Portal de Periódicos da CAPES

Reconstituting the centrality of power in management and organization studies

2024; Wiley; Volume: 21; Issue: 2 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1111/emre.12663

1740-4762

Chris Carter, Richard Badham, Andrea Whittle, Stewart Clegg, Chris Carter, Andrea Whittle, Richard Badham, Stewart Clegg,

Management and Organizational Studies

Chris Carter University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, Scotland, United Kingdom Abstract This dialogue engages in some reflection on the role of power in management and organization studies, prompted by the publication of the second edition of Frameworks of Power, by Stewart R. Clegg (2023). The dialogue includes contributions by Chris Carter, Richard Badham and Andrea Whittle and some thoughts in response by Stewart Clegg. The dialogue begins with an overview by Chris Carter, and then the further contributions both denounce the 'forgetting of power' in current views of organizational phenomena—such as leadership, team behaviour and resilience—in which differences in interests and in freedom of choice seem to be missing in action. Andrea Whittle first introduces the relationship between power and leadership, as a neglected topic, followed by Richard Badham, recalling lessons from the past that should not be forgotten. Reflecting on the dialogue, Stewart Clegg responds by relating power's salient dimensions and types to the model of circuits of power and calls for a resuscitation of some classically European management and organization theory ways of thinking about power and democracy. Keywords: circuits of power, democracy, dimensions of power, future-making, leadership, organizations, power relations Absences Over the past 30 years, management and organization studies' theory has expanded considerably, becoming more sophisticated in its theoretical and methodological range. Yet, it often sidesteps crucial aspects of power and politics. Given the undeniable and urgent presence of power and politics in everyday organizational life, this oversight is surprising. Whether it is a profitable business school facing budget cuts from the central university in which it is situated, a government slashing arts' spending to balance the books, a significant supermarket chain squeezing the margins on one of its suppliers, or wealthy polluting countries blocking strong measures to mitigate climate change, these are all demonstrations of power and politics. Power creates winners and losers. Within the broad canon of organization and management theory, there are researchers addressing these issues, but it is rarely the go-to explanation. Instead, our research often fails to confront issues of power and politics directly. As Hardy & Clegg (1996) once said, 'some dare call it power', yet three decades on, most researchers prefer to remain quiet on this issue. The complex architectonics of institutional theories' logics and works or the mystical chicanery of process theory often trump the focus on power and politics. Or it might be a case that power hides in plain sight. Early theorists of the modern era of organization theory, which arguably commenced in the 1960s, were more attuned to researching power and politics (Clegg 1975; Pettigrew 1972). Their contributions remain relevant 50 years after their publication. Antecedents This new generation of scholars mirrored developments within social science's central boulevards of theorizing, which were busily escaping Parsons' intellectual straitjacket. Giddens (1971) rediscovered the sociological classics, examining the implications of Marx, Weber and Durkheim for modern society. In particular, he was acutely aware of how social structures reproduce themselves. The community power debates emanating from North America provided significant conceptual and empirical contributions. Most notably, Bachrach & Baratz (1970) highlighted the second face of power, exploring how power works best when behind the scenes. They showed how elites could stop uncomfortable issues from coming to the fore or kill off reforms through non-decision-making and the mobilization of bias. This critical insight is as relevant today as it was then. Fellow travellers, such as Crenson (1971), examined how corporate power prevented anti-pollution ordinances from being adopted, all without the need to intervene formally in politics. This work was produced at a time of political tumult in the United States, and the analysis focused on how power works in practical terms. Steven Lukes (1974) extended the community power debate and coined the term the third dimension of power in his concise but brilliant book. His argument echoed fashionable structuralist analyses of the day. It made the point that power works best when there is no conflict because social agents accept the status quo as inevitable and beyond challenge. This is relevant to understanding why the peasantry or proletariat failed effectively to challenge their conditions in the 18th and 19th centuries or why employees are quiescent in the face of modern-day corporate culture programmes. Similarly, Gaventa (1980) demonstrated how the third dimension of power functioned in the traditional coal mining occupational communities of the Appalachian Valley. Debates come and go (Clegg et al. 2022). Lukes' (1974) introduction of Gramsci's (1971) concept of 'hegemony' to a wider audience and his extension of Bachrach & Baratz's (1970) two faces of power into three dimensions led not only to a second edition of the book (Lukes, 2005) in which he discussed some of the response to the first edition. Mark Haugaard developed the three-dimensional model further, adding a fourth dimension of power (Haugaard 2020). Braverman's (1974) Labour and Monopoly Capital proved fruitful for the labour process debate that characterized much work from that date until the present day, although with a declining relevance in recent times. The inheritors of Braverman's conception of power in the workplace are arguably the critical realists, who have, inter alia, made important contributions to understanding workplace resistance (Ackroyd & Thompson 1999) and elites (Reed 2012). From the late 1970s, the influence of Foucault's (1977) ideas percolated widely. Foucault represented a very different way of thinking about power to the more structural emphasis of either Lukes or Braverman and seemed wholly disconnected from the American debates about community power that had been so significant in political science. The European debates seemed to be forming around different key texts, with the occasional synthesis of two or more strands, such as Knights & Willmott's (1989) marriage of labour process theory and Foucault (1977), pioneering a post-structural study of the workplace. Their focus was the rapidly changing financial services industry, which they interpreted using a Foucauldian reading of power and resistance, stimulating an innovative research programme (Grey 1994; Hodgson 2003; Knights et al. 1994; Knights & McCabe 1998). In American organization theory, the debate continued to centre on resource dependence, as promulgated by Pfeffer and Salancik (Hillman et al. 2009). Curiously, while institutional theory, the US Academy of Management's major intellectual enterprise of the last 30 years, has had much to say on most things, it has fallen eerily silent on the question of power (Clegg 2010). These strands, the community power debate and the dimensions of power (Haugaard 2012), the significance of resources and organizational dependence, especially on those that were strategically contingent (Hickson et al. 1971), the labour process debates (Delbridge 2007; Knights & Willmott 2016; O'Doherty & Willmott 2001) and Foucault on power (Foucault 2019), seemed not to be interacting or addressed in the same frame. Frameworks of power The achievements of the writers profiled above presented a rich smorgasbord of ingredients to study power and politics for Stewart Clegg, now a central figure in power debates, when a young sociologist of organizations studying at the University of Bradford, immersed himself in these resources as well as broader interests in music, film, history, literature and politics. His career took him from crisis-hit 1976 Britain to Brisbane in the 'Deep North' of Australia. An unintended consequence of this move was that he found himself the sole organization theorist in an interdisciplinary School of Humanities, providing a lively environment for young scholars of many disciplines, forming part of Brisbane's edgy underground scene. 1 Every theoretical framework is a product of its time and space; Clegg's (1989/2023) work is no different. His framework is a synthesis, in the same way as is Giddens's (1984) seminal Constitution of Society; he reprised the classics of power and embraced new developments, including Foucault, new institutionalism and actor-network theory, breaking new ground. Seemingly retaining a commitment to different levels of power, his work did so in a way that was both processual and interpretive, rather than structural. It centred on flows rather than structural determinations. Clegg's framework conjures up power as a series of interlocking circuits, it points to the interconnections, contingencies and the pervasiveness of power. Clegg's work is deeply concerned with the ethics and morality of power, something he views as stripped out of overly rationalized accounts, or those relying on engineering or biological metaphors. But his analysis is interested in the world as it is, not as it should be, voiced in a constant dialogue between theoretical concepts, history and the present. Little goes unanalysed. The premise of his work is simple: if one wants to understand organizations and their actions, it is crucial to understand power and politics. If the message was simple, the content was somewhat more complex. Clegg's book quickly became a classic; it caught the zeitgeist of a changing world and added new concepts to complement the old. It put power firmly on the agenda for the study of organizations in the 1990s and contributed more widely to debates on power across the social sciences. For instance, Flyvbjerg (1998) and Haugaard's (1997) theorizations of power, shared a close resonance with Clegg's work. These works offered an agenda for the future. Organization Theorists, primarily in Europe and Australia, set on a new path, which, in time, took on the form of Critical Management Studies. Clegg's work was one of the foundation stones of this movement. In 1996, Clegg co-edited the Sage Handbook of Organization Studies (Clegg et al. 1996). This was a radical statement, as it reshaped the canon of organization studies, providing a new centre of gravity for the field. It also signalled the post-war generation's control of the discipline. It provided a much-needed re-set. The 1990s and noughties were a fertile period for sociologically oriented, organization studies. There was a flowering of creative and critical work. Clegg was undoubtedly one of the central figures of this period, with younger researchers following the path he outlined (Clegg et al. 2007; Cunha et al. 2006; Gordon et al. 2009; Kornberger et al. 2006; Kornberger & Clegg 2011; Pitsis et al. 2003). This author was one of them (Carter et al. 2008 & 2011), heavily influenced not only by his ideas but also the joie de vivre associated with their expression (Clegg 1996, 2002; Clegg et al. 2000, 2004). From the vantage point of 2024, this now looks like a golden age: creativity and passion are now dwarfed by a desiccated form of institutionalism coupled with an obsession with publishing in 'A' journals (Carter & Spence 2019). Further adventures in organization theory We do not have to live in the pasts that have been made in the futures still to be created … If we are to change the world we need to change power relations. Before we can change the world then we must understand how that world was made and that requires substantial engagement with the role that conceptions of power have played in its making. (Clegg 2023: 31) Present histories such as the Covid-19 pandemic, Russia's invasion of Ukraine and the Climate Emergency test the huge explanatory capacity of organization studies, something we should pursue further within broader and deep analysis founded in the craft expertise of the organization theorist, rather than the fast media pronouncements of strutting business school panjandrums, pontificating about the hot topic du jour. It is important to remember that 'while the future will always be uncertain, what we do and strive for in the present frames its possibilities' (Clegg 2023: 318). This is a crucial point and one that organizational theorists should heed. The world is in a perilous state and requires scholars of all stripes to engage with its problems. To not do so is an abrogation of scholarly responsibility. In three decades from now, if the climate emergency has been mitigated, democratic institutions are thriving, inequalities have been eliminated, culture is flourishing, and people are living healthy and prosperous lives it will be a result of power and politics being mobilized for good. This is the challenge, one that must be embraced. References Ackroyd, S. & Thompson, P. (1999) Organizational misbehaviour. London: Sage. Bachrach, P. & Baratz, M.S. (1970) Power and poverty: theory and practice. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Bourdieu, P. (1993) The field of cultural production: essays on art and literature. New York: Columbia University Press. Braverman, H. (1974) Labor and monopoly capital: the degradation of work in the twentieth century. New York: Monthly Review Press. https://doi.org/10.14452/MR-026-03-1974-07_1 Carter, C. & Spence, C. (2019) For social reflexivity in organization and management theory. In: T. Zilber, J. Amis & J. Mair (Eds.) The production of managerial knowledge and organizational theory: new approaches to writing, producing and consuming theory, Research in the Sociology of Organizations, Vol. 59. Emerald, pp. 217–235. Carter, C., Clegg, S.R. & Kornberger, M. (2008) Strategy as practice. Strategic Organization, 6(1), 83–99. https://doi.org/10.1177/1476127007087154 Carter, C., Clegg, S.R. & Wåhlin, N. (2011) When science meets strategic realpolitik: the case of the Copenhagen UN climate change summit. Critical Perspectives on Accounting, 22(7), 682–697. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cpa.2011.04.002 Clegg, S.R. (1975) Power, rule and domination: a critical and empirical understanding of power in sociological theory and organizational life. London and Boston: Routledge and Kegan Paul, International Library of Sociology (Republished 2013 as Clegg, S. R. (2013 reprint) Power, Rule and Domination: A Critical and Empirical Understanding of Power in Sociological Theory and Organizational Life, London: Routledge Library Editions: Organization: Theory & Behaviour Volume 6). Clegg, S.R. (1989) Frameworks of power. London: Sage. https://doi.org/10.4135/9781446279267 Clegg, S.R. (1996) The rhythm of the saints. Electronic Journal of Radical Organization Theory, 1(1), 1–6. Clegg, S.R. (2002) "Lives in the balance": a comment on Hinings and Greenwood's "disconnects and consequences in organization theory?" Administrative Science Quarterly, 47(3), 428–441. https://doi.org/10.2307/3094846 Clegg, S.R. (2010) The state, power and agency: missing in action in institutional theory?. Journal of Management Inquiry, 19(1), 4–13. https://doi.org/10.1177/1056492609347562 Clegg, S.R. (2023) Frameworks of power, 2nd edition. London: Sage. Clegg, S.R., Carter, C. & Kornberger, M. (2004) Get up, I feel like being a strategy machine. European Management Review, 1(1), 21–28. https://doi.org/10.1057/palgrave.emr.1500011 Clegg, S.R., Courpasson, D. & Phillips, N. (2006) Power and organizations. London: Sage. https://doi.org/10.4135/9781446215715 Clegg, S.R., Cunha, M.P. & Berti, M. (2022) Research movements and theorizing dynamics in management and organization studies. Academy of Management Review, 47(3), 382–401. https://doi.org/10.5465/amr.2018.0466 S.R. Clegg, C. Hardy & W. Nord (Eds). (1996) In: Handbook of organization studies. London: Sage. Clegg, S.R., Linstead, S. & Sewell, G. (2000) Only penguins: a polemic on organization theory from the edge of the world. Organization Studies, 21(1), 103–117. https://doi.org/10.1177/0170840600210007 Clegg, S.R., Rhodes, C. & Kornberger, M. (2007) Desperately seeking legitimacy: organizational identity and emerging industries. Organization Studies, 28(4), 495–513. https://doi.org/10.1177/0170840606067995 Clegg, S.R. & Haugaard, M. (2009) The SAGE handbook of power. London: Sage. https://doi.org/10.4135/9780857021014 Crenson, M. (1971) The un-politics of air pollution: a study of non-decision-making in the cities. Baltimore, MD: John Hopkins University Press. Crozier, M. (1964) The bureaucratic phenomenon. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Delbridge, R. (2006) Extended review: the vitality of labour process analysis. Organization Studies, 27(8), 1209–1219. https://doi.org/10.1177/0170840606069145 Emirbayer, M. & Johnson, V. (2008) Bourdieu and organizational analysis. Theory & Society, 37(1), 1–44. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11186-007-9052-y Flyvbjerg, B. (1998) Rationality and power: democracy in practice. Chicago: Chicago University Press. Foucault, M. (1965) Madness and civilization: a history of insanity in the age of reason. Pantheon. Foucault, M. (2019) Power: the essential works of Michel Foucault 1954–1984. Penguin. Gaventa, J. (1980) Power and powerlessness: quiescence and rebellion in an Appalachian valley. Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press. Giddens, A. (1971) Capitalism and modern social theory: an analysis of the writings of Marx, Durkheim and Max Weber. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511803109 Giddens, A. (1984) The constitution of society. Cambridge: Polity Press. Gordon, R., Clegg, S.R. & Kornberger, M. (2009) Embedded ethics: discourse and power in the New South Wales police service. Organization Studies, 30(1), 73–99. https://doi.org/10.1177/0170840608100515 Grey, C. (1994) Career as a project of the self and labour process discipline. Sociology, 28(2), 479–497. https://doi.org/10.1177/0038038594028002007 Hardy, C. & Clegg, S. (2006) Some dare call it power. In: S.R. Clegg, C. Hardy, W. Nord & T. Lawrence (Eds.) Handbook of organization studies. London: Sage. https://doi.org/10.4135/9781848608030.n27 Haugaard, M. (1997) The constitution of power: a theoretical analysis of power, knowledge and structure. Manchester: Manchester University Press. Haugaard, M. (2020) The four dimensions of power. Manchester University Press. https://doi.org/10.7765/9781526110381 Hickson, D.J., Hinings, C.R., Lee, C.A., Schneck, R.E. & Pennings, J.M. (1971) A strategic contingencies' theory of intraorganizational power. Administrative Science Quarterly, 16(2), 216–229. https://doi.org/10.2307/2391831 Hillman, A.J., Withers, M.C. & Collins, B.J. (2009) Resource dependence theory: a review. Journal of Management, 35(6), 1404–1427. https://doi.org/10.1177/0149206309343469 Hodgson, D. (2003) 'Taking it like a man': masculinity, subjection and resistance in the selling of life assurance. Gender, Work and Organization, 10(1), 1–21. https://doi.org/10.1111/1468-0432.00001 Knight, A. (2007) Radical media in the deep north: the origins of 4ZZZ-FM. Queensland Review, 14(1), 95–105. https://doi.org/10.1017/S1321816600006188 Knights, D. & McCabe, D. (1998) 'What happens when the phone goes wild?': staff, stress and spaces for escape in a BPR telephone banking work regime. Journal of Management Studies, 35(2), 163–194. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-6486.00089 Knights, D. & Willmott, H. (1989) Power and subjectivity at work: from degradation to subjugation in social relations. Sociology, 23(4), 535–558. https://doi.org/10.1177/0038038589023004003 D. Knights & H. Willmott (Eds). (2016) In: Labour process theory. Springer. Knights, D., Sturdy, A. & Morgan, G. (1994) The consumer rules? An examination of the rhetoric and "reality" of marketing in financial services. European Journal of Marketing, 28(3), 42–54. https://doi.org/10.1108/03090569410057281 Kornberger, M. & Clegg, S.R. (2011) Strategy as performative practice: the case study of Sydney 2030. Strategic Organization, 9(2), 136–162. https://doi.org/10.1177/1476127011407758 Kornberger, M., Carter, C. & Clegg, S.R. (2006) Rethinking the polyphonic organization: managing as discursive practice. Scandinavian Journal of Management, 22(1), 3–30. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scaman.2005.05.004 Lukes, S. (1974) Power: a radical view. London: MacMillan. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-02248-9 Lukes, S. (2005) Power: a radical view, second edition. London: Palgrave MacMillan. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-230-80257-5 Maclean, M., Harvey, C. & Clegg, S.R. (2018) Organization theory in business and management history: present status and future prospects. Business History Review, 91(3), 457–481. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0007680517001027 Maclean, M., Harvey, C. & Clegg, S.R. (2016) Conceptualizing historical organization studies. Academy of Management Review, 41(4), 609–632. https://doi.org/10.5465/amr.2014.0133 M. Maclean, C. Harvey, R. Suddaby & S. R. Clegg (Eds). (2021) In: Historical organization studies: theory and applications. London: Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003033592 O'Doherty, D. & Willmott, H. (2001) Debating labour process theory: the issue of subjectivity and the relevance of poststructuralism. Sociology, 35(2), 457–476. https://doi.org/10.1177/S0038038501000220 Pettigrew, A.M. (1972) Information control as a power resource. Sociology, 6(2), 187–204. Pitsis, T., Clegg, S.R., Marosszeky, M. & Rura-Polley, T. (2003) Constructing the Olympic dream: managing innovation through the future perfect. Organization Science, 14(5), 574–590. https://doi.org/10.1287/orsc.14.5.574.16762 Reed, M.I. (2012) Masters of the universe: power and elites in organization studies. Organization Studies, 33(2), 203–221. https://doi.org/10.1177/0170840611430590 Stafford, A. (2004) Pig city: from the saints to savage garden. Brisbane: The University of Queensland Press. Iterson, A. & Clegg, S.R. (2008) The politics of gossip and denial in inter-organizational relations. Human Relations, 61(8), 1117–1137. https://doi.org/10.1177/0018726708094862 Marrewijk, A., Clegg, S.R., Pitsis, T. & Veenswijk, M. (2008) Managing public-private megaprojects: paradoxes, complexity and project design. International Journal of Project Management, 26(6), 591–600. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijproman.2007.09.007 Andrea Whittle University of Newcastle Business School, Newcastle upon Tyne, England, United Kingdom Most researchers tend to settle on their preferred unit of analysis early on in their careers and stick to honing their craft at that level. Some researchers specialize in 'zooming in' to the micro-level who explore the micro-dynamics of interaction (I count myself here) or the intricacies of individual cognition in organizations. Some researchers operate more comfortably at the meso level, examining the interactions between organizations and their environments. We also have researchers who specialize in 'zooming out' to broader or grander issues at the macro level and explore the functions and dysfunctions of markets, institutions, societies and historical epochs. Few scholars try to work across all these levels, for obvious reasons given how challenging they are to link together in a meaningful way. Power can be found in the most mundane circumstances, as is evident when Clegg (2023) invites the reader to 'zoom in' on a snippet of a tape-recorded conversation. The conversation is between men on a building site discussing 'normal clay' and is taken from Clegg's earlier book Power, Rule and Domination (Clegg 1975: 146). It turned out that project managers were skilled at squeezing additional payments out of their clients when they succeeded in arguing that the clay into which they were digging bore holes was not 'normal'. The fact that the men were discussing the digging of holes in the ground was, it turns out, most apt because it provided an opportunity to examine how this one micro-instance of conversation at the 'surface' level could provide insights into what was going on 'below the surface'. The 'surface' conversation could be interpreted not only as a set of power plays in its own right but also as a manifestation of 'deeper' structural levels to which the analysis of power relations could then 'zoom out'. These 'deeper' structural levels concerned the modes of rationality used in the workplace and the broader capitalist structures of profit maximization shaping the relations between the men and their building site managers and these managers and their clients, as well as the organizations and their owners and beneficiaries. By forging these links between the 'surface' and 'deeper' structures, a novel set of conceptual links were forged between the micro-level theories of interpretation and interaction grounded in phenomenology and ethnomethodology and the macro-level theorists of society and economy, such as Weber. This fascination with the linkages between the 'small detail' of actions and interactions and the 'big picture' of societies and their structures pervades some of the best work in our field. In critically assessing theories of power from across the social sciences, analysis needs to draw on political science discussions about the workings of sovereign power, community power and elites; it needs to address theories from sociology of the rules, norms and values generating social structure and order; theories from science studies on the workings of networks; theories of ideology and hegemony from neo-Marxist thinkers; and theories from post-structuralist thinkers about historical shifts in the construction of systems of thought and the subject positions they open up. It was such insights that were integrated into a theoretical model of a 'circuit' of power relations by Clegg (2023), akin to an electrical circuit board directing flows of electricity around the components of the circuit. The first circuit is the 'causal' power relations, comprising episodic power struggles (i.e. particular episodes where conflict or power plays can be observed). The second circuit is the 'dispositional' circuit. Here, overt conflict and struggle is not observed because this circuit provides the social rules and 'passage points', which create relations of meaning and membership and which creates social integration. The third circuit is the 'facilitative' circuit, comprising the systems of domination enacted through techniques of discipline, such as the system of surveillance. The study of power: Taking stock I will address the present status of teaching and research into power and organizations in business schools. The present state is both reassuring and alarming at the same time, in my opinion. The reassuring aspect is that discussions about power remain alive and kicking, albeit in some regions, some journals and some subject areas more than others. European Management Review has been among those journals playing a key role in pushing the frontiers of knowledge about power forward, with articles exploring power relations in settings as diverse as change initiatives in multinational corporations (Drori & Ellis 2011) and the employment of knowledge workers (Panico 2010). That said, scholars differ on the extent to which managerialism is uncritically accepted, with its tendency to regard power as an illegitimate 'dirty' word and its tendency to view managerial and corporate actions as 'normal' and 'natural' unless they breach established laws or expectations. Scholars also differ on the extent to which 'critical' ideas about managerial and corporate power are tolerated or permitted. It is therefore not always easy for researchers or educators working in particular institutions or writing in particular journals to speak of 'power'. One such 'alarm bell', in my eyes, is found in the current state of teaching and research into leadership—a topic I have been exploring in recent years in my own research. Leadership is arguably one of the most popular and alluring concepts circulating in business schools today. Business school academics are told they are not educating future managers, but rather the 'business leaders of the future'. PhD students and research associates around the world are being funded to advance knowledge about how to create more, or better, leaders. Even long-established journals are being re-titled to remove the word 'manager' and replace it with the term 'leader' or 'leadership'. 3 One effect of this discourse of leadership is that scholars seem to sidestep the fact that those in 'leadership positions' in organizations—in other words the 'managers', 'superordinates' or 'administrators' as organizational scholars used to call them in the past (Mautner & Learmonth 2020)—exercise particular forms of power that their authority position in the organizational hierarchy and the system of formal laws and established meaning systems in society enables them to exercise. Bosses can sack, discipline or demote workers, but it is considerably harder for the reverse to occur, for instance. The result is that discussion of power is absent from all but a few critical texts on leadership (Learmonth & Morrell 2019). 4 It is as if these other writers imagine that employees at work are just like the protestors who join Greta Thunberg on a climate protest: inspired and motivated by their leader's vision and values but never subjected to any systems of surveillance or forms of implicit or explicit threat found in contemporary organizations. It is also as if these writers imagine that employees could simply change their minds and decide not to 'follow' what their bosses tell them to do, with no repercussions on them and their families and their communities, in the same way as someone could decid