Organizing for Social and Institutional Change in Response to Disruption, Division, and Displacement: Introduction to the Special Issue

Abstract

In this editorial for our Special Issue, we focus on ways to better understand the role of organizations, organizing, and the organized during social and institutional change in response to disruption, division, and displacement. The papers in this Special Issue provide important insights into the hardships and heartache arising from social disruption, division, and displacement; in addition, they provide glimpses into potential ways of moving forward. To set the stage, we develop a framework building on extant literature that highlights several analytic approaches to understanding the consequences of eroding, or inadequate, institutions, the challenges of building anew when the status quo is destroyed, and what such novel and complex realities entail for organizational analysis. We offer a temporal view of responses to disruption, division, and displacement that draws on the papers in this Special Issue to identify and explain potential risks and challenges that arise at different points in time. To conclude, we provide a short summary of each paper, and call for a reinvigorated research agenda that goes beyond the excellent work featured here by broadening and deepening our focus on approaches to organizing that expressly address disruption, division, and displacement.

Social Class and Work: A Review and Organizing Framework

“…Future research questions might ask “In what ways does power operate surreptitiously to weaken the voices of the disadvantaged, and how can institutional actors disrupt and more favorably reconstruct these processes?” and “Why and how do elite institutional actors, who benefit from the system, choose to engage in disruptive activities (e.g., see Scully et al, 2018, study of ‘privilege work’)?” Relatedly, cross-level research might highlight how the purposeful work of supporters advocating for expanded employee benefits and pay—such as raising the minimum wage—would benefit nearly 40% of African American workers and a third of Hispanic workers (Cooper, 2019) in the United States, and it also could explore resistance to these types of institutional proposals. Arguably, maintaining the current minimum wage is an exercise in domination by elites to retain power that has proven effective in reducing economy-wide racial gaps (Derenoncourt & Montialoux, 2020) Future scholarship should build on existing studies to also consider how disruption of ongoing practices or creation of new institutions through episodic power (“relatively discrete, strategic acts of mobilization”; Lawrence, 2008: 174) may begin to redress power imbalances rooted in systemic power (but see Creed, Gray, Hollerer, Karam, & Reay, 2021).…”

A Call for Activist Scholarship in Organizational Theorizing

“…If only we are willing to try. In a recent issue of Organization Studies (Creed et al, 2022), my colleagues and I outlined the kinds of scholarship required by a world suffering from the disruption, division, and displacement of people and institutions on which we once relied. The agenda is way too long and involved to expound here, but it presages a shift in the kind of scholarship we, as organizational scholars, could contribute to the world.…”

“…Another noteworthy example of activist research grew out of the aftermath of the collapse of Beirut, Lebanon. Researchers turned activists founded Khadid Beirut to lead efforts to restore human dignity in Lebanon while simultaneously breaking the cycles of political corruption, dependence, and learned helplessness endemic to the former culture (Creed et al, 2022). Their efforts epitomize what I mean by activist research.…”

‘Does Our Work Matter?’ The Role of Organizational Researchers in Extreme (War)Times

“…After all, research is also fashion-driven, and, currently we are witnessing an increased interest from organization scholars in creating engaged research communities that are taking extreme events, grand challenges, and socio-environmental issues more seriously (Creed, Gray, Höllerer, Karam, & Reay, 2022; Howard-Grenville, 2021). It is likely that such research will grow over the next decade, but it is less certain whether this growth will provide the kind of theories and knowledge needed to overcome the harmful consequences of these events and issues in our organizational world.…”