Section members have organized the following sub-themes:
Sub-theme 37: International Migration, Work and Organization
Sub-theme 44: Marxist Organization Studies: Structures, Systems and Power
Sub-theme 63: Antecedents and Consequences of Institutional Logics for Reasoning and Rationality
Sub-theme 37: International Migration, Work and Organization
Call for Papers
Migration and work-based mobility has become more ubiquitous today than ever before (OECD, 2013). Migrants and their relationships to host societies and institutions have been studied from many different perspectives (e.g., sociological, psychological, economic and labor perspectives) but still remain understudied by organizational scholars (Binggeli et al., 2013). In this sub-theme, in accordance with the overall Colloquium theme, we seek to create reflexive exchange between scholars involved in studying migration and its consequences for individuals, organizations and societies. Migrants’ lives are filled with logos relating to migration motivations as well pathos accompanying their journeys. In addition, power structures as well as cultural pressures affect migration and acculturation.
Our goal is to bring together scholars interested in formulating a multidisciplinary approach to better understand migrant relationships with the workplace, labour market, culture as well as society of the host country. The magnitude of the work and life transition calls for understanding both micro career forces and adaptation (Zikic et al., 2010), as well as macro structural and institutional factors that frame the migration experience (Reitz et al., 2014; Fang et al., 2009). We are interested in both high-skilled as well as low-skilled migration, second generation issues as well as permanent and circular/return migration (Tung, 2008). Organization studies remain focused on the most privileged migrants, while countries continue to rely on unskilled migrants in building their economic success. Hence, unskilled migration remains a hidden facet of organizations. We seek to understand how studying migrants in the organizational context can be informed and enriched by research in related disciplines, such as sociology and geography (e.g., Boyd & Schellenberg, 2007; Bauder, 2003).
In keeping with the EGOS Colloquium 2015 theme, we ask how migration broadens the notion of diversity in organizations, as well as what responsibilities organizations have to this facet of globalization. The goal is to understand positive as well as negative outcomes of immigrant diversity at the individual, societal as well organizational level. Topics papers might address – by no means exhaustive – are as follows:
- What distinguishes today’s migration pattern from yester years?
- How may migrants change or diversify our societies? How does migration fundamentally or temporarily transform identities, practices, and induce cross cultural fertilization and learning in the workplace?
- How does migration complicate our understanding of “bringing your whole self to work” (Conger, 1994; Pratt & Ashforth, 2003) and the relationship between work and community?
- How do organizations foster or deter migration and the integration of migrants into workplaces? How can organizations benefit from bicultural and multicultural workers?
- How do individuals construct careers and mobility for themselves, whether with or without help from organizations? How do migrants construct meaning out of their work? Under what conditions do migrants engage in collective action to exert their rights (Yu, 2014)?
- How are patterns of immigrant entrepreneurship impacting host and origin economies?
- How can organizational and management studies become more open to migration, theoretically and practically?
- What can be done at the institutional levels, both in the host and origin countries, to improve the situation of migrants and of organizations employing them?
- How do migrant experiences compare across continents?
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Sub-theme 44: Marxist Organization Studies: Structures, Systems and Power
Call for Papers
In 2015, we will build on the success of the five previous EGOS Marxist studies sub-themes in bringing together people who share an interest in building on Marx’s ideas to advance organization studies. With Athens as the host city, the organizers of the EGOS 2015 Colloquium have invoked various Greek philosophers in calling for papers that examine organizational life, challenge unreflexive practice, consider the ongoing reflexive reconstitution of organization and the power relations and responsibilities that are entwined in these social relationships. This sub-theme takes up this invitation by providing the space for reflection on the current contributions and future prospects of Marxist-inspired organization studies in examining the structures, systems, and power relations of contemporary organizational life. As the organizers observe ‘Much of modern organizational life is carried out through structures, systems and routines, following norms and rules, within power structures’ and Marxist work is particularly well placed to contribute to the examination of these phenomena.
We particularly welcome papers that address the following:
- Processes and systems of globalization and cross-national organization
- Studies of work, organization and the labour process
- Studies of organization and society, including processes of hegemony, class relations and power structures
- Marxist analyses of institutional fields and processes of institutionalization
- Class analyses of employee identities, including the professions and occupational groups
We are not dogmatic in an attachment to any specific kind of Marxism – all kinds are welcome. In previous years our sub-theme has enjoyed lively debate spanning a wide range of Marxist approaches. Some scholars have sought to integrate insights from organization studies into a Marxist framework, while others have examined how Marxist insights may fruitfully add analytical value to other research traditions.
We invite contributions that either (a) enrich our understanding of the empirical world of organizations based on Marxist theoretical foundations, or (b) enrich Marxist theory in a way that promises deeper understanding of that world.
While the overall EGOS call asks for short papers under 3000 words, this sub-theme encourages longer submissions so we can better assess the fit with our program.
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Sub-theme 63: Antecedents and Consequences of Institutional Logics for Reasoning and Rationality
Call for Papers
We seek to explore new avenues of research on reasoning and rationality at the nexus of institutional logics, organizations, and individuals. The spotlight has been on research showing how market capitalism as a form of reasoning and rationality has permeated into many aspects of life, creating fundamental changes in what economies and societies value (Fourcade-Gourinchas & Babb, 2002; Thornton, 2004; Lounsbury & Hirsch, 2010; Hall & Lamont, 2013). However, few studies examine how alternative institutions to the market might, could, and should produce different forms of reasoning and rationality.
We are interested in research on the complementarities and contradictions between different forms of rationality as defined by the market, state, corporate, professions, family, religions, and community institutional logics. How does reasoning and rationality emerge, become institutionalized, and produce consequences for what individuals and organizations value? How might a shift in the salience of institutional logics create opportunities to change what is valued? What causes value and worth to collapse (or not) under market criteria?
How is the reasoning which underlies ethical decision making altered by changes in institutional logics? Why have the professions, once the guardians of normative and ethical standards of reasoning, themselves taken-up market-like principles? In light of the history of the professions as keepers of honest markets and corporations, why have the boundaries between the professions and the market become blurred and permeable?
Research is emerging that suggests institutional logics are agentive and modular and their categorical elements are decomposable (Thornton, 2004: 40; Thornton et al., 2012, chapter 5; McPherson & Sauder, 2013; Durand et al., 2013). But, who are the institutional avatars of the 21st century that manipulate such logics and why (Mudge & Vauchez, 2012)? If actors exercise choices in their reasoning, which orders and logics of the inter-institutional system do they draw on to inform their perceptions and the principles influencing and organizing their thought processes, goals, motives, and strategies of action? We need more evidence and a fuller understanding of the triggers of agency and the limits of decomposability of institutional logics.
We are particularly interested in empirical papers that explore these questions and that show changes in the antecedents and consequences of institutional logics that contradict and check the rising dominance of the market logic as a form of reasoning and rationality.
Organizations, Occupations and Work 