Reconstruction in Strategy and Organization: For a Pragmatic Stance

Citation

Casler C (2020) Reconstruction in Strategy and Organization: For a Pragmatic Stance. Doctor of Philosophy. Frederiksberg: Copenhagen Business School [Phd]. Ph.d. Serie, No. 14.2020. https://research.cbs.dk/en/publications/reconstruction-in-strategy-and-organization-for-a-pragmatic-stanc

Abstract
This thesis seeks to reconstruct strategy and organization according to a newly elaborated pragmatic stance. By way of example, Part I analyses two sub-fields ostensibly devoted to contrasting approaches to strategy – strategic management and strategy-as-practice – in order to show commonality in their attitudes of investigation despite other epistemological, methodological and theoretical differences. This points to a broader preoccupation with a certain mode of theory development predominant across much of strategy and organizational research, which orients attention away from concrete organization. Arguing that the plural nature of personhood and the cultivation of practical-ethical conduct are centrally implicated in this preoccupation, as well as a number of other contemporary shortcomings and intractable field-level debates, Part II of the thesis develops a positive reconstruction of the field according to a pragmatic stance, drawing principally on the work of John Dewey and Max Weber. The thesis then exemplifies this pragmatic stance through a re-appraisal of the classic organizational practitioner-theorist Chester I. Barnard. The thesis concludes by drawing implications of a pragmatic stance for research, practice, and management education.

Keywords
strategy; organization; management history; management education; pragmatism; Dewey; Webe; Barnard