Thomas Lennerfors | Uppsala University (original) (raw)
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Papers by Thomas Lennerfors
Tetsugaku companions to Japanese philosophy, 2019
This chapter describes Watsuji Tetsurō’s ethics of ningen – of human betweenness- explores how it... more This chapter describes Watsuji Tetsurō’s ethics of ningen – of human betweenness- explores how it forms the base of an ethics of technology, and analyses a contemporary technology – containerization – based on his ethics. Watsuji sees technology as part of the milieu. Technology is thus not autonomous, but represents betweenness. Technology can also affect betweenness, and promote it. In its analysis of a contemporary technology, the paper describes containerization as a way to efficiently transport goods, which bears the potential of promoting betweenness, but seen more metaphorically, containerization of people and thought put serious obstacles to realizing an ethics of ningen.
Springer eBooks, Sep 30, 2018
A major challenge for fighting corruption is our narrow conceptions about corruption and the lack... more A major challenge for fighting corruption is our narrow conceptions about corruption and the lack of alternative, creative theorizations about both corruption and anti-corruption (Breit et al. in Ephemera: Theory and Politics in Organization 15: 319–336, 2015). This chapter responds to this challenge by discussing organizational corruption and anti-corruption in an alternative way. It reviews three different definitions of corruption and argues that corruption should be seen as the degeneration of a legitimate value. With this view of corruption, this chapter develops an anti-corruption framework by inverting Ashforth and Anand’s (Research in Organizational Behavior 25: 1–52, 2003) work on the normalization of corruption in organizations. The components of the framework are de-rationalization (producing alternative discourse and going beneath discourse), de-institutionalization (manipulating organizational memory and highlighting counterfactual corruption events) and de-socialization (excluding the personal and excluding the social). In the latter part, the chapter argues that one could relate to anti-corruption measures in any of four ways: anxiety, superego, courage and justice. It suggests that a balanced mix of these four subject positions is useful for fighting corruption.
Science and Engineering Ethics, Sep 13, 2022
2022 IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference (FIE), Oct 8, 2022
In this paper, I will let the Sloterdijkian concept of anthropotechnics (from the book You Must C... more In this paper, I will let the Sloterdijkian concept of anthropotechnics (from the book You Must Change Your Life!), the creation of human beings from training, repetitions, and habits, to guide my research. Human life is about training and repetition, about ascetism. But, in human beings there are also always upward-tending traits, so when one encounters humans, one will always find acrobats. Different cultures, such as religious cultures, aristocratic cultures, military cultures, athletic cultures and cognitive cultures, have different vertical tensions. The paper brings Sloterdijk to a face-to-face discussion with the technological development staff of a Swedish shipping company (the guys who design, draw, calculate, how ships should be built and rebuilt). It discusses the rationales behind technological development in this company over the last 50 years and explores how ascetics and acrobats have moulded themselves individually and collectively, working on themselves and working on artefacts. In this anthropotechnic training camp, people have constantly asked themselves: which way is up?
In this paper I depart from the case of a change project/process that has taken place within the ... more In this paper I depart from the case of a change project/process that has taken place within the Stena group (Lennerfors 2013a). In 1982, Stena Bulk - a company that was intended to trade in bulk c ...
HAL (Le Centre pour la Communication Scientifique Directe), 2019
The case study method is nothing new: cases in their real-world context have been used not only f... more The case study method is nothing new: cases in their real-world context have been used not only for research but also for teaching in different disciplines for many decades. Multidisciplinary collaborative teaching and learning frameworks, however, can contribute to the development of sustainability case-based education in rather innovative ways. To exemplify this, the present paper will particularly examine the transformative potential of the introduction of a "legal perspective" to promote students' learning into a co-taught course based on a range of selected case studies about sustainability in industrial companies and whose main feature consists in involving instructors and students from various educational backgrounds and two different higher education institutions, namely
"Ethics as practice" as ethico-politics: the contributions from Alain Badiou's ethi... more "Ethics as practice" as ethico-politics: the contributions from Alain Badiou's ethical thought
Proceedings of the International Association for Business and Society, Jul 1, 2007
The Japanese philosophy of Kaizen, or continuous improvements, has been accepted and adopted all ... more The Japanese philosophy of Kaizen, or continuous improvements, has been accepted and adopted all around the world. A central concept in kaizen which is extremely well-known in Japan, but somewhat less acknowledged in Europe and the U.S. is mieruka (見える化), which means visualization or visual control. Mieruka is a central component in the shopfloor practices that have undergone Kaizen. In Annual reports of Japanese companies, for example Toyota, mieruka practices are brought forth. Being part of a management philosophy, mieruka is said to lead to fast problem identification, increased efficiency, and organizational knowledge sharing.Playing just a little with words, and entering into opposition to mieruka, we will launch the concept satoruka (悟り化). Satoru, or the noun satori is based in Buddhist thinking meaning enlightenment. Satoruka means a process, or moment, of transition to enlightenment (ka means change, or transition), in other words to become enlightened. In our paper, we intend to explain what satoruka is and how it can be understood to understand organizations. The major consequence as we see it is to counter the functionalist and practitioner-oriented semantic space in which mieruka is situated. This might sound counter-intuitive to a "Western" audience, but indeed enlightenment (and other concepts such as Truth) in Buddhist thinking is not related to the Enlightenment movement in the West. Enlightenment should therefore not be seen as a way of reaching some kind of objective, quantifiable, truth, but about reaching a state of true understanding. In the Japanese lexicon Kojien, satori is explained as "to understand things clearly" or "to transcend the heart's doubts and gain mastery of the mind". Satori has not only been used for Buddhist enlightenment, but also in other well-known philosophico-cultural movements in Japan, for example in Bushido, where it does not only mean the "functional" or "practitioner-oriented" aspects of "slashing and chopping", but rather to understand the true meaning of the "way" of the sword and the true nature of things by becoming one with nature. Once again, remember that the meaning of "truth" radically differs from Western conceptions of truth. In this paper, we will discuss satoruka, its relation to the traditional concept of satori, and show how it is relevant to the study of organizations (especially we will explore the relevance for the community based view on organizations, which we draw on) and in what context satoruka might arise.
Today, in a situation where global requirements of sustainability are high, and where sustainabil... more Today, in a situation where global requirements of sustainability are high, and where sustainability and energy use has received renewed interest because of the Great East Japan Earthquake, we address one of the sustainability efforts that Japanese companies are making - namely Green IT. Basically, Green IT means both to reduce environmental impact by using IT, and to reduce the environmental impact of IT as such. In the U.S. and Europe, Green IT is gaining speed, but might it be the case that Japan is lagging behind? In this presentation, we present the current state of Green IT in Japan and situate it in a global context. We also discuss its importance for the future.
Culture and Organization, Jul 3, 2018
Nothing, as a matter of fact, is more closed to us than this animal life from which we are descen... more Nothing, as a matter of fact, is more closed to us than this animal life from which we are descended. … The animal opens before me a depth that attracts me and is familiar to me. In a sense, I know this depth: it is my own. It is at the same time that which is farthest removed from me, that which deserves the name depth, which means precisely that which is unfathomable to me.
Emerald Publishing Limited eBooks, Aug 29, 2017
Abstract In this chapter, four different theorizations of corruption are presented. The first con... more Abstract In this chapter, four different theorizations of corruption are presented. The first concerns the principal–agent understanding of corruption. The second explains how a person is socialized into corruption. The third builds on philosophy and posits that corruption is degeneration from an ideal, presenting a multifaceted view of different goods and their respective corruptions. The fourth is inspired by psychoanalysis and explains why corruption is often externalized and seen as a feature of other people, companies, sectors, and countries. The chapter claims that to understand corruption fully without running into simplistic analyses, one always needs to reflexively consider various perspectives, of which these four are important examples.
Tetsugaku companions to Japanese philosophy, 2019
This chapter describes Watsuji Tetsurō’s ethics of ningen – of human betweenness- explores how it... more This chapter describes Watsuji Tetsurō’s ethics of ningen – of human betweenness- explores how it forms the base of an ethics of technology, and analyses a contemporary technology – containerization – based on his ethics. Watsuji sees technology as part of the milieu. Technology is thus not autonomous, but represents betweenness. Technology can also affect betweenness, and promote it. In its analysis of a contemporary technology, the paper describes containerization as a way to efficiently transport goods, which bears the potential of promoting betweenness, but seen more metaphorically, containerization of people and thought put serious obstacles to realizing an ethics of ningen.
Springer eBooks, Sep 30, 2018
A major challenge for fighting corruption is our narrow conceptions about corruption and the lack... more A major challenge for fighting corruption is our narrow conceptions about corruption and the lack of alternative, creative theorizations about both corruption and anti-corruption (Breit et al. in Ephemera: Theory and Politics in Organization 15: 319–336, 2015). This chapter responds to this challenge by discussing organizational corruption and anti-corruption in an alternative way. It reviews three different definitions of corruption and argues that corruption should be seen as the degeneration of a legitimate value. With this view of corruption, this chapter develops an anti-corruption framework by inverting Ashforth and Anand’s (Research in Organizational Behavior 25: 1–52, 2003) work on the normalization of corruption in organizations. The components of the framework are de-rationalization (producing alternative discourse and going beneath discourse), de-institutionalization (manipulating organizational memory and highlighting counterfactual corruption events) and de-socialization (excluding the personal and excluding the social). In the latter part, the chapter argues that one could relate to anti-corruption measures in any of four ways: anxiety, superego, courage and justice. It suggests that a balanced mix of these four subject positions is useful for fighting corruption.
Science and Engineering Ethics, Sep 13, 2022
2022 IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference (FIE), Oct 8, 2022
In this paper, I will let the Sloterdijkian concept of anthropotechnics (from the book You Must C... more In this paper, I will let the Sloterdijkian concept of anthropotechnics (from the book You Must Change Your Life!), the creation of human beings from training, repetitions, and habits, to guide my research. Human life is about training and repetition, about ascetism. But, in human beings there are also always upward-tending traits, so when one encounters humans, one will always find acrobats. Different cultures, such as religious cultures, aristocratic cultures, military cultures, athletic cultures and cognitive cultures, have different vertical tensions. The paper brings Sloterdijk to a face-to-face discussion with the technological development staff of a Swedish shipping company (the guys who design, draw, calculate, how ships should be built and rebuilt). It discusses the rationales behind technological development in this company over the last 50 years and explores how ascetics and acrobats have moulded themselves individually and collectively, working on themselves and working on artefacts. In this anthropotechnic training camp, people have constantly asked themselves: which way is up?
In this paper I depart from the case of a change project/process that has taken place within the ... more In this paper I depart from the case of a change project/process that has taken place within the Stena group (Lennerfors 2013a). In 1982, Stena Bulk - a company that was intended to trade in bulk c ...
HAL (Le Centre pour la Communication Scientifique Directe), 2019
The case study method is nothing new: cases in their real-world context have been used not only f... more The case study method is nothing new: cases in their real-world context have been used not only for research but also for teaching in different disciplines for many decades. Multidisciplinary collaborative teaching and learning frameworks, however, can contribute to the development of sustainability case-based education in rather innovative ways. To exemplify this, the present paper will particularly examine the transformative potential of the introduction of a "legal perspective" to promote students' learning into a co-taught course based on a range of selected case studies about sustainability in industrial companies and whose main feature consists in involving instructors and students from various educational backgrounds and two different higher education institutions, namely
"Ethics as practice" as ethico-politics: the contributions from Alain Badiou's ethi... more "Ethics as practice" as ethico-politics: the contributions from Alain Badiou's ethical thought
Proceedings of the International Association for Business and Society, Jul 1, 2007
The Japanese philosophy of Kaizen, or continuous improvements, has been accepted and adopted all ... more The Japanese philosophy of Kaizen, or continuous improvements, has been accepted and adopted all around the world. A central concept in kaizen which is extremely well-known in Japan, but somewhat less acknowledged in Europe and the U.S. is mieruka (見える化), which means visualization or visual control. Mieruka is a central component in the shopfloor practices that have undergone Kaizen. In Annual reports of Japanese companies, for example Toyota, mieruka practices are brought forth. Being part of a management philosophy, mieruka is said to lead to fast problem identification, increased efficiency, and organizational knowledge sharing.Playing just a little with words, and entering into opposition to mieruka, we will launch the concept satoruka (悟り化). Satoru, or the noun satori is based in Buddhist thinking meaning enlightenment. Satoruka means a process, or moment, of transition to enlightenment (ka means change, or transition), in other words to become enlightened. In our paper, we intend to explain what satoruka is and how it can be understood to understand organizations. The major consequence as we see it is to counter the functionalist and practitioner-oriented semantic space in which mieruka is situated. This might sound counter-intuitive to a "Western" audience, but indeed enlightenment (and other concepts such as Truth) in Buddhist thinking is not related to the Enlightenment movement in the West. Enlightenment should therefore not be seen as a way of reaching some kind of objective, quantifiable, truth, but about reaching a state of true understanding. In the Japanese lexicon Kojien, satori is explained as "to understand things clearly" or "to transcend the heart's doubts and gain mastery of the mind". Satori has not only been used for Buddhist enlightenment, but also in other well-known philosophico-cultural movements in Japan, for example in Bushido, where it does not only mean the "functional" or "practitioner-oriented" aspects of "slashing and chopping", but rather to understand the true meaning of the "way" of the sword and the true nature of things by becoming one with nature. Once again, remember that the meaning of "truth" radically differs from Western conceptions of truth. In this paper, we will discuss satoruka, its relation to the traditional concept of satori, and show how it is relevant to the study of organizations (especially we will explore the relevance for the community based view on organizations, which we draw on) and in what context satoruka might arise.
Today, in a situation where global requirements of sustainability are high, and where sustainabil... more Today, in a situation where global requirements of sustainability are high, and where sustainability and energy use has received renewed interest because of the Great East Japan Earthquake, we address one of the sustainability efforts that Japanese companies are making - namely Green IT. Basically, Green IT means both to reduce environmental impact by using IT, and to reduce the environmental impact of IT as such. In the U.S. and Europe, Green IT is gaining speed, but might it be the case that Japan is lagging behind? In this presentation, we present the current state of Green IT in Japan and situate it in a global context. We also discuss its importance for the future.
Culture and Organization, Jul 3, 2018
Nothing, as a matter of fact, is more closed to us than this animal life from which we are descen... more Nothing, as a matter of fact, is more closed to us than this animal life from which we are descended. … The animal opens before me a depth that attracts me and is familiar to me. In a sense, I know this depth: it is my own. It is at the same time that which is farthest removed from me, that which deserves the name depth, which means precisely that which is unfathomable to me.
Emerald Publishing Limited eBooks, Aug 29, 2017
Abstract In this chapter, four different theorizations of corruption are presented. The first con... more Abstract In this chapter, four different theorizations of corruption are presented. The first concerns the principal–agent understanding of corruption. The second explains how a person is socialized into corruption. The third builds on philosophy and posits that corruption is degeneration from an ideal, presenting a multifaceted view of different goods and their respective corruptions. The fourth is inspired by psychoanalysis and explains why corruption is often externalized and seen as a feature of other people, companies, sectors, and countries. The chapter claims that to understand corruption fully without running into simplistic analyses, one always needs to reflexively consider various perspectives, of which these four are important examples.
Studentlitteratur, 2019
Vad är etik för ingenjörer? Ingenjörer utvecklar teknik som har stor påverkan, positiv och negati... more Vad är etik för ingenjörer? Ingenjörer utvecklar teknik som har stor påverkan, positiv och negativ, på människor och miljö. Det innebär att ingenjören måste ta ställning och göra moraliska bedömningar. Dessutom måste hen ta hänsyn till andra intressenter – medarbetare, ägare, kunder och leverantörer – som kan ha motstridiga intressen.
I den här boken presenteras en praktisk, handgriplig process för att hantera etiska dilemman: medvetenhet, ansvarstagande, kritiskt tänkande och handling. Författaren ger många exempel från teknikområden som spänner från byggkonstruktion till transhumanism. I ett genomgående fall får du som läsare tänka till i processens olika steg: att utveckla eller inte utveckla ”Livspartnern” som stöd i vården och i livet. Vad är gott och ont, rätt och fel? Det är frågan.
Studentlitteratur, 2019
What is ethics in engineering? Engineers develop technology that has a major impact, positive and... more What is ethics in engineering? Engineers develop technology that has a major impact, positive and negative, on people and the environment. This means that engineers must take a stand and make moral judgements. Also, they need to take other stakeholders into consideration – employees, owners, customers and suppliers – who might have conflicting interests.
In this book a practical, hands-on process for handling ethical dilemmas is presented: awareness, responsibility, critical thinking and action. The author gives many examples from engineering areas ranging from construction to transhumanism. In a recurring case you as a reader think through each of the steps in the process: to develop or not develop the “Life Partner”. What is good and evil, right and wrong? That is the question.
Brill, 2019
Snow in the Tropics by Thomas Taro Lennerfors and Peter Birch offers the first comprehensive hist... more Snow in the Tropics by Thomas Taro Lennerfors and Peter Birch offers the first comprehensive history of the independent reefer operators. These shipping companies, such as Lauritzen, Salén, Seatrade, Star Reefers, and NYK Reefer, developed the dedicated transport of refrigerated products like meat, fish, and fruit by ship, from the early 20th century to the present. Snow in the Tropics describes how the history of the reefer operators has been formed in relation to shippers, such as Dole and Chiquita, in a constant struggle with the liner companies, such as Maersk, and in relation to global economic and political trends. It also covers how the industry is discursively constructed and the psychological drivers of the business decisions in it.
This book explores the relevance of Japanese ethics for the field of ethics of technology. It cov... more This book explores the relevance of Japanese ethics for the field of ethics of technology. It covers the theories of Japanese ethicists such as Nishida Kitarō, Watsuji Tetsurō, Imamichi Tomonobu, Yuasa Yasuo, as well as more contemporary ethicists, and explores their relevance for the analysis of energy technologies, ICT, robots, and geoengineering. It features contributions from Japanese scholars, and international scholars who have applied Japanese ethics to problems in the global condition.
Technological development is considered to cause new ethical issues, such as genetically modified organisms fostering monocultures, nanotechnologies causing issues of privacy, as well as health and environmental issues, robotics raising issues about the meaning of humanity, and the risks of nuclear power, as witnessed in the Fukushima disaster. At the same time, technology embodies a hope for mankind, such as ICT improving relationships between human beings and nature, and smart systems assisting humans in leading a more ethical and environmentally friendly life. This book explores these ethical issues and their impact from a Japanese perspective.
Culture and Organization, 2022
In contemporary academia, education is often perceived as a supplement to an academic career or a... more In contemporary academia, education is often perceived as a supplement to an academic career or a tool to satisfy management through course evaluations and this can alienate academics from teaching. To create inspiration and deepen the understanding of teachers' alienation as well as disalienation in the management classroom, we draw on Hermann Hesse's last novel 'The Glass Bead Game'. The story of Joseph Knecht who escapes an elitist pedagogical province to engage in personal teaching serves as an inspiration through which we discuss the act of resisting alienation in contemporary management education. Alienation, as we learn from Hesse, is not an unchangeable condition and it can be resisted through reinventing personal teaching, refocusing attention from the demands of academic excellence to the imperfection of human beings, and acknowledging education as a history maker and teaching as a preparation for life and death.