Toward polyphonic constitutive historicism: a new research agenda for management historians

Smith, Andrew ORCID: 0000-0002-8589-7608 and Russell, Jason (2016) Toward polyphonic constitutive historicism: a new research agenda for management historians. MANAGEMENT & ORGANIZATIONAL HISTORY, 11 (2). pp. 236-251.

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Abstract

Ten years after the call for a ‘historic turn,’ this paper builds on recent developments in organizational remembering scholarship to outline a new research agenda for management historians. Traditionally, management historians have focused on understanding what actually took place in the past. The research agenda for management historians proposed in this paper involves a shift in focus to understanding how perceptions of the past influence economic action in the present. This paper outlines a new methodology for management research. The paper argues that management scholars need to draw on the latest research in the field of social memory studies to ensure that our methodologies for investigation organizational remembering are polyphonic. Polyphonic research involves attempt to capture and analyze diverse voices, rather than just a single voice or just the voices of a few elite individuals within an organization. We critique much of the existing literature on how the past on organizational memory is non-polyphonic in the sense that the historical ideas of only a small number of actors are considered.

Item Type:	Article
Uncontrolled Keywords:	Historic turn, labor history, constitutive historicism, organization studies, organizational memory, management history, organizational remembering, memory studies, rhetorical history
Depositing User:	Symplectic Admin
Date Deposited:	11 Apr 2016 10:41
Last Modified:	17 Dec 2022 01:27
DOI:	10.1080/17449359.2015.1115742
Related URLs:	Author Publisher
URI:	https://livrepository.liverpool.ac.uk/id/eprint/3000429