Towards a Butlerian methodology: Undoing organizational performativity through anti-narrative research

Abstract

This article explores the methodological possibilities that Judith Butler's theory of performativity opens up for organizational research. Specifically, it draws on insights fromButler's critique of subjective recognition as a process of perpetual 'undoing' through which the complexity of lived experience is compromised in the performance of a seemingly coherent, recognizable subjectivity. Drawing on an interview-based study focusing on workplace experiences of gender, ageing and LGBT sexualities, the article considers what it means to undertake organizational research premised upon a performative ontology grounded in a critique of the normative conditions governing organizational recognition. Specifically, it asks: What form might a Butler-inspired methodology take? What opportunities might it open up or difficulties might it pose for organizational researchers? The article outlines and evaluates a method described here as 'anti-narrative interviewing'. We argue that this method constitutes a valuable methodological resource for organization studies researchers with an interest in studying how and why idealized organizational subjectivities are formed and sustained, as well as a way of empirically advancing the in-roads that Butler's writing has made into the study of human relations at work.

Mental Heath as a Weapon: Whistleblower Retaliation and Normative Violence

“…Following Foucault, we acknowledge that the construction of research 'knowledge' through categorization of data is itself a form of power, and we recognize that insights are generated rather than 'uncovered' during the research process (Riach et al 2016;see also Harding 2008). However, some way of making sense of our vast and complex data set was necessary.…”

“…We drew on other scholars inspired by poststructuralist psychoanalysis (Harding et al 2014;Riach et al 2014Riach et al , 2016 and began with a close reading of data, followed by open coding. We were interested in the ways in which 'identities are constituted within circulating discourses,' such that discourses '"speak through" subjects' self-reflections.…”

“…We are effectively 'un-done' by our affective desires for being recognized as valid subjects: 'the subject produces its coherence at the cost of its own complexity' (Butler 1993, p. 115). The organizations we work for can contribute to such 'undoing'; workplace norms have a strong influence over our sense of self not least because organizational rules and processes tend to 'fix' subjects into position, even where this is unwilled (Riach et al 2016). Roberts describes organizational leaders' experiences of being refused recognition by management discourses alongside the subsequent control that such denial exerts: 'the refusal [of recognition] contains the employee by robbing him/her of a sense of existence and capability ' (2005, p. 634).…”

“…She shows how such practices are effective because capitalist forms of organization elicit from us the kinds of passionate attachments to dominant social norms, values and rules, which are re-affirmed and re-embedded through circulating discourses in ways that ultimately represent normative violence, suggesting that power is both an intra (psychic)-and intersubjective (social) process rather than a property or attribute that one can obtain at the expense of the other. While Butler does not expand on this in the context of work organizations, others have recently illustrated how her 'recognition-based critique of the conditions governing viable subjectivity' (Riach et al 2014(Riach et al , p. 1679 can shed light on dynamics of normative power in organizations (Borgerson 2005;Harding et al 2013Harding et al , 2014Riach et al 2016), not least in relation to sexuality and gender (Tyler and Cohen 2008) but also the consumption of management textbooks (Harding 2003), ethical workplaces (Kenny 2010) and organizational violence (Varman and Al-Amoudi 2016). This theory has recently been applied to understand the experiences of whistleblowers in the aftermath of their disclosures (Kenny 2017) and their exclusions from recruitment practices and friendship circles because of having engaged in 'impossible speech.'…”

“…Specifically, there is no attention paid to how the wrongdoing organizations deploy various discourses including that of mental health, to undermine the claims of whistleblowers who often internalize and enact these. In this article, we contribute to research on this important issue by drawing on Judith Butler's 'recognition-based critique' of subjectivity and power, a growing area of interest in organization studies (Riach et al 2014(Riach et al , p. 1679; see also Borgerson 2005;Harding et al 2014;Kenny 2010Kenny , 2017Riach et al 2016;Tyler and Cohen 2008). This view builds on the resource-based approach because it sees power as inherent to the very formation of the subject, as she constructs a sense of self through identification with discourse, rather than simply an entity that is either possessed or not.…”