Psychoanalysis, Work, Organizations and Society

Call for papers: Psychoanalysis, Work, Organizations and Society

SIG Business and Society

EURAM Conference 2014 - 4-7 June 2014, Valencia, Spain

This Topic intends to explore the contributions of psychoanalytic perspectives to the study of work, management and organizations, and to seek ways of developing psychoanalysis that allows us to make connections between these objects of enquiry and their impact on wider society. We encourage papers that specifically make links between the contribution of psychoanalytical insights to other traditions of thinking: in philosophy, politics, and management studies. We are especially interested in the advance of Critical Management Studies and its contribution to the understanding of corporate social responsibility. We wish to promote a broad psychoanalytical orientation, included but not limited to any affiliation whether Freudian, Lacanian, Kleinian or Winnicottian. We do not intend to support dogmatic or doctrinal disputes but instead seek dialogue and mutual advance.

We welcome all contributions exploring management and organizational issues with a psychoanalytical perspective, but we are particularly interested in:

1. Micro studies of work

1. Clinical studies of subjectivity at work. The subjectivity of workers might offer insights into executants’ point of views but also into the subjectivity of leaders and managers.

2. Clinical studies that draw on the testimony of workers, either suffering or enjoying a work situation. We welcome papers based upon the experience of psychoanalytical patients or in depth psychoanalytical case studies of particular organizations conducted by researchers.

3. We wish to encourage papers that seek to grasp “situations” in ways that take us beyond conventional sociological dualisms  to show how structure interacts with the subjectivity of workers. Specific interventions of counselors, for example, are particularly welcomed.

2. Macro studies of organizations and society

1. To include studies of wider organizational phenomena.

2. Some phenomena might be interpreted as being broader in their scope than specific work situations. We suggest that psychoanalytical insights can be valuable in the study of phenomena that are normally deemed to be relevant and exclusive only at the “organizational level”. Studies of Human resource management systems such as evaluation systems in specific occupations could be one example of macro organization that might usefully be treated to a psychoanalytical perspective.

3. Studies of the impact of business on society. Here we would encourage contributions that seek to deal with societal wide issues, such as forms of power/ domination and resistance or gender issues in our societies.

3. Studies of the link between micro analysis and macro studies

There are many ways to link or side-step “the macro” and “the micro”. We believe psychoanalysis can help contribute to this broader shift in contemporary social theory. Micro-studies of work and studies of organizational phenomena, for example, can be studied as symptoms of broader society’s trends. Conversely, society might be considered a ‘symptom’ and so we encourage researchers to investigate new ways of thinking how the place of work in work organizations impacts on wider society.

Submissions
We invite submission of full papers up to 40 pages, following the Euram submission guidelines. Submissions will be made on the Euram 2014 website from December 1st 2013 until January 16th 2014. Notification of acceptance will be given as of 28 March 2014.

More information and guidelines are available on the Euram 2014 website

You may also contact Carine Chemin-Bouzir for further information

Track convenors:
Gilles Arnaud, ESCP Europe, France (garnaud@escpeurope.eu)

CarineChemin-Bouzir, Neoma Business School/ Gregor, France (carine.chemin-bouzir@neoma-bs.fr)

AlessiaContu, Warwick Business School, University of Warwick (Alessia.Contu@wbs.ac.uk)

Damian O’Doherty, Manchester Business School, University of Manchester (d.o’doherty@manchester.ac.uk)

Howard Schwartz, Oakland University (schwartz@oakland.edu)

BénédicteVidaillet, University of Lille 1/ LEM, France (benedicte.vidaillet@univ-lille1.fr)