Complex Knowledge

Studies in Organizational Epistemology

Inbunden, Engelska, 2004

AvHaridimos Tsoukas

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In this book Haridimos Tsoukas, one of the most imaginative organization theorists of our time, examines the nature of knowledge in organizations, and how individuals and scholars approach the concept of knowledge.Tsoukas firstly looks at organizational knowledge and its embeddedness in social contexts and forms of life. He shows that knowledge is not just a collection of free floating representations of the world to be used at will, but an activity constitutive of the world. On the one hand the organization as an institutionalized system does produce regularities that can can be captured via propositional forms of knowledge. On the other, the organization as practice, as a lifeworld, or as an open-ended system produce stories, values, and shared traditions which can only be captured by narrative forms of knowledge.Secondly, Tsoukas looks at the issue of how individuals deal with the notion of complexity in organizations: Our inability to reduce the behaviour of complex organizations to their constituent parts. Drawing on concepts such as discourse, narrativity, and reflexivity, he adopts a hermeneutical approach to the issue.Finally Tsoukas examines the concept of meta-knowledge, and how we know what we know. Arguing that the underlying representationalist epistemology of much of mainstream management causes many problems, he advocates adopting a more discursive approach. He describes what such an epistemology might be, and illustrates it with examples from organization studies and strategic management.An ideal introduction to the thinking of a leading organizational theorist, this book will be essential reading for academics, researchers, and students of Knowledge Management, Organization Studies, Management Studies, Business Strategy, and Applied Epistemology.

Produktinformation

Utgivningsdatum2004-12-02
Mått173 x 242 x 29 mm
Vikt785 g
FormatInbunden
SpråkEngelska
Antal sidor428
FörlagOUP OXFORD
ISBN9780199275571

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Introduction ; PART I: EXPLORATIONS INTO ORGANIZATIONAL KNOWLEDGE ; 1. The Firm as a Distributed Knowledge System ; 2. Forms of Knowledge and Forms of Life in Organized Contexts ; 3. What is Organizational Knowledge? ; 4. The Tyranny of Light: The Temptations and the Paradoxes of the Information Society ; 5. Where Does New Organizational Knowledge Come From? ; PART II: COPING WITH ORGANIZATIONAL COMPLEXITY ; 6. Understanding Social Reforms: A Conceptual Analysis ; 7. Chaos, Compelxity, and Organiztion Theory ; 8. Complex Thinking, Complex Practice: The Case for a Narrative Approach to Organizational Complexity ; 9. Reading Organizations: Uncertainty, Complexity, Narrativity ; PART III: META-KNOWLEDGE: THE EPISTEMOLOGY OF MANAGEMENT RESEARCH ; 10. Refining Common Sense: Types of Knowledge in Management Studies ; 11. The Word and the World: A Critique of Representationalism in Management Research ; 12. What is Good Theory? Arguments for a Discursive Organization Science ; 13. The Conduct of Strategy Research

Complex Knowledge is a thought-provoking, insightful, and deeply engaging exploration of the nature of knowledge in and about organizations. Not only does it offer a compelling critique of contemporary ways of understanding organizational knowledge, but it articulates a powerful alternative vocabulary grounded in such notions as situated practice, enactment, mutual constitution, improvisation, temporality, and creativity. Most importantly, it forces us - as researchers and practitioners - to take seriously the inherent reflexivity of our ongoing actions in the world.