Unwilling theory: A response to Hughes’ ‘Looking Elsewhere’

Abstract

Jason Hughes' paper 'Looking Elsewhere: Howard S. Becker as Unwilling Organization Theorist' offers a long overdue survey of Becker's ideas. I hope it will spark renewed interest in the work of Becker among organization theorists.The essay certainly saves us all a lot of time as it ties together Becker's terminology, theory and methods and contextualizes his work within recent trends in sociology and organization studies. However, while Hughes focuses on the potential of Becker's ideas as a theory of organizations, in this commentary, I would like to focus on the other part of Becker-the 'unwilling organization theorist'. What, I want to ask, can we learn from Becker'sunwillingness?