Towards a Political Philosophy of Management: Performativity & Visibility in Management Practices

De Vaujany, F.X.; Aroles, J.; Laniray, P.

Abstract

Phenomenological, process-based and post-Marxist approaches have stressed the immanent nature of the ontogenesis of our world. The concept of performativity epitomizes these temporal, spatial and material views. Reality is always in movement itself: it is constantly materially and socially ‘performed’. Other views lead to a pre-defined world that would be mostly revealed through sensations (i.e. ‘representational perspectives’). These transcendental stances assume that a subject, although pre-existing experience, is the absolute condition of possibility of it. In this paper, we develop another view of performativity (either complementary or interrelated to an immanent stance), one that re-introduces transcendence in the analysis but sees in it something dialogical to the process itself. We draw from the notions of visibility-invisibility and continuity-discontinuity (Merleau-Ponty 1945/2013, 1964) in order to show how everyday activity both performs and makes visible the world. From that perspective, modes of visibility appear as conditions of possibility of performativity itself. We draw some implications for the conceptualization of management practices.

Citation

De Vaujany, F., Aroles, J., & Laniray, P. (2019). Towards a Political Philosophy of Management: Performativity & Visibility in Management Practices. Philosophy of Management, 18(2), 117-129. https://doi.org/10.1007/s40926-018-0091-4

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: May 17, 2018
• Online Publication Date: May 31, 2018
• Publication Date: Jun 30, 2019
• Deposit Date: Aug 2, 2018
• Publicly Available Date: May 31, 2019
• Journal: Philosophy of Management
• Print ISSN: 1740-3812
• Electronic ISSN: 2052-9597
• Publisher: Springer
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 18
• Issue: 2
• Pages: 117-129
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s40926-018-0091-4
• Public URL: https://durham-repository.worktribe.com/output/1319625