Excuse the length of this post..
Mike Chumer
On Being Critical
Where are we?
What drew me to critical scholarship in general and critical management in
particular was not any specific ideological position or affinity but
rather what appeared to be an approach to inquiry that transcended
ideological alignment. After all inquiry and research into the basic
assumptions underlying the beliefs of individuals and collectives suggest
that the scholar remains both neutral and reflexive. Neutral to the degree
that preconceived notions and biases about collectives and what might be
their plight takes a back seat to the rigors of inquiry. Reflexive in that
scholars as instruments in the research process are aware of their biases
to the point where they can be articulated as research is being performed
so that others are aware of them . This awareness permits the research to
be evaluated accurately and succinctly.
However I have observed the following which is troubling to me. The first
is that there are very strong biases held by critical management scholars
that remind me of people who were directly involved in the peace movement
of the 60s and 70s here in the USA. At that time it was easy to take up
and rally around a cause. Vietnam was a political war and civil rights a
war of social justice. These scholars align themselves with groups that
have a very strong liberal and leftist bent. That is OK but if it begins
to influence scholarship then maybe it is not.
The second observation is a clear difference between the direction that I
perceive critical management taking here in the US versus what I sense the
direction is in the UK. In the US we seem to be positioning Critical
Management with an uppercase C and M whereas in the UK the "c" and "m" are
lower case. This difference is very defining.
Drilling down a bit, the nature of the "strong biases" observed by our
various colleagues are clearly articulated in a personal communication
received by me from one of the list members. It reads as follows:
"The problem is that the so-called "critical" people -- as in critical
literature studies, critical legal studies, etc.-- are really trying to
fool
people. They are not really critical, they just want to wear the garb of
independent thought the better to promote their own ideologies. They
have
allowed concerns about injustice and stupidity they do encounter here to
foam up into an anti-Americanism that tries to befriend any of our
country's
enemies. They are the worst enemies of real "criticism" because they
give
it such a bad name."
Granted this comment surfaced as a result of communications on the list
subsequent to the destruction in New York of the WTC and the killing of
close to 7000 innocent people but this perception is probably shared by
others. The key here is the notion of "independent thought " wrapped up
and packaged at the hands of some extremely powerful ideologies. Popper
speaks of "epistemology without a knowing subject". Weick borrows some of
that thought as well as Wiley's when he addresses the concept of
"extra-subjectivity". I suggest that many scholars who claim to practice
critical management scholarship are writing from a heavily biased position
grounded in some very dense ideologies.
I guess it is easy to take up a cause and rationalize one's alignment to
it under the guise of being critical, reference some of the recent
comments concerning the fate of women and children in Iraq. Blaming those
deaths on US sanctions in that country. How convenient an argument yet
how shallow in its scholarly dig.
Critical about human life
When I heard these comments it reminded me of an actual situation I
encountered when in Vietnam as a platoon commander. I will call this
recounting the "human shield metaphor" and make the claim that this form
of "shielding" is in reality what is going on in Iraq and countries like
Afghanistan. The story goes as follows:
" While on a routine patrol about 20 miles west of Danang in October 1965,
my platoon which was attached to an infantry company bivouacked on the top
of Hill 327. The number references the height of the hill in meters above
sea level. As we set up for the night we followed all combat protocols
that included setting up listening posts. Now listening posts are some
selected people who in this case took positions in strategic locations
down the face of the hill a distance from the rest of us who were at the
hill's crest. Their mission was to listen in the dark of night and if they
heard something communicate that over certain frequencies in a
predetermined manner. At about 3 AM, communications were initiated by all
listening posts indicating that there seemed to be activity at all points
around the hill's periphery. Upon receiving these communications our
immediate action was to send flares skyward. Flares were set off lighting
the entire sky as if it were daytime in order to give those of us at the
top of the hill a clear view as to what was going on.
To our horror at the base of the hill was a human ring starting to move up
the hill. In the first 2 rows of this ring were women and children from
the villages we had moved through in our patrol. Behind them were older
men from the villages. Behind them prodding them to move forward with
their weapons were countless numbers of the Viet Cong (VC). The VC were
using these innocent humans as shields. Talk about an ethical dilemma in a
wartime situation. If we open fire we kill women and children. If we don't
we fall prey to the VC and would lose our lives. We did what we had to
do."
How did this read in the press? "Marines kill innocent civilians". Easy
for those who look for these kind of headlines to berate Marines and
suggest that they randomly and without regard kill innocent civilians.
Now is it our fault that innocent women and children are killed as a
result of US policies? Perhaps to some. Yet I suggest that human shielding
evidenced by me in Vietnam is occurring in Iraq and other parts of third
world countries. Further this "using human as shields" by those who could
care less about human life is missed by some scholars who find it more
convenient to back a cause ( under the guise of being critical) rather
than doing the scholarly "digging" required (in true critical spirit).
Being Critical
Then what does it mean to be "critical"? Does being critical suggest an
alignment with a certain ideology using this ideology as a base for
academic and related forms of scholarly inquiry? If it does so suggest and
imply then perhaps implicit to the critical project is a form of
"scholarly asymmetry" that is paradoxical with the purpose and intent of
that project.
Any field of study even one as embryonic as critical management must be
critical about its own criticalness. This suggests that we should practice
what we seem to preach because if we don't it will be obvious to
others. But what is it that we preach and in what is it grounded? If we
ground our scholarship in our ideologies then let us be clear about what
those ideologies are to ourselves and to our colleagues. However if we
ground our scholarship in being critical then lets try to transcend our
ideologies and other "chains that bind us" as best we can, if we can. If
we can't then perhaps being critical is merely another form of academic
hegemony where the creation of knowledge is controlled by the self
interests of a few under the cloak of impartiality.
Therefore I feel we should be careful about CM and its strong ideological
link and investigate cm, its interdisciplinary inclusiveness and its
openness to critical constructs.
|
