The Production of Power in Organisational Practice – Working with Conflicts as Heuristics (original) (raw)
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2015
This article argues for the value of working with conflicts in social practice as resources for collaboration, learning and development. The interest in conflicts in social practice is rooted in a preoccupation with social power relations and how to understand and analyse power relations from a subject-science perspective. Following this interest, a methodological framework, best described as a kind of ‘mobile ethnography’, is discussed and exemplified through an empirical example. A preliminary conceptual framework for understanding power as a capacity for action is presented. The overarching ambition of the article is to consider what democratic collaboration and coexistence entails and how it might be supported conceptually and analytically by the notion of conflicts as heuristics for social inquiry and by the notion of power as a capacity for action and social participation. The dilemmas of everyday life Reading through the morning paper, we might frown with outrage if we come a...
Outlines-Critical Practice Studies
2016
This article argues for the value of working with conflicts in social practice as resources for collaboration, learning and development. The interest in conflicts in social practice is rooted in a preoccupation with social power relations and how to understand and analyse power relations from a subject-science perspective. Following this interest, a methodological framework, best described as a kind of ‘mobile ethnography’, is discussed and exemplified through an empirical example. A preliminary conceptual framework for understanding power as a capacity for action is presented. The overarching ambition of the article is to consider what democratic collaboration and coexistence entails and how it might be supported conceptually and analytically by the notion of conflicts as heuristics for social inquiry and by the notion of power as a capacity for action and social participation. The dilemmas of everyday life Reading through the morning paper, we might frown with outrage if we come a...
Tamara: The Journal of Critical Organization Inquiry, 2016
When doing any kind of ethnography we are always confronted with questions of power and domination. In this article the problem is dealt with through an analysis of the debate between Gadamer and Habermas. In the late 1960es and the early 1970es they exchanged a series of essays and articles where they discussed the status of power and domination in relation to understanding (hermeneutics) in particular and to the social sciences in general. I will use some of the arguments from this debate and confront them with the an ethnographic method called the conceptualising method (Henriksen et al, 2004), as I find that the role of power and domination discussed in this ancient debate also counts for the conceptualising method in particular and in any ethnography in general.
Introduction: Exploring Power for Change
IDS Bulletin, 2006
Linking participation with power Concepts and methods of 'participation' are used increasingly throughout the world in shaping policy and in delivering services. At the Institute of Development Studies (IDS) we are finding that these participatory approaches throw new light on the complex interactions within and between society and state institutions at local, national and global levels. Participatory approaches lead to questions about how different kinds of knowledge and values shape the rules of the game and policy choices. What are the societal and political processes through which power operates that inform whose voice is heard and whose is excluded? This then leads to asking what is power? Is it just about someone making other people act against their best interests? Or, is it also the glue that keeps society together? What are the connections between power and social change? To make explicit that these are the questions at the core of our research and teaching interests, the Participation Group at IDS has recently changed its name to 'Participation, Power and Social Change'. And, in keeping with that name change, this issue of the IDS Bulletin aims to present some of our current work on the practice of power in development and on the entry points for change. Much of this work has been supported by a programme of action research and capacity building funded between 2003-6 by the Department for International Development (DFID), the Swedish International Development Agency (Sida) and the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC), and the contributions explicitly or otherwise reflect our dialogue with colleagues in these agencies as well as more broadly with our many partners in civil society and research institutes, primarily in the South, but also in the North.
Journal of Rural Studies, 2008
In Britain, and Wales particularly, inclusion and equal opportunities for all became key principles guiding the work of the many partnerships that were established at the beginning of this century. A primary objective of this paper is to develop a greater understanding of the politics and processes within 'partnership' as a widely used governance instrument. We argue that rather than dismissing partnerships for their exclusionary mechanisms, they might be considered as distinctive 'arenas of power' where the emphasis on participation and consensus shapes power relations in particular ways. What we demonstrate, using a differentiated topology of power [Allen, J., 2003. Lost Geographies of Power. Blackwell Publishing], is the effect that different modes of power, at different times, can have on social interaction and the process of partnership working. Although inequality in terms of resources existed in our study, we show that effective partnership working was enhanced at times when more reciprocal modes of power were used. We conclude, therefore, that an analysis of power based on resources alone is limited because the use and effect of resources may be ''modified, displaced or disrupted depending upon the relationships that come into play'' [Allen, J., 2003. Lost Geographies of Power. Blackwell Publishing, p. 97]. Hence, there is a need for more research on power struggles and conflicts in partnerships over time. Only then it is possible to see how and when differences in resources affect social interaction and result in different levels of (in)equality. A partnership cannot be seen simply as an indirect instrument of a dominant government actor to control organisations and individuals.
How Power Relationships are Involved in Research Methods
plaNext - next generation planning
With the rise of activism and activist research, this paper explores how power relationships are involved in traditional and emerging methods used in research on activism. This question matters as research methods have the potential to both improve the capacities of activist groups and enhance knowledge of agents involved: researcher and activist. The added value of the paper is that it presents a range of methods used in research on activism, including new methods that are relatively uncommon in planning research. The second contribution of this paper is that it is based on a power framework by Forester; it analyses how power is embedded in the use of a particular research method. The authors find extant differences between the methodologies when analyzed through this framework, especially in their potential to involve with activist communities. The authors encourage researchers to be braver in using activist research methods and to be aware of the underlying power discourses in their choices.
Communities of domination? Reconceptualising organisational learning and power
Journal of Workplace Learning, 2004
In identifying a bias within situated learning theory towards routine work practices, this paper develops a theoretical framework for assessing the relationships between learning, sensemaking and power in the non‐routine practices of temporary organising. The paper locates processes of sensemaking and learning in a model of organisational change that attempts to render power in communities of practice more visible than has been the case in theorising hitherto, by focusing on sensegiving in change projects. Change is conceived in terms of an oscillation between the routines of permanent organising and the more experimental, innovative actions of temporary organising, where leaders mobilise actors to explore new ideas. The role of sensegiving in such processes, it is argued, helps shed light on the political nature of micro‐processes of change.
Power as a capacity for action and social participation
Power is often associated with struggles for power, and therefore with fair competition at best, domination at worst. However, since the ways we think and talk about a subject influence the ways we act in relation to it, it is important to recognize how this conceptualization of power blurs an important mutualistic dimension of power that plays an important role in the conduct of our everyday lives, and needs to play an even more significant role in a still more complex and globalized world. Starting from a notion of power as a capacity for action, this paper attempts to outline an alternative vocabulary for thinking about power. The vocabulary is not meant to replace, but rather situate the adversarial conception of power within a broader framework, encompassing both ‘power over’ and ‘power with’ relations. The framework draws on different inspirations but mainly on German–Danish critical psychology.
A century ago Robert Michels proposed that despite its necessity to the empowerment the powerless, it was an 'iron law' that organisation would end up subjugating them under oligarchy. His tragic vision remains a powerful contribution to how analysts think of power in organisations. However, rather than accepting this gloomy prognosis, my paper asks what kind of organisation can ensure (as far as possible) that ordinary men and women flourish and that domination is kept in check. Drawing on different theoretical approaches to power, tools will be developed for evaluating organisations with social and political goals (OSPs) in terms of how they empower or disempower members and participants in a variety of different ways. Thus, firstly, I draw on differing approaches to power -including behaviouralism, structuration and Foucauldian notions -that illuminate relevant aspects of organisational life: the role of individual actors, of rules and decision-making processes, the impersonal power of procedure and administration, the constitutive power of practices, habits and organisational routines, and the disciplinary effects of techniques like marketing and campaign organisation. Secondly, a key distinction is made between what, in these different settings, empowers people and what disempowers them, which requires us to separate analytically conceptualisations of power over and those of power to.