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Introduction
Since the 1970s a field of organization studies has emerged that explicitly takes a critical stance towards modern practices of management and organization and to (what is constructed in this paper as) the "mainstream"[1] of scientific theory and research on these practices ([34] Grey and Willmott, 2005a). Given this dual purpose of critiquing management and the studies thereof, this field has appropriately labeled itself as critical management studies (CMS).
Although the field of CMS is not easily defined and demarcated, some common lines of thought can be discerned. Put briefly, CMS scholars argue for a critical conception of management "in which research is self-consciously motivated by an effort to discredit, and ideally eliminate, forms of management and organization that have institutionalized the opposition between the purposefulness of individuals and the seeming givenness and narrow instrumentality of work-process relationships" ([5] Alvesson and Willmott, 1992, p. 4). This givenness (or naturalness) of relationships needs to be critically examined (or de-naturalized), because what is treated as natural or given often masks underlying structural power and ideological differences (e.g. between managers and employees, capital and labor, men and women). Further, narrow instrumentality, according to which knowledge and truth are only valued in relation to effective and efficient managerial performance, is countered by an anti-performative stance, in which broader concerns (like just working relationships, human development and ecological effects) are brought into the discussion ([5] Alvesson and Willmott, 1992; CMS Manifesto; [28] Fournier and Grey, 2000; [34] Grey and Willmott, 2005a).
Ultimately, the ideals of CMS are human emancipation and enlightenment, based on the:
[...] assumption of the possibilities of a more autonomous individual, who, in the tradition of Enlightenment, in principle can master his or her own destiny in joint operation with peers ([5] Alvesson and Willmott, 1992, p. 9; [46] Nord and Jermier, 1992).
Although sharing a critical conception, CMS scholars differ in their stance towards the objects of their critiques. Regarding management, some scholars want to engage with practice, using critique pragmatically to effect desired changes in organizations, while others want to disengage with practice, fearing a colonization of CMS terms and ideas by practitioners ([28] Fournier and Grey, 2000; [36] Huff and Huff, 2002; [46] Nord and Jermier, 1992). However, some consensus seems to emerge...