed dilemma. All lectures will have suggested reading material, which will typically be a combination of journal papers and book chapters. In addition, there will be visiting lectures (from Dr Gatenby and Dr Wainwright), whereas students will be strongly encouraged to attend related departmental seminars to be delivered by invited academics.
Learning activities include:
Individual/group assignments
In class debate and discussion
Private study
Use of online material
Type | Hours |
---|---|
Seminar | 11 |
Follow-up work | 12 |
Tutorial | 1 |
Lecture | 24 |
Revision | 12 |
Completion of assessment task | 40 |
Preparation for scheduled sessions | 10 |
Wider reading or practice | 40 |
Total study time | 150 |
Resources & Reading list
General Resources
Philosophy of Management. Journal
Organization Studies. Journal
Academy of Management Review. Journal
Stanford Encyclopaedia of Philosophy.
Organization. Journal
Textbooks
Hatch, M. J. (2012). Organization theory: Modern, symbolic and postmodern perspectives. Oxford University Press.
Tsoukas, H. (2005). Complex knowledge. Oxford University Press.
Pugh, D. S., & Hickson, D. J. (2007). Writers on organisations. Penguin.
Lipton, P. (2004). Inference to the best explanation. Psychology Press.
Aldrich, H. (1999). Organisations evolving. Sage.
Morgan, G (1997). Images of Organization. Sage.
Griseri, P. (2013). An Introduction to the Philosophy of Management. Sage.
Alvesson, M., Bridgman, T., & Willmott, H. (Eds.) (2009). The Oxford handbook of critical management studies. Oxford University Press.
Blackburn, S (2001). Think: A Compelling Introduction to Philosophy. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Heilbroner, R. L. (2011). The worldly philosophers: The lives, times and ideas of the great economic thinkers. Simon and Schuster.
Perrow, C. (1986). Complex organisations: A critical essay. McGraw-Hill.
Tsoukas, H., & Knudsen, C. (Eds.) (2005). The Oxford handbook of organization theory. Oxford University Press.
Fuller, S. (2012). Knowledge management foundations. Routledge.
Okasha, S. (2002). Philosophy of science: A very short introduction. Oxford University Press.
Griseri, P. (2001). Management Knowledge: A critical view. Palgrave.
Fleetwood, S., & Ackroyd, S. (Eds.) (2004). Critical realist applications in organisation and management studies. Psychology Press.
Assessment
Formative
This is how we’ll give you feedback as you are learning. It is not a formal test or exam.
Set exercises - non-exam
- Assessment Type: Formative
- Feedback: Feedback through class discussions and weekly exercises. Also all students will be given the opportunity to meet the module leader to discuss choice of essay topic and progress.
- Final Assessment: No
- Group Work: No
Summative
This is how we’ll formally assess what you have learned in this module.
Method | Percentage contribution |
---|---|
Essay | 100% |
Referral
This is how we’ll assess you if you don’t meet the criteria to pass this module.
Method | Percentage contribution |
---|---|
Essay | 100% |
Repeat
An internal repeat is where you take all of your modules again, including any you passed. An external repeat is where you only re-take the modules you failed.
Method | Percentage contribution |
---|---|
Essay | 100% |
Repeat Information
Repeat type: Internal & External