Rumbling on performativity_Frits Simon

Matthews et al. (2012) suggest five reasons for the incorporation of complexity
theory into OMS. First they draw attention to the increasing rates of social
change. These rates of change produce quite some uncertainty, amongst others
for managers. While even the rules of the game change due to unexpected
events, complexity sciences might help to understand what is happening. Secondly
they point to the acknowledgement that social reality is dynamic and nonlinear
(see for instance: KNAW, 2011) and that to understand this reality a process
perspective is needed, through which – thirdly – social behaviour, because of its
unpredictability, can be understood. A fourth argument - as mentioned earlier
with regard to OMS – the practical results of OMS are disappointing up to now
and an approach in which temporality, change or transformation is understood
may produce insights in what really is happening within organizations. A fifth
argument is that a complexity approach offers possibilities to leave behind a
mechanistic, Newtonian perspective in which reality is reduced to a well-defined
and predictable whole of connected and stable elements. This still is a dominant
perspective that would relate poorly to the actual societal dynamics. A sixth
reason why complexity has caught interest is articulated by Abma (2011) and
Johannessen (2009). Both point to the central importance of emergence or
self-organization in which irreversibility and novelty can be explained, without
falling back on reductionist and control-oriented approaches. In social sciences
there are omens for the insurgence of social instead of individualistic or bio-medical
approaches of human behaviour (Brinkgreve, 2014). Whatever complexity
might bring, it cannot offer an individualistic perspective on human behaviour.
With regard to the field of OMS Johannessen (2009) points to deficit of much of
the management literature which has proven to be of little practical relevance. A
deficit which is underlined in much of the research on change management of
Homan (2005). Homan introduces complexity in OMS as an approach to clarify
why most of the planned organizational changes fail and he develops some ideas
how change evolves in the polyvocal orchestra an organization is.
The different turns point to very different perspectives on social sciences, but there are
quite some themes which they appear to have in common. The importance of language,
the workings of power, the focus on life-world and practice, the unpredictability
of human behaviour, the criticizing of objectivity of science and the relativity of viewpoints
are shared. I conclude that within these turns a growing interest is to be noticed
towards the local, the specific or the subjective in a contrast with the general and
objective orientations from a positivistic stance. This contrast exemplifies the breach
between a reflexive and a modernistic approach of science. Reflexive research collapses
“... an entire array of binary oppositions that have traditionally given “method” its
meaning in academia … fact/fiction, subjective/objective, art/science, reason/emotion.”
(Frentz, 2008: 23).
In line with the basic contention that our social reality is ever-changing due to the
unpredictable outcomes of human behaviour, reflexive research is an obvious approach
for doing research. To repeat myself: trying to understand what is happening in
2. Research from a complex responsive process-approach | 35