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Mike wrote: > 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. I think that Mike's post really takes us to the heart of what is 'critical', though I have to confess doubts about the distiction between his accout of 'critical' scholarship and more traditionally 'scientific' modes of enquiry. example 1 - reflexivity Mike suggests that reflexivity involves "scholars as instruments in the research process" being aware of, and articulating, their biases so that their research can be evaluated accurately. This is simply a claim for greater scientific objectivity - not a problem in itself but it does imply that the scientist can step back from, and be objective about, himself. The possibility of doing this is not universally accepted and for many, myself included, the impossibility of realising this act of separation is a defining problematic for 'critical' approaches. Mike's resolution of this problem in neo-cartesian terms (separating objective/neutral mind from subjective, embodied experience and belief) seems premature at the very least. This raises point 2 - neutrality Connected to the discussion above, there have been a number of theoretical interventions featuring prominently in 'critical management' scholarship that have problematised the idea that knowledge can ever be neutral. Recent exchanges on this list have illuminated this point far more eloquently than I could. Mike - I was unsure about your big 'CM' little 'cm' point. For myself the capitalised 'Critical' connects to the European 'Critical Theory' tradition of the Frankfurt School etc. which is a strong current in CMS in the UK. 'critical', on the other hand, is an imprecise and much contested term that, to misquote Humpty Dumpty in Alice In Wonderland, seems to mean 'exactly what people want it to mean'. This is a serious point. 'critcal' is being contested right now on this group and in numerous conferences, books and papers. Central to this contestation is the concept of 'ideology'. Which brings me back to the starting point of Mike's post, and his desire to 'transcend' ideology. In 1931, Adorno distinguished between 'transcendent' and 'immanent' critiques. Whilst Mike's approach follows the transcendent line and seeks to expose ideology from a position outside that ideology (a transcendent critique of critical management so to speak), an immanent critique would start to expose internal contradictions from within a specific position, without assuming that we can ever entirely escape ideology and subject position. It seems that this latter might be a more useful point from which to pursue Mike's stated aim of making critical management "critical about its own criticalness" without necessarily assuming a priori the possibility of neutral knowledge. If we go for the latter and claim privileged access to objectivity and neutrality by following scientific principles of, e.g. falsifiability, then what distiguishes 'critical management' from 'management science'? My apologies for the simultaneous length and simplicity of this post, chris ----------------------- Christopher Land Teaching Fellow Industrial Relations and Organizational Behaviour Warwick Business School CV4 7AL 024 76524658