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Authoritarianism, Populism, and the Global Retreat of Democracy: A Curated Discussion

Authoritarianism, Populism, and the Global Retreat of Democracy: A Curated Discussion To the surprise of many in the West, the fall of the USSR in 1991 did not lead to the adoption of liberal democratic govern- ment around the world and the much anticipated “end of history.” In fact, authoritarianism has made a comeback, and liberal democracy has been on the retreat for at least the last 15 years culminating in the unthinkable: the invasion of a democratic European country by an authoritarian regime. But why does authoritarianism continue to spread, not only as an alternative to liberal democracy, but also within many liberal democracies where authoritarian leaders continue to gain strength and pop- ularity? In this curated piece, contributors discuss some of the potential contributions of management scholarship to under- standing authoritarianism, as well as highlight a number of directions for management research in this area. Keywords institutional theory, business & society, ethics evolved into a mixture of anger and fear as it has become Introduction apparent that there is seemingly little the West can (or at Michael Lounsbury and Nelson Phillips least will) do to stop Russian aggression and the growing humanitarian crisis that has followed the invasion. While Over the past decade, there have been increased calls for man- agement scholars to do more research that is societally relevant and important—to, for example, address grand challenges (e.g., University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA, USA George et al., 2016) and to examine the role of organizations American University of Cairo, New Cairo, Egypt and institutions in the production and maintenance of economic University of Oxford, Oxford, UK inequality and systemic power imbalances (e.g., Amis et al., Harvard University, Boston, USA 2020). While historically “such topics have been difficult to University of Leeds, Leeds UK publish in our leading journals,” more recently “business University of Sydney, Sydney, Australia University of Stavanger, Stavanger, Norway schools are becoming more oriented to making research and University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, USA education more relevant to their broader societies, which will University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA, USA in turn encourage scholars to pursue under researched topics Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA of critical importance” (Tihanyi et al., 2022, p. 712). We University of Hamburg, Hamburg, Germany believe that recent events in Ukraine demand that management Humbolt Institution for Internet and Society, Berlin, Germany University of California, Berkeley, CA, USA scholars once again look beyond more traditional management University of California, Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA, USA themes and focus their attention on a topic that is highly socie- University of Alberta, Edmonton, Canada tally relevant and globally important: the rise of authoritarianism University of Toronto, Toronto, Canada and the threat this poses to democratic governments and the WU Vienna University, Wien, Austria international rule of law. Corresponding Author: When Russia invaded Ukraine in February of this year, Nelson Phillips, University of California, Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA, the Western world reacted with shock and disbelief, and as USA. days, weeks, and now months have passed, this shock has Email: nelson_phillips@ucsb.edu 4 Journal of Management Inquiry 32(1) sanctions and an ever increasing supply of arms are helping the rule of his father. Even in the United States, the election Ukraine defend itself, the war continues and Ukrainians con- of Donald Trump, and his subsequent refusal to accept his tinue to die. What the people of Ukraine currently face—the election loss, rang alarm bells for many observers concerned invasion of their country and a direct threat to their democra- about the direction of American democracy. tically elected government—is something that was thought to All of these new authoritarian governments are led by what be a thing of the past in Europe, but nonetheless highlights Rachman (2022) calls “strong man” leaders. These leaders, the growing challenges facing the rule based international including Putin, Xi, Bolsanaro, Duterte, and Trump, share order that developed after World War 2 (Lounsbury & defining characteristics: “the creation of a cult of personality; Wang, 2020). contempt for the rule of law; the claim to represent the real These challenges have become manifest in a multiplicity people against the elites (otherwise known as populism); and of ways. In Russia, citizens are facing repression and an a politics driven by fear and nationalism” (Rachman, 2022, unprecedented disinformation campaign as the Russian gov- p. 10). Importantly, these leaders are able to thrive in both ernment seeks to prevent dissent over the invasion of more traditional dictatorships and systems that are, at least at Ukraine. Perhaps surprisingly for many international observ- the beginning of their leadership, democratic: a frightening ers, it seems that the Russian government’s control of the prospect for many existing democracies. press and the Internet has proven sufficient to keep the major- We believe that these profound challenges growing out of ity of Russians convinced of the justice of an invasion to the twinned rise of populism and authoritarianism, and the reverse the “Nazification” of Ukraine and protect the concomitant decline of institutional trust in liberal democracy Russian speaking minority. in the early twenty-first century, provide an important focal In China, there is a very different kind of authoritarian point for new management scholarship. To encourage discus- government and a different kind of challenge to liberal sion and new research in this area, we have assembled a col- democracy; but one that is spreading around the world via lection of short essays that highlight a variety of important their Belt and Road initiative and their increasingly sophis- issues and questions that are worthy of more systematic ticated use of soft power. At the same time, tension around inquiry. the status of Taiwan continues to grow as China attempts to assert its sovereignty over an independent and democratic country despite the warnings from the West that Taiwan has Authoritarianism at the Organizational Level the right to govern itself. China’s authoritarian regime has publicly set the return of Taiwan as a key goal and, at least In the first piece, Davis emphasizes how authoritarianism has in public discourse, refuses to accept the idea that profoundly worked its way into corporations, highlighting Taiwanese citizens have the right to self-governance. “founder friendly” authoritarian structures inhabited by Further evidence of the erosion of the liberal democratic leaders such as Mark Zuckerberg who embrace an autocratic model can be found in the Middle East. The many govern- ideology that resists any form of democratic oversight. His ments affected by the Arab Spring democracy movement arguments provide a useful corrective to considering the have mostly reverted back to authoritarian systems. The renaissance of authoritarianism as something that we hope of the Arab Spring has fizzled as democracy has should examine only at the level of the nation state. receded in country after country. Even more worryingly, Instead, the same ideology and leadership style is happening surveys indicate that support for democracy is waning and in some of the world’s most important companies. more and more citizens believe that a strong leader is Next, Gartenberg and McGahan argue that we have more needed to take control of the situation in their countries. tools in our toolkit than we perhaps recognize and suggest Liberal democracy is no longer seen as the solution to the that we find inspiration from foundational organizational challenges facing their countries and countries like the thinkers such as Coase, Barnard, and Selznick who worked UAE and Singapore are commonly cited as attractive at a time when authoritarianism was even more visible and models where strong authoritarian leaders have succeeded dangerous. They argue that our field has evolved in a way in creating economic growth and stability. that makes it difficult for us to deal with the realities of author- In a number of newer democracies, like Brazil and India, itarianism and therefore propose adding in a humanistic populist leaders with authoritarian tendencies are winning concern for values, stories, and the experiences of individuals. elections over more liberal contenders and eroding the insti- The resulting combination will, they suggest, help us to tutional underpinnings of democracy. For example, in a explore critical questions such as when does authority frightening turn of events for democracy in the Philippines, become authoritarianism and how do people within authority- Ferdinand Marcos Jr., the son of the former dictator of the based organizations experience freedom and tyranny? Philippines Ferdinand Marcos Sr., has managed to rehabili- Adler and Bodrož ic suggest a research agenda that tate the image of his family and has been sworn in as the explores the interaction of regimes of public policy (contrast- new President to the horror of citizens who lived through ing more laissez-faire or more transformative regimes) and Adler et al. 5 models of organizational management (contrasting more sets of cultural elements in authoritarianism and democracy hierarchical or more collaborative models). Combining the and then highlights how the logic of democracy can be two dimensions, they identify four alternative responses to eroded in small steps and authoritarian tendencies can the current period of crisis: authoritarianism, oligarchy, local- develop in even the most established democracy. She ends ism, and democratization. A disturbing number of liberal with a strong call to action for management researchers to democracies have evolved into oligarchies (see Davis’s con- focus more on the perils of authoritarianism. tribution in this forum), and the resulting aggravation of Highlighting examples such as Trump’s recent activities various crises has encouraged the reemergence of authoritar- promoting “The Big Lie,” Glynn argues that the cultural anal- ianism. In the face of this twin danger, many put their faith ysis of symbolic and linguistic frames can shed light on the in localist alternatives. Adler and Bodrož ic argue for the growing success of modern authoritarian governments. She fourth option—democratization, based on a democratic- begins with an analysis of the two contrasting world orders transformative state and an organizational model privileging on display during the riots at the U.S. Capitol—the “illiberal” bottom-up problem-solving. versus the “liberal.” She uses frame analysis to examine the Battilana and Sheppard-Jones begin by arguing that way that Trump was able to convince his followers of the ille- though past generations of organization scholars greatly gitimacy of his election loss. Interestingly, she also shows advanced our understanding of power, today, dominant man- how the frames created by Trump have become disconnected agement research largely focuses on the performance of from him and discusses the frightening ramifications of this shareholder-value maximizing and largely hierarchical cor- development. porations, without systematically accounting for power and Clegg points to the need for further research that compares inequality. They then offer a solution: to counter the authori- varieties of state-led versus market-led systems, but main- tarian turn in organizations and society, the field must revive tains that neo-economically liberal and democratic states research on power sharing and accountability in organiza- weather crisis much more effectively than do states in tions. This entails studying organizations beyond the firm, which system integration is subordinate to authoritarian such as social movements, bureaucracies, and social enter- social integration. He draws on the concept of circuits of prises, and collaborating with political scientists to test inno- power to unpack the key differences between authoritarian vations in democracy that can strengthen democracy at work regimes today and Western democracies. and in government. The Role of Digital Technologies in Modern Authoritarian Systems Authoritarianism Meyer begins her contribution by making the important point The final two contributions focus on the connection between that authoritarianism is actually a perversion of authority as new forms of authoritarianism and digital technology. First, authority requires the consent of those who are governed. Gümüsay begins by highlighting the various crises and con- She then draws on the ideas of Arendt to begin to unpack flicts that pervade contemporary society and economy. He the increasing inability of democratic societies to uphold goes on to argue that they can be usefully understood as the capacity to act in the face of authoritarian crises. She forms of institutional contestation and argues that our theo- emphasizes the need to more deeply understand the changing ries need to better account for how digital technologies nature of institutional trust in core liberal, democratic institu- play a key role in shaping institutional processes—especially tions that sows the seeds for authoritarianism. as related to civic and political engagement such as in Armanios and Adly argue for a systematic research Russia’s disinformation efforts as well as Ukrainian resis- agenda on authoritarian systems themselves, unpacking tance. He closes with a call for rethinking what we study, their variegated nature to understand why some forms of why we are studying what we study, and how we study the authoritarianism are more resilient than others. They intro- topics we choose to study. duce a “varieties of authoritarianism” typology based on In the final contribution, Leonardi focuses on social media two characteristics of an authoritarian regime that leads to and their use both in spreading democracy and, more four categories of regime with varying degrees of resilience. recently, in efforts to undermine democracy and further the The two dimensions—degree of professionalization of the goals of the authoritarian leaders. He goes on to argue that bureaucracy and whether or not the territorial boundaries the power of social media lies in how they let people see are aligned with the authoritarian logic of the regime—high- how other people respond to their messages. He further light important aspects of regimes that have been so far argues that the algorithmic nature of social media platforms largely ignored. plays a key role in their impact on political processes. He Haveman highlights how institutional and relational theo- closes with a discussion of the importance of social media ries can be leveraged to enhance our understanding of the rise and their effects on organizations as an area of further inves- and fall of authoritarian governments. She focuses on related tigation for management scholars. 6 Journal of Management Inquiry 32(1) The idea of giving a 28-year-old college dropout Wrapping Up uncontestable control of a major global corporation might While we realize that the question of authoritarianism lies seem like a surprising choice. Yet in recent years nearly some distance from the traditional topics that management half the tech startups listing shares on the stock market researchers have focused on, management scholarship has have included similar structures, driven by an Ayn amassed a considerable toolkit of theories that we believe Rand-inflected theory of corporate governance (Davis, have the potential to provide real insight into this important 2021b). According to this theory, widely shared in Silicon phenomenon. Furthermore, the research capacity of our field Valley, founders are makers pursuing their unique vision is tremendous: the array or methods, resources, and expertise and should not be held back by moochers and takers and reg- that has been developed to understand the social world is ulators—including their own shareholders. Thanks to truly impressive. We have the opportunity to contribute signif- enablers in the world of venture capital, particularly Peter icantly to our understanding of authoritarianism and the ability Thiel of Founders Fund and Marc Andreessen of of our institutions and citizens to respond to authoritarian Andreessen Horowitz, Silicon Valley today is awash in cor- leaders in our midst and authoritarian countries running porate dictatorships. In 2021, an astonishing 46% of tech IPO amok in the world. Our discussion here will hopefully pique firms had dual-class voting shares, according to data com- the interest of management scholars and inspire more of our piled by Jay Ritter (https://site.warrington.ufl.edu/ritter/ community to think, write, and research aspects of authoritar- files/IPOs-Tech.pdf). ianism that will help to reduce the threat to liberal democracy The same venture capitalists and entrepreneurs who pro- at organizational and societal levels. mulgate these “founder friendly” authoritarian structures have recently taken a strident stance against ESG, that is, the movement to measure corporations on their environmen- Authoritarianism with Silicon Valley tal, social, and governance impacts and to reward those who Characteristics orient toward sustainability, equity, and accountability. In Gerald F. Davis April 2022 Elon Musk tweeted “I am increasingly convinced The spread of authoritarianism in the political realm is that corporate ESG is the Devil Incarnate” (https://twitter.com/ paralleled by trends in the American technology sector, elonmusk/status/1510485792296210434), while venture capi- where CEOs increasingly exercise authority without mean- talist Marc Andreessen quotes Peter Thiel approvingly: “ESG ingful structural oversight or accountability. The mythology is just a hate factory. It’s a factory for naming enemies, and we of the visionary founder, exemplified by Steve Jobs, Mark should not be allowing them to do that. When you think ESG, Zuckerberg, and Elon Musk, has existed for generations. you should be thinking Chinese Communist Party” (https:// Today, however, this mythology is increasingly buttressed twitter.com/pmarca/status/1512213405511286784). Former by formal structural devices that centralize power in the Vice President Mike Pence joined the fray, claiming that hands of one or two top executives and provide few formal ESG is a movement of corporate wokeism that “allows the channels to serve as checks and balances. As ever more of left to accomplish what it could never hope to achieve at the our economy and society are mediated by online platforms ballot box or through competition in the free market. ESG originating in Silicon Valley, corporate authoritarianism empowers an unelected cabal of bureaucrats, regulators and becomes a greater threat to everyday democracy (Davis, activist investors to rate companies based on their adherence 2017; Davis, 2021a). to left-wing values” (Pence, 2022). Once again, corporate Google and Facebook pioneered this trend, giving their leaders need to be protected from accountability to their founders (Larry Page and Sergei Brin at Google and Mark own “unelected” shareholders. Zuckerberg at Facebook) super-voting shares that essentially At the same time tech firms are protecting their leaders guarantee them corporate control in perpetuity. When from outside accountability, some of them are creating or Facebook went public in 2012, Zuckerberg controlled 60% deploying workplace surveillance tools best suited to a cor- of the votes via his Class B shares and lockup agreements. porate Stasi, in which employee actions are monitored in As the IPO prospectus noted, “Mr. Zuckerberg has the extravagant detail from the moment they log in to work. In ability to control the outcome of matters submitted to our 2009 Peter Thiel’s Palantir implemented a surveillance stockholders for approval, including the election of directors program for JP Morgan where their engineers “vacuumed and any merger, consolidation, or sale of all or substantially up emails and browser histories, GPS locations from all of our assets. In addition, Mr. Zuckerberg has the ability to company-issued smartphones, printer and download activity, control the management and affairs of our company as a and transcripts of digitally recorded phone conversations. result of his position as our CEO and his ability to control Palantir’s software aggregated, searched, sorted, and ana- the election of our directors” (https://www.sec.gov/ lyzed these records, surfacing keywords and patterns of beha- Archives/edgar/data/1326801/000119312512034517/d2879 vior” that merited scrutiny (Waldman et al., 2018). Electronic 54ds1.htm). This structure still holds to this day. employee surveillance has greatly accelerated since then, Adler et al. 7 particularly after Covid induced a vast increase in remote the quality of the lives of those involved. From these insights, work. AI-enabled “bossware” has turned virtual workplaces we learned about the myriad ways in which authority is exer- around the world into corporate Panopticons, enabling cised, and the relative advantages and shortcomings of those at the top to monitor and control laborers in exacting authority over alternative mechanisms of cooperation. In detail through tentacles reaching directly into workers’ doing so, the field has advanced significantly over the past homes and cars (Corbyn, 2022). Perhaps unsurprisingly, decades, not only in expanding our body of knowledge, but some tech firms are using the ability to monitor employee also moving from a focus on productive efficiency and ratio- communications to root out discussions of politics under nal, self-interested agents to a broader set of recognized out- the rubric of “mission protocol” (Savodnik, 2021). comes and behavioral assumptions. Coinbase CEO (and Ayn Rand admirer) Brian Armstrong Despite these advances, the field is not yet equipped to offered severance packages to any employees who wanted explain the challenges of our times. In general, the social to talk about politics at work—social activism was distracting scientific orientation of the field has moved us toward from the company’s core mission of enabling the crypto methods that are evidence-based, statistically valid, replica- economy (Barber, 2020). (Skeptics might wonder why dis- ble, and that yield cumulative findings. This evolution is cussions of Black Lives Matter count as political, while pur- welcome in almost every respect and resolves many of the suing a crypto-libertarian vision informed by “Atlas deficiencies of earlier eras. However, one consequence of Shrugged” does not—see Popper, 2020.) the credibility revolution is that it has crowded out humanis- Authoritarianism—centralized power without democratic tic analysis: the view that each individual is, sui generis,in accountability—has long characterized corporate America, possession of unique traits, dignity, and agency. In contrast as philosopher Elizabeth Anderson has documented so to methods common in our field, humanistic analysis is not well. Recent trends in technology and tech firms have concerned with average treatment effects or explaining vari- taken this tendency to radical new levels. Call it authoritar- ance across large populations of people engaged in compara- ianism with Silicon Valley characteristics. ble activities. Instead, it is focused on considerations such as narratives, experiences, meanings, and understandings of the moral dimensions of situations. In the humanities, scholars seek insights on, for example, how people within organiza- Organizations, Authority, and the tions grapple with right versus wrong, and good versus Humanities bad, to use Sigdwick’s categorizations of moral reasoning. Claudine Gartenberg and Anita M. McGahan This approach involves asking questions such as: When In the early 1930s, the young economist Ronald Coase does authority become authoritarianism? How do people spent a year in America observing capitalism in action. As within authority-based organizations experience freedom a socialist caught between the allure of Russian authoritarian and tyranny? How should competing claims among individ- planning and American exuberant liberalism, he saw a uals be adjudicated in organizations or in society at large? paradox in the vast operations of Ford and General Motors. These are some of the core questions of our time, and ones “Lenin had said that the economic system in Russia would that our current approaches to research are not designed to be run as one big factory… Economists in the West [main- address. tained] that to run the economy as one big factory was an This has not always been true. Foundational organiza- impossibility. And yet there were factories in England and tional thinkers such as Coase, Barnard, and Selznick devel- America. How did one reconcile the impossibility of oped their ideas during the tumultuous first half of the running Russia as one big factory with the existence of fac- twentieth century. Each witnessed authority manifest both tories in the West?” (Coase, 1988, p. 8) In other words, in capitalist enterprises that served as unprecedented even within the most liberal systems in the world, much of engines of growth and in authoritarian regimes that attracted human cooperation occurred with hierarchical organizations millions to their cause while simultaneously slaughtering in which employees willingly ceded control to a centralized millions of others. The two faces of authority likely informed authority. How could authoritarianism be an engine of their complex views of the relative benefits and dangers of liberalism, and how could liberalism be an engine of centralized power in ordering human cooperation. authoritarianism? Echoes from those times are reverberating today. Once In the near century since Coase’s trip, the field of manage- again, we are witnessing the allure of authoritarianism, not ment and organizations has offered extensive insights on this only in Russia and its invasion of Ukraine, but also in popu- paradox. Rich streams of research emerged during the late list responses to liberalism across the globe, in the fracturing 20th and early 21st centuries on a wide range of organiza- of realities and rise of conspiratorial narratives within online tions, and especially on corporations. This research has con- communities, in the need for belonging in an increasingly tributed to our understanding of the conditions, activities, technology-mediated world, in the generalized disaffection decision-making processes, and effects of organizations on with institutions across liberal societies. These portentous 8 Journal of Management Inquiry 32(1) trends highlight the two faces of authority and the urgent prosperity. But the climate emergency makes it imperative need to study the organization as places through which that we discontinue heavily polluting activities and invest people actualize meaning in their lives, and in which moral in sustainable alternatives—even though the former repre- questions are raised, discussed, and sometimes argued, sents great losses to investors and the latter may not be prof- buried, abandoned, or elevated. itable for many years to come. We cannot hope to meet the The structure of our field today—evolving through the last climate challenge if we rely only on the limited “win-win” half of the life and career of Coase—has rendered us ill- solutions that are within the reach of private enterprise. prepared to address authoritarian challenges at a geo-political Government action seems essential. But what form of gov- level. For the field to engage fully in these and other globally ernment action would be adequate to this challenge? significant issues, we must combine our social scientific Looking for parallel situations, we have reviewed previ- methods with a humanistic approach to making sense of ous periods of crisis as they emerged in the course of each the world. Just as the field of management has benefitted of the five major technological revolutions to date in the immensely from integrating ideas from economics, sociol- most advanced capitalist countries (Bodrož ic & Adler, ogy, and psychology over the past few decades, we must sim- 2018; Bodrož ic & Adler, 2022). This review suggests that ilarly incorporate perspectives from history, anthropology, we can map the possible trajectories of development of philosophy, and other humanistic fields to grapple fully advanced capitalist economies in the face of such crises with the social changes that define our times. along two axes. The first axis is defined by whether the dom- We know a lot—and have the potential to know a lot more inant public policy regime orients us toward greater laissez- —about how the same practices designed to promote finan- faire, relying on the primacy of private value creation and cial prosperity can also make people vulnerable in a wide the market as the primary coordinating mechanism, or range of ways, contributing to the pathologies of our times. toward a regime in which the state would play a transforma- Our field has much to add to public understanding of how tive, system-building role by advancing missions aimed at this vulnerability may accumulate in communities. Whether creating public value. The second axis is defined by these potential contributions come to fruition depends on whether the dominant model of organization in public and the openness of our field to embracing approaches that private sectors is more coercive, relying on hierarchical have historically been the domain of other fields, placing authority as the primary organizing principle, or more human dignity, agency, and the moral dimensions of organi- enabling, relying on community collaboration rather than zation at the center of our work. As Philip Selznick wrote in hierarchy. Combining in a 2 × 2 matrix the two main alterna- 1994: tive choices, we identify four alternative futures for resolving the current period of crisis: authoritarianism, oligarchy, local- We cannot do without authority, nor can we forgo rationality in ism, and democratization—see Figure 1. the management of resources. But authority and rationality are Authoritarianism pulls public policy toward system- highly problematic ideas, and no particular way of doing building and pulls organization toward coercion and hierar- things can be considered inevitable or beyond question. chy. An authoritarian-transformative state might indeed Therefore we should ask: What kinds of purposive organizations attempt to address the climate crisis. We see one form of are justified by the nature of the institution? What kinds of this type of state in China; but it might well also emerge in authority? What kinds of subordination? (Selznick, 1994, the wealthy countries of the global North, where authoritari- p. 262–263.) anism is already mounting (Alizada et al., 2022) and shoots of eco-fascism are growing (Kamel et al., 2020). Given the limitations of this model—the costs in civil rights and the Authoritarianism, Oligarchy, Localism, or opportunity costs in lost bottom-up engagement if we take Democratization? Alternative Futures for a top-down approach to climate adaptation and mitigation Resolving the Climate Crisis —the authoritarian response to the climate crisis points us Paul S. Adler and Zlatko Bodrož ic down a costly and risky path (Shahar, 2015). The governance weaknesses of the advanced economies Widespread distrust of central government encourages of the global North are becoming ever more apparent—and one alternative path: perhaps government should step back, dangerous. While the Covid epidemic might pass notwith- and we should entrust our future to the market process and standing the ham-fisted government responses, the climate wisdom of CEOs whose ideas can be implemented through crisis seems only to accelerate in the absence of stronger gov- corporate hierarchies. Under a laissez-faire policy regime, ernment action. The currently dominant public-policy however, market competition tends toward concentration, responses to climate change—relying on modest industry through both economies of scale and scope and the accumu- regulation—aim to nudge us toward sustainability while lation of extra-economic influence (as witnessed, for ensuring the continued profitability and growth of the example, in the success of big oil firms in shaping public private sector and thereby maintaining the country’s opinion and policy on climate change—see Washington Adler et al. 9 Figure 1. Four responses to the climate crisis. (2013)). The result is a self-reinforcing path toward Advocates for what we call democratization embrace a oligarchy. If the authoritarian response to the climate crisis system-building role of the state, but in contrast to seems risky, the oligarchy response seems suicidal, albeit Authoritarianism, they call for the state to play an enabling all too possible. Over the last four decades, the United rather than coercive role. Such a democratic-transformative States has largely ceded leadership in responding to the state is embedded within society, rather than standing apart climate crisis to the corporate sector, and it has brought us from and hierarchically above it. This would take the form of to the brink of disaster, notwithstanding the positive gestures an expanded public sector and of government policies aimed of the more forward-looking faction of the business commu- at strengthening and activating bottom-up problem-solving nity. Oligarchy portends a world where the very affluent will within that sector as well as within independent enterprises and be able to protect themselves from the worst consequences of civil society. In contrast to localism, all levels of government the climate crisis, while the rest flounder on their own in an and society are activated and coordinated to advance the sustain- ever-more inhospitable world. ability agenda, harnessing network effects and other positive Advocates of localism accept (sometimes reluctantly) the externalities on national as well as local levels, for example overarching laissez-faire policy regime and argue that the through a series of missions that could drive the green transition best path forward is through innovations at the local level. (Mazzucato, 2021). This path might take the form of much- Some jurisdictions will allow oligarchies to dominate, but in strengthened Nordic social-democracy or a reimagined demo- other places, we might see local movements push for more cratic socialism. The proponents of either are, however, as yet democratic and environmentally sustainable forms of commu- politically very weak. nity wealth-building (Dubb, 2016). Local businesses, commu- At present, we see China and Russia exemplifying the nity organizations, and government can work together to authoritarian response—China with some notable successes address local effects of climate change. The “transition with respect to climate action, but also serious limitations towns” movement is one example (Barry & Quilley, 2009). (Li et al., 2019; Smith, 2017). The US seems to be leaning However, forced by the overarching laissez-faire regime to toward oligarchy (Winters & Page, 2009), with a still compete with jurisdictions taking the low road, local largely passive response to the climate crisis. Localist community-based efforts face impediments to diffusion. approaches such as those in transition towns are remarkable Moreover, it is difficult to see how these bottom-up initiatives but seem limited to incremental changes (Heikkinen et al., cohere into the national and international transformation that 2019). Looking toward the future, given the inevitability of is so urgently needed. In the face of the climate crisis, we serious climate-induced crises, and given the weakness of will need major investments programs that only national gov- the oligarchy and localism options, the risk of authoritarianism ernments can orchestrate. The localism scenario foregoes the is growing even in the advanced economies of the global necessary benefits of nation-level scale and interconnectivity. North. The only effective alternative to authoritarianism, we 10 Journal of Management Inquiry 32(1) argue, is democratization. But we do not see any major a result, they stopped problematizing and theorizing them. country moving in that direction. Though as organization scholars, we know too well that the While we as scholars cannot choose the future of our process of institutionalization of dominant organizational countries, we can choose the topics of our research. Given archetypes is a political one, we fell into our own trap by the stakes and the prospects, we hope we will see more taking for granted the archetype of large profit-maximizing research on the system-building role of governments and companies (Greenwood & Hinings, 1993). This evolution on opportunities for widening and deepening democratic has had serious implications for the field of organization participation. studies as a whole: We came to consider politics as usual as business-as-usual. This shift has left us with a dangerous and partial perspective on organizations, one that over the past decades has too often failed to account for the role of Centering Power to Resist Its organizations in the reproduction of power inequalities. It Concentration: On the Need to Account has also opened the way to legitimate critiques from philos- for Power in Organization Studies ophers like Elizabeth Anderson. In her book, Private Julie Battilana and Kara Sheppard-Jones Government (2017), she provocatively states that modern The year 2021 marked the 16th consecutive year of dem- corporations are akin to authoritarian regimes: They concen- ocratic decline globally (Repucci & Slipowitz, 2022). With trate power in the hands of shareholders and management the rise of authoritarian strong-men, and instances of demo- while providing little, if any, power to workers over the orga- cratic backsliding around the globe (Waldner & Lust, nization’s strategic decisions. 2018), the distribution of power and its implications in orga- At present, the field of organization studies must urgently nizations and in society has re-emerged as a central question. renew its commitment to studying power and its distribution Previous generations of organization scholars would have in organizations and in society. We must join the vibrant and had much to say about these worrisome trends, but do we, vital discussion on building organizations and societies that the new generation? are fairer and more democratic at a time when power concen- The field of organization studies has played a critical role tration and authoritarianism are on the rise. The actions of cit- in advancing our understanding of power dynamics in inter- izens and organizers on the ground reinforce the importance personal relationships, in organizations, and in society (for of such a renewed commitment. Indeed the #metoo and reviews see Clegg et al., 2006; Fleming & Spicer, 2014; Black Lives Matter movements have transfused into the Ocasio et al., 2020). In the 1950s and 1960s, early thinkers academy, spurring a new wave of engagement, attention, of organization theory, including Richard Emerson, and resources dedicated to the study of gender and racial Richard Cyert, James March, Michel Crozier, and Erhard justice in organizations, as well as diversity, equity, and Friedberg were seminal contributors to theorizing power. inclusion. Then, in the 1970s, organization scholars like Jeffrey Building on the momentum of this important field of Pfeffer, Gerald Salancik, and Stewart Clegg advanced this research, organization studies must revive research on genealogy, further refining the study of power relationships power sharing and accountability in organizations more within and between organizations. These contributions broadly (Casciaro & Battilana, 2021). While in the past from the field of organization studies even cross-pollinated decades we have taken for granted that decisions in organiza- with other disciplines, feeding broader theorizing on tions ought to be made by those at the top, such organizing power. But interestingly, even though these organization the- models are far from the only ones that exist. For instance, orists continued their foray, in the following decades, power the COVID-19 pandemic has brought renewed attention to drifted to the margins of organization studies and manage- the democratization of firms (Ferreras et al., 2022). More ment, leaving the subject mostly to critical theorists democratic forms of organizing, such as cooperatives or (Alvesson & Deetz, 2006). codetermination models, which are prominent in some Increasingly, research published in dominant publications European countries, have existed for over a century and in the field turned toward the study of shareholder-value point to alternative forms of power sharing between maximizing and largely hierarchical corporations, focusing workers, top executives, and shareholders that require mostly on the factors affecting their performance, without more attention and are worthy of study (Battilana et al., systematically accounting for the role of power and inequal- 2022). Additionally, a field of research at the intersection ity in these analyses (Amis et al., 2020). Organization schol- of political science and organization studies could empiri- ars did recognize the inherently political nature of cally test propositions put forth, for instance, by delibera- organizations—that they are embedded in broader societal tive scholars in organizations. Innovations in open power hierarchies. They did so in their discourse about orga- democracy (Landemore, 2020), direct democracy, and par- nizations in general, but, where they came short is in center- ticipatory democracy (Dryzek et al., 2019) applied and ing on these political dynamics in their empirical studies. As studied in organizations could provide workers with a Adler et al. 11 say in the decisions that affect them directly, while dee- Ann Swidler (1986) observed that in unsettled times pening our understanding of these innovations and their people turn to explicitly articulated, highly organized potential to invigorate democracy in society and, in meaning systems that claim to offer unified answers to prob- doing so, resist authoritarianism. lems—ideologies—while taken-for-granted traditions lose This ambitious agenda must be pursued across various their capacity to guide action. At any point in time, she organizational settings. This entails moving beyond the argues, the structural opportunities for ideologies to thrive study of the single dominant archetype of the corporation. differ. Times of crises are a fertile breeding ground for autho- Instead, we must study various types of corporations, from tra- ritarian ideologies. Whether all crises of the last decades ditional profit-maximizing ones to benefit corporations and deserve the denotation or have been rendered crises as their equivalents across the world. We must also invest once outcome of political and rhetorical rent seeking notwithstand- again in studying other forms of organizations whose func- ing, there has been an accumulation of crises and the general tioning is critical to a healthy and resilient democracy, includ- sense of societal fragility is high. Although we know that dis- ing social movements, public bureaucracies, not-for-profits, tributed decision-making, collective action, and collabora- cooperatives, and social enterprises among others. It is critical tions are the way forward (Frey-Heger et al., 2021; these studies account for the evolution of both offline and Kornberger et al., 2019), with their sense of urgency and virtual forms of organizing, as the emergence of new online high stakes for a large number of people, crises facilitate a platforms raises important questions regarding power and direct display of state muscle, and justify order-obedience inequality that also merit further inquiry (Bernholz et al., relationships. 2021; Tufekci, 2017; Vallas & Schor, 2020). However, the growing authoritarianism is not rooted in As organizations and societies across the world grapple the necessities of crisis response, nor in the strength or per- with growing power concentration up the corporate ladder suasiveness of the underlying regimes and their ideologies and in the halls of government, it is urgent that organization or the charisma of their leaders, but in the weakness of the scholars rise to the occasion and recenter power at the core of institutions that embody democratic values and the organiza- their research endeavors. The stakes could not be higher. tions that support them. It is the mistrust toward traditional authorities and core cultural institutions that clears the way for autocratic phantasies. The institutions and organizations that should guide us through uncertain times are in crisis Organizing Against Authoritarianism themselves. Sources of the weakness are the polarization Renate Meyer and fracturing of society that produce, amidst virtual mass Ultimately, authoritarianism—for the sake of space I connectivity and an explosion of social media communities, subsume under this term various forms of autocratic the loneliness that, according to Hannah Arendt (1986), is the regimes—is a perversion of authority. Authority, as soil for totalitarianism and its results. Totalitarian regimes, defined, e.g., by Max Weber (1978), is the ability to rule she notes, are built on movement and acceleration—stable over people based on their consent, that is, authority is institutions of any sort are their enemies. They are character- grounded in their believe in the legitimacy of the rule and ized by a loss of a shared reality and truth gaps (“everything trust in its representations—institutions, actors, and organiza- is possible and nothing is true”), the isolation of people from tions alike. Authoritarianism elevates the ruling center above each other, and the complete absence of authority. the people, swaps belief in the legitimacy of the rule with the Consequently, the contributions of organization scholars fear of sanctions and renders the potency of the ruler abso- are essential in three areas. First, we need to study how lute. In order to give authoritarian regimes a coating of authoritarianism is organized, its characteristic features, authority, higher powers, such as God or Patria—the autho- relationships, its distinct institutions and organizations ritarian leader rules in their direct lineage and tradition—or during emergence and upholding, the (re)sources of its sha- the super-natural charisma of “born” leaders are evoked, peshifting capacities. On a societal level, we need to better often in an unholy assemblage. The sacralization and sym- understand the growing amalgamation of previously differ- bolic overloading of politics—the staging of secular leaders entiated institutional orders, such as, for instance, state and together with the highest religious dignitaries, or the adorn- religion, and its consequences. While it may seem that such ment of those who only recently attained power with the developments promise a de-fragmentation of society, they insignia of eternal rule—is accompanied by a conspicuous may actually prepare the ground for comprehensive ideolo- distain for constitutional law and courts as the prime custodi- gies to grow. ans of the people-authorized rule of law. The aspiration of Second, authoritarianism has a high degree of active orga- showcasing authority makes control over and totalization nization and an equally high degree of active disorganization: of history a collateral conditio sine qua non—there can be Disconnection, splintering, prevention of networking, mis- nothing outside of the authoritarian rule, no alternative, not trust is as organized as are their counterparts (Meyer & in the present, not in the past, not in eternity. Quattrone, 2021; Pawlak, 2022). We need to know more 12 Journal of Management Inquiry 32(1) about how disorganization is accomplished, how the manu- authoritarian systems subjugate their civil societies to the facturing of isolation and fracturing is achieved amidst the will of a small cadre of political elites (Linz, 1964). In partic- technologically possible hyper-connectivity. ular, authoritarian state logic seems more predicated on con- Third, authoritarian regimes thrive on the inability of stricting distribution to those in power and their cronies, or on people to act collectively and to collaborate across divi- selective redistribution to appease the general public to the sions. We need to advance our knowledge on how the will of that cadre (Beblawi & Luciani, 1987; Ross, 2001). capacity to act in concert among equals can be maintained, Legitimacy is based on the leader’s charismatic authority how a pluralist public space can be kept open across all (Weber, 1968), and/or wielding tools of extreme violence cleavages, how horizontally organized societal institutions that can forcibly suppress anti-regime activities (Linz, can regain power and trust in the face of crises and unsettled 1964; Slater & Fenner, 2011). times. One way perhaps to incorporate greater variation is to con- sider the alignment or misalignment between authoritarian logics (and despotic power) and their perceived territorial Varieties of Authoritarianism claims and/or territorial integrity. This is not to say that Daniel Erian Armanios and Amr Adly such misalignments do not impact other political systems; On February 24, 2022, as Russia launched airstrikes we simply observe here that such misalignments seem across Ukraine, we were taking stock of another region salient in characterizing different authoritarian actions. For some 2,000 km south. Just before the Russian invasion of instance, Putin’s ambitions reflect the wider territorial Crimea in 2014, the Arab Spring was concluding its first reaches of the former Tsarist empire from the 1700s. We wave that started in Tunisia and swept through Egypt, can also see similarities to other countries such as Turkey, Libya, Yemen, Syria, Morocco, and Bahrain. In 2019, a whose ambitions reflect those of their former Ottoman second wave swept through Algeria, Lebanon, Iraq, and Empire. On the other hand, Egypt’s territorial claims have Sudan. The result has been varied to say the least. Egypt, largely remained similar to their present-day boundaries, Syria, and Bahrain have all remained or reverted back to with the exception of a brief loss of the Sinai from 1967− authoritarianism. Tunisia and Morocco initially incorporated 1973. The same for Iran whose territorial boundaries still revolutionary representation toward a democratic transition reflect the historic core of ancient Persia. before reverting to more authoritarian tactics. Libya, Prior work shows how institutional carriers underpin the Algeria, Iraq, Lebanon, Yemen, and Sudan all had their shared understandings and standards of a system systems transition or collapse; their outcomes remain unre- (Armanios & Eesley, 2021). To bring this concept into our solved. In the short span of just over a decade, we observe inquiry around authoritarianism, we link it to notions of infra- everything from authoritarian resurgence to transformation. structural power, or the degree to which civil society depends This begs the question: how are some authoritarian regimes on state institutions for the delivery of goods and services so resilient, while others are not? (Mann, 1984). To do this, we focus on carriers that operate To better account for this variation, we seek to introduce within the state’s civil society such as state banks, hospitals, the possibility of developing a more multifaceted “varieties and bureaucratic agencies—those state entities for which cit- of authoritarianism” approach. Scholars recognize authoritar- izenry rely for goods and services and hence the means by ian systems have varied capacity to withstand uprisings which authoritarian subjugation is sustained. (Skocpol, 1979; Slater & Fenner, 2011; Tilly, 1978). One way to incorporate greater variation is to perhaps con- However, these exercises still tend to treat authoritarian sider the degree to which the institutional carrier is profes- regimes along a single conceptual spectrum, being all sionalized to global standards. The degree to which state lumped as non-democratic. To attempt here to commence civil sector is professionalized will likely decide how effi- this process, we leverage organizational theory, namely ciently state bureaucracy can enact the needs of the authori- from the institutional perspective, to add conceptual variation tarian system. However, this comes at a potential cost to the to the scholarship around authoritarianism that has largely regime. If revolution successfully detaches state bureaucracy been the preoccupation of political science. More specifi- from its authoritarian logic, even temporarily, these carriers cally, we see the notion of institutional logics as allowing have the ability to operate autonomously along global stan- us to add heterogeneity to despotic power, and the notion dards rather than regime interests, thereby becoming an of institutional carriers as allowing us to add further hetero- enabler of further disruption (Armanios & Adly, 2022). As geneity to infrastructural power. such, different authoritarian systems may be more or less Prior work argues that state institutional logics aim to willing to professionalize their civil society. For instance, redistribute resources in the public interest and their legiti- Egypt and Iran increasingly professionalized their state macy is based on democratic participation (Thornton et al., sectors to global standards, such as banking (Adly, 2020; 2012, Table 3.2). We must expand that notion of state Mihret et al., 2020). However, Libya under Gaddafi largely logic to one that includes despotic power, or how suppressed such professionalization (Basir et al., 2021). Adler et al. 13 While not having the territorial integrity issues of Libya, have critical contributions to provide and the need for Gabon and Trujillo’s Dominican Republic are arguably doing so is only increasing. We hope initiating such a typol- examples of a lack of professionalization due to a desire to ogy as the one we present here will help us get off the side- heavily concentrate power around a single family and its lines of these increasingly critical issues and begin to cronies. So much so, that the Trujillo regime even refused enhance our impact in these domains for which we have to professionalize occupations needed for even the most largely neglected in our scholarship. basic of healthcare, such as nursing (Zeller, 2018). From these two possible sources of variation, we could Organizing the Authoritarian State then begin to envision a 2 × 2 typology that begins to charac- terize different kinds of authoritarian regimes and potentially Heather A. Haveman their differential resilience (or fragility) to disruption. One Governments, like many other elements of modern socie- axis would be the degree to which existing territorial bound- ties, consist of organizations: elected or appointed assemblies aries are aligned or misaligned with authoritarian logics (and that write and pass laws, staff departments that interpret laws despotic power). The other axis would be the degree to which and develop rules to enforce them, law-enforcement agencies institutional carriers (infrastructure power) are professional- that are authorized to use force to uphold laws, and judicial ized to global standards. bodies that evaluate both laws themselves and compliance Table 1 presents examples of authoritarian systems for each with laws. This holds true across the spectrum from the cell in our typology. Greater professionalization arguably most authoritarian government to the most democratic. increases the efficiency of state institutions to deliver goods Authoritarian governments are headed by individuals or orga- and services. This may potentially better prevent internal dis- nizations that wield (almost) absolute control over their juris- ruptions as such efficiency arguably enhances citizen depen- dictions. In practice, authoritarianism is a continuum ranging dency on the authoritarian state. Those whose logics operate from complete leader control (as in North Korea) through within current territorial boundaries can prevent external dis- partial leader control (as in Singapore) to democratic control ruptions to their systems. Authoritarian logics that are mis- (by the people themselves, as in Norway). To understand the aligned with territorial claims perhaps are more likely to rise of authoritarian governments, then, we need to understand experience credibility crises that will drive them to reconfigure the degree of authoritarianism, the extent of rulers’ power. territorial boundaries in greater alignment with their logic. This Here, I will focus on the logics of governments. Logics, will only induce perennial conflicts with neighbors. related sets of cultural elements (norms, values, beliefs, and As we reflect on the current Russia incursion into the symbols) that help individuals and organizations make Ukraine, let’s not make the same mistakes we did amidst sense of their everyday activities and order those activities the Arab Spring and assume all authoritarian regimes are in time and space, define the rules of the political game. the same. Nor should we continue to observe from afar. Logics determine both what should be done in order to Almost 11.6% of the world’s economic activity comes out achieve desired outcomes and what is good to do. In other of areas of civil unrest just like these (Institutes for words, they encompass both instrumental (means-end) ratio- Economics & Peace, 2021). As organizational scholars, we nality and value rationality. Logics are most powerful when they are institutionalized—accepted as normal, natural, proper, even taken for granted. Table 1. Potential Typology for Classifying Variety in Authoritarian The logic of democracy is egalitarian, as exemplified by Regimes. the slogan “one person, one vote.” This focus on equality of access to politics is central to democracy, even though Authoritarian Logic in practice the definition of “person” is sometimes highly (Despotic Power) restrictive, limited by gender, race or ethnicity, religion, or Aligned Misaligned economic status. The democratic logic became institutional- Territorial Territorial ized in many parts of the world in the 150 years following the Boundaries Boundaries French and American Revolutions. Its institutionalization was reinforced by three sets of events: (i) the 1945 victories Institutional More Examples: Examples: of the Allies over the Axis in World War II; (ii) the hatching carriers professionalization Egypt and Iran Russia and (infrastructural Turkey of fledgling democracies in Africa, Latin America, and parts power) Less Examples: Examples: of Asia as European empires slowly crumbled; and (iii) the professionalization Dominican Libya and breakup of the Soviet Union from 1988 to 1991. Republic Sudan The democratic logic celebrates equality, social solidarity, (under and mutual respect (“we the people” in the U.S.; “liberté, Trujillo) and égalité, fraternité” in France), and denigrates self-seeking Gabon behavior (corruption) and favoritism. Embodying this logic, 14 Journal of Management Inquiry 32(1) democratic governments strive to be “of the people, by the expertise to understand organizations, inside and outside people, for the people,” as Abraham Lincoln famously put government, in all their variety and complexity. If we don’t it. This means that democratic governmental organizations take on the charge of analyzing and (I hope) helping resist are expected to serve voters and their families, and demo- the rise of authoritarianism, who will? Who else could do it cratic governmental officials, elected or appointed, are as well as we can? expected put voters and their families first. Although long institutionalized, the democratic logic has The Authoritarian Legacy of Trumpism been under siege for several decades. In many countries, it has been gradually, through many small steps, replaced by Mary Ann Glynn the logic of authoritarianism, which celebrates centralized power. To justify centralized power, often in the guise of [There is] an ongoing struggle between two sets of habits … One… is represented by the Capitol -- that competing interests can be democracy, the authoritarian logic relies on sharp, resolved through reason, and that when the people decide to transfer Manichean distinctions between “us” and “them,” usually power, we affirm the system that allows it by gathering on the based on religion or morality, geography, or race or ethnicity. Capitol steps for the handover. The rioters brought other habits. “Us,” however it is defined, is good; “them” is viewed with …“The mob was fed lies … They were provoked by the president suspicion—sometimes utterly maligned. Pitting “us” and other powerful people, and they tried to use fear and violence to against “them” puts governments on a war setting and justi- stop a specific proceeding of the first branch of the federal govern- fies centralizing power: political elites are assumed to know ment which they did not like. Never before had the president, the best how to safeguard “us” from the clear and present most powerful person in American government, taken aim at a dangers posed by “them.” core feature of that government. … for the first time in American How do would-be authoritarians undermine the logic of History.” (Dickerson, 2022) democracy and replace it with the logic of authoritarianism? th They leverage existing organizations, both inside and The deadly January 6 2021 assault on the U.S. Capitol, outside government. Inside government, they create cults of which the FBI viewed as “domestic terrorism,” was a shocking personality around strong, charismatic men (rarely women). and vicious “war scene” (Amiri, 2022) where two contrasting They then institutionalize those cults by taking over estab- world orders—the “illiberal” versus the “liberal” (Lounsbury lished political parties or launching new ones and appealing & Wang, 2020)—were in literal and figurative battle. The to voters though emotion-laden polemics that surface latent war was predicated on Trump’s delusion that the election fears or invent new ones. They use the electoral power was stolen from him and his intention to thwart the peaceful they’ve gained to control legislative assemblies, passing transition of power. Even more startling, perhaps, was the laws and devising rules to limit voting by “them,” ostensibly reveal of his increasingly authoritarian leadership. to clean up the electoral system. They also co-opt the courts Although authoritarianism is often thought as rule being under the guise of improving judicial efficiency. And they inflicted on others, it is, ironically, actively fueled by “antic- classify opponents as traitors, using laws, police and armies, ipatory obedience”: “Most of the power of authoritarianism is and the courts to detain and punish (sometimes kill) them. freely given. … individuals think ahead to what a repressive Outside government, would-be authoritarians co-opt news government will want, and then offer themselves without media, persuading (or forcing, using police and armies as being asked” (Snyder, 2017, p. 17). Initially, this involves levers) media outlets to parrot authoritarians’ ideas and opin- an unreflective adaptation to new leadership, a process that ions, and to report “alternative facts” as true. Co-opting news redounds to Milgram’s experiments on obedience where he media is easiest when media ownership is highly concen- found that people were remarkably willing to follow an trated—when a small number of sites or companies dominate authoritarian’s directives, even to the point of harming or the delivery of information and opinion to the public. killing others (Snyder, 2017, p. 21). Would-be autocrats often co-opt another trusted source of Nowhere was this as evident as in the responsiveness of information and opinion: religious authorities. This is Trump’s followers to his signature slogan: Make America easiest when religious tenets are instantiated in a hierarchical Great Again (MAGA). It was a siren call to a new way of organization with centralized power, such as the Roman thinking, with new rules, “depicting a nation in crisis, Catholic or Eastern Orthodox Church. Would-be autocrats while positioning himself [Trump] as the nation’s hero – also co-opt business organizations in exchange for favors. the only one who can conquer our foes, secure our This is easiest when industry, and thus economic power, is borders.” Urging his followers to “trust him,” claiming he highly concentrated. is “really smart” and “I alone can fix it,” paired with errone- My challenge for organizational theorists is to take this ous claims that he won the election, the anger of the MAGA bare-bones argument, flesh it out, and test it empirically. movement was key in the storming of the Capitol. Two of our tools—institutionalist and resource-dependence Trump’s authoritarianism influence was predicated on his theories—should be especially useful. We possess the “rhetorical brilliance” in framing situations or events to his Adler et al. 15 advantage. Framing involves “the packaging and organiza- (Clegg, 1989). Societies of Western Europe and the United tion of information … for shaping others’ understandings States are based on a post-modern organically liquid solidar- and behaviours … [which] brings attention to a few stylized ity in which electoral competition is central. System integra- dimensions of reality, while hiding others” (Giorgi, 2017, tion also differs markedly. In contemporary Russia it flows p. 712). In his classic work, Frame Analysis, Goffman through pipelines of oil and gas that are the major network (1974, p. 24) argues that framing results in “social frame- resource forming the basis for a network of system integra- works” used by collectives; Trump’s frames explicitly tion that is state controlled. While the EU imports about aggrandized himself and demonized his perceived enemies. 45% of its gas and 25% of its oil from Russia, the combina- The Mueller Report (2019) made this point: “Trump has mar- tion of sanctions and voluntary withdrawals from the market keted himself as the apotheosis of American exceptionalism will have destabilizing effects not only on them but more so —as the nation’s hero—by using rhetorical tactics more often on Russia. If Russian integration of its pipeline network to associated with unheroic authoritarian leaders” to attack the Europe is ruptured, the consequences will be extreme for investigation and Mueller himself as politically illegitimate. Russia, starved of foreign capital from export sales. The effect of repeated falsehoods is to numb the audience Western reduction of gas and oil demand is a major shock to a preferred framing, normalizing aberrations. Reinforcing to Russian system integration. this rhetoric was Trump’s admonition “not to trust our own In the west, the USA and Europe’s primary means of eyes and ears—that what we see is not what is real” and system integration is through complex global market net- instead, to simply trust him. It was chillingly Orwellian in works that are far less material, more digital and much its framing. In his dystopian novel on the dangers of totalitar- more pervasive, with the sanctions regime these afford ianism, Orwell warns: “The Party told you to reject the evi- having the potential to shut Russia’s oligarchy out of dence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most global capital markets. These western counties have every essential command” (1984, p. 69). Ignore what your eyes motive to divest from the carbon economy; Russia has not. might tell you; only trust in the authoritarian leader. Some counties in Europe, especially Norway, are showing Much of Trump’s rhetoric creates a new or different how it can be done. Others, such as Germany, are slowly reality in which “alternate facts” are common and critiques following. are routinely castigated as hoaxes or witch hunts. Trump pro- Social integration works through different solidarities, fusely promoted false and misleading information; by the end ideal typically represented as modern and postmodern, or of his presidency, he had lied 30,573 times, about 21 times one could say Russian and western. Of course, social integra- per day (Higgins, 2021). The Big Lie—Trump’s claim that tion can always construct an Other on whom the unleashing a corrupt conspiracy robbed him of a second term as of episodic power can be justified: for Russia, at the present, President—diffused widely within his base who embraced the Ukrainian state is the Other. It is the irruption of episodic it fully; it took on a life of its own, apart from Trump. power spilling into this state that strengthens social integra- Many now embrace his demagoguery, ideology, and authori- tion at home, through opposition, antagonism, and violence tarian style, but not necessarily his personality. to the western European oriented political projects of the The decoupling of the man from the movement suggests that majority fraction of the Ukrainian political elites. The minor- authoritarianism can continue well beyond the authoritarian’s ity fraction maps its support closely onto social identity rule. The most enduring vestige—apart from the democratic claims premised on language, religion, and ethnicity sprung institutions attacked—is Trumpism. It has metastasized from Mother Russia, claims that have little external legiti- from Trump’s delusional framing on his inauguration day in macy in the face of Russian barbarism. 2017—with the biggest crowds ever—to a widespread and Power does not normally work through coercion except ambient movement, amplified by disinformation and distortion, when the order ordinarily secured breaks down. An implication broadcast in social and right-wing media, aggressively militant, of this is that social systems that intervene forcibly to reform and framed with falsehoods. “Authoritarianism is surging” “deviance” are not, in fact, powerful. The claims of Russian (Lozada, 2022) and liberalism needs to meet the moment. and Ukrainian social integration are fused in language and its sense of national identity—yet these are clearly not resonating. The paradox is that the war becomes a civil war in its own terms: if Russian social integration is pan-national, then the Circuits of Power and the Crisis of Russian invasion of Ukraine is a declaration of war on a shared social Authoritarianism identity. It is important to note, as did Parsons (1963), that cre- Stewart Clegg ation of power within a system normally presupposes consen- Updating Durkheim (1893), contemporary Russia is sus on goals, providing a framework within which facilitative based, ideologically, on modern mechanical solidarity. It is power operates. The Ukrainian state has not shared goals not a liquidly modern society (Bauman, 2000). The contrast with Russia since at least 2014 and the Maidan Revolution. with the West is striking; the circuits of power quite different Social and system integration clash on Ukrainian soil. 16 Journal of Management Inquiry 32(1) To summarize: in the east, where there is centrality of cir- destroyed (Lawrence & Suddaby, 2006). Institutions and conflict cuits of social integration, social ordering is marked by too relate intimately to each other: Institutions shape conflict and much state and too little market, while in the west’s most neo- conflict shapes institutions. As a result, institutional tensions, liberally economic expressions, there is centrality of circuits turmoil, and upheaval emerge. Conflict and war uproot lives, of system integration and social ordering is marked by less organizations, and institutions. For Friedland and Alford state and more market. As circuits of social and system inte- (1991, p. 256): “Institutional contradictions are the bases of the gration traverse these relations each is liable to circuit break- most important political conflicts in our society.” These conflicts ing from events. Where social integration is central, power may be between nation states and their values, beliefs, convic- over deviant subjects defined in terms of dominant concep- tions, and interests, or across different types of institutions, tions of normal power/knowledge will be forcibly exercised, such as the state, market, profession, family, religion, and even against resistance. Where system integration is central community. and achieved not just through material but also digital infra- If we see conflicts as being about institutions, we can see structure with its abstract coding, the system may be con- how the Ukrainian government has tried to uphold state insti- founded when confronted with events but not face rupture. tutions. The digital war over what happens in Ukraine and Crisis in either market-led system integration or in state-led how it is interpreted also becomes a war about diverse and social integration can destabilize existing knowledge, resource contradictory narratives and understandings—and questions dependencies, and pattern of interaction. In such conjunctures, of authority. All this is central to upholding both the function- while system disintegration can be fixed by states learning new ing of institutions and their legitimacy. routines, such as quantitative easing, social disintegration is far It is important to see and analyze these institutions and the more problematic where no higher order organization (other struggles over them. Some may argue that zones of conflict than potentially religious institutions such as the Orthodox are devoid of institutions. Institutions break down, and one Church in Russia) exists to fix internal problems of integration. day, they seem to be simply gone. However, in most cases, However, these can be displaced externally through a projec- they do not disappear entirely but merely change and shift tion of episodic power, in the name of social integration, into —possibly into other forms. Take the market as the institu- other systems, disintegrating them in the process, as in Ukraine. tion underpinning transactions for goods and services. In Neo-economically liberal and democratic states weather wars, such transactions are inhibited but not stopped. crisis much more resiliently than do states in which system inte- Informal markets pop up, where people purchase necessary gration is subordinate to authoritarian social integration. The goods and services. Likewise, nonmarket mechanisms— former situations are far less ideological while the latter are for such as the sharing of food, water, and shelter—may more ideological, contrary to the lessons of Western Marxism. replace market mechanisms. The institutions of the family, Contradictions in system integration have not destroyed capital- community, and state substitute for the market in such ism becauseof its relative autonomyas a circuit of power/knowl- cases. Institutions hence remain present and central. edge, especially in the most central global states; in addition, the A period of war and conflict is high time for radical insti- plurality and diversity of social integration within such nations tutional work—to reproduce, alter, and destroy institutions. It make them far more resilient, even when all the preconditions entails a struggle over symbols, identities, physical and of fiscal and legitimation crisis are present, matters attended to digital infrastructures, and social relations. It is also high at more length, elsewhere (Clegg, forthcoming). time for new forms of organizing such as hackathons. Hackathons can be used to swiftly coordinate and collabo- rate. The term hackathon is a portmanteau of hacking and Organizations, Institutions, and War marathon. Hacking indicates a focus on technological solu- Ali Aslan Gümüsay tions. Marathon is really a misnomer, as hackathons are Nowadays, few would deny that we have reached the end rather design sprints. So, hack-sprint would be more fitting. of the “end of history.” Change, not stability, is constant. At these events, whether analog or virtual, software and hard- Crisis mode is the new normal, whether it is due to ware are co-developed to “hack the crisis.” In the Ukraine COVID-19 or the war in Ukraine—or the ever-looming war, the solutions thus developed attempt to stop or inhibit climate crisis. And, of course, these crises are interrelated: violent attacks or alleviate their consequences. Examples Fossil fuel dilemmas show us how deeply interlinked include software that allows residents who remained in global sustainability and national sovereignty are. Ukraine to report damage to public buildings and apartment As nation states and authoritarian leaders seem to be celebrat- blocks, and software that acts as a propaganda filter by flag- ing a comeback, it is apt to ask: What is the role of organization ging social media posts that are likely fake news. studies in general and institutionaltheoryinparticular? Perhaps The role of the digital should not be underestimated. Digital unsurprisingly, I believe that, now more than ever, they have an technologies, and the affordances they provide, can significantly important one. As crises unfold, organizations and institutions shape institutional processes. In the last decade, social media come to the fore. They are maintained and disrupted, built and and other digital platforms have redefined civic and political Adler et al. 17 engagement by enabling new ways of connecting, collaborat- spread of organizing that fueled democracy in areas known ing, and mobilizing. For instance, in the Ukrainian war, politi- not only for its absence, but also for social movements cians have leveraged the technological features of social demanding it. media platforms. The president of Ukraine uses Twitter to Flash forward just one decade. Social media platforms like report on the current situation, offer praise and criticism, and Facebook and Twitter are once again at the nexus of massive enter into dialogue with other politicians—effectively opening social change. Yet the use of such tools for the spread of up discussions to a world-wide audience. As popular opinions democracy has been replaced by their deployment for the globally are largely on his side, this form of diplomatic conver- enactment of authoritarianism. It turns out that those social sation puts additional pressure on world leaders to act in line media affordances that make it possible for (dis)information with Ukrainian interests and requests. The digital arena thus to spread quickly, for people to easily organize into self- becomes a space in which institutional work is performed. referential communities, and for online sentiment to We see how debates in traditional and social media frame the spill-over into offline action have been the primary tools war in certain ways. These debates are part of processes of insti- that have enabled leaders like Putin, Bolsonaro, and Trump tutionalization and deinstitutionalization. They can be seen as to wield such strong influence over so many. attempts to legitimize and delegitimize actions. In my view, the core engine driving action in both direc- To conclude, we need to update what we study, how we do so, tions—democratization on the one hand and authoritarianism and why. Regarding what we study, we see how globally inter- on the other—is the same. Sure, social media are phenome- connected societal grand challenges are (Gümüsay et al., 2020) nally efficient at allowing the person on the street (or the and the need to study them on a very macro level (Lounsbury authoritarian leader in the country’s capital) to create and dis- & Wang, 2020). United Nations Sustainable Development seminate messages nearly instantaneously without any Goals 16 on “peace, justice and strong institutions” and17on vetting or filtering. But were that the only thing that social “partnerships for the goals” attest to the significance of effective, media did, it would not be enough. The primary affordance inclusive, and sustainable worldwide institutions. Regarding that makes social media unique among other forms of how we study, the risk is that our findings may be outdated media and communication technology is that they make before they are codified due to the pace of change. We thus visible how other people respond to those messages. need to engage with the future before the future catches up Nearly half a century of study in the fields of social and with us. This requires us to rethink and transform theory, empir- I/O psychology have shown how our own thoughts and ics, and our scholarly community. Timeliness is an ingredient of actions are fundamentally shaped by the perceptions, attri- relevance. For instance, we may need to move from studying butions, and inferences we make about other people’s what is (not) to what if (not). And our peer review process behaviors. And, the evidence is compelling that when we may need updating to ensure rigor while making it more applica- are acting in public (or believe that we are), our thoughts ble to this new normal. I could envisage fast track models—like and actions tend to converge toward our beliefs about at airports—but not just for academic passengers who pay what is normative or popular. Social media enables us to business-class rates but for those who serve a more immediate see how people who we believe are like us and those public interest. Lastly, as to the why, we cannot leave the who we believe are very different from us, react to future to authoritarian leaders, as we sweep up their messes various stimuli. For example, do they post incendiary com- and thendo our theorizing.Instead, I thinkweneedtoco-create ments about political figures I revere, or do they “like” a the future (Gümüsay & Reinecke, 2022)—with modesty, deep news story that affirms my beliefs? Although one can humility, and continuous reflection on the role of academia. never know for sure why other people act the way they As the future is unfolding in front of us, we need to play our do, that certainly does not stop us from making inference part—or in this post-truth world, we will be taken apart. about their motives and rationalizing their actions. Because social media make visible what people do, we believe we can know what they think. And because we know Social Media our own behaviors are visible to others who are also making Paul Leonardi inferences about us, any action we make on a social media plat- Starting in December 2010 and continuing into the Spring form is the equivalent of doubling down on “this is who I am.” of 2011, people across Northern Africa and the Middle East The bottom line is that the visibility of actions enabled by social began to engage in massive social protests demanding polit- media platforms plays an incredibly powerful role in our inter- ical reform. Using social media platforms like Facebook and pretation of the world and our place in it. Twitter on their mobile devices, protesters spread word, It is precisely this strong sense of “I know what other recruited, and mobilized in public squares and at State capi- people think and I know who I am in relation to such think- tals from Cairo to Damascus. Observers of this Arab Spring ing” that can accelerate democratization as it did in the Arab that toppled dictators such as Mubarak and Qadhafi argued Spring, while also fueling authoritarianism as it now appears that social media was the tool that allowed for this rapid to be doing in the COVID era. 18 Journal of Management Inquiry 32(1) If social media is the spark that ignites behavioral visibil- 3. Note that governments can be strongly authoritarian even if they have the trappings of democracy, such as elections and ity, algorithms are the accelerant that allow visibility to do its elected legislative bodies. Opposition candidates can be work. We don’t just happen to be exposed to, or arbitrarily harassed, convicted on trumped-up charges, even killed; oppo- stumble across, random people reacting to information and sition parties can be outlawed; and electoral results can be disinformation on our social media platforms; a sophisticated manipulated or faked. set of algorithms are making decisions about whose actions will be made visible to us (and to whom our own actions will be made visible) based on their predictions about what References we are most likely to click on or share. In other words, algo- rithms determine, in large part, what is made visible to us and Adly, A. (2020). Cleft capitalism: The social origins of failed market making in Egypt, Stanford studies in Middle Eastern what remains invisible. 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Abstract

To the surprise of many in the West, the fall of the USSR in 1991 did not lead to the adoption of liberal democratic govern- ment around the world and the much anticipated “end of history.” In fact, authoritarianism has made a comeback, and liberal democracy has been on the retreat for at least the last 15 years culminating in the unthinkable: the invasion of a democratic European country by an authoritarian regime. But why does authoritarianism continue to spread, not only as an alternative to liberal democracy, but also within many liberal democracies where authoritarian leaders continue to gain strength and pop- ularity? In this curated piece, contributors discuss some of the potential contributions of management scholarship to under- standing authoritarianism, as well as highlight a number of directions for management research in this area. Keywords institutional theory, business & society, ethics evolved into a mixture of anger and fear as it has become Introduction apparent that there is seemingly little the West can (or at Michael Lounsbury and Nelson Phillips least will) do to stop Russian aggression and the growing humanitarian crisis that has followed the invasion. While Over the past decade, there have been increased calls for man- agement scholars to do more research that is societally relevant and important—to, for example, address grand challenges (e.g., University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA, USA George et al., 2016) and to examine the role of organizations American University of Cairo, New Cairo, Egypt and institutions in the production and maintenance of economic University of Oxford, Oxford, UK inequality and systemic power imbalances (e.g., Amis et al., Harvard University, Boston, USA 2020). While historically “such topics have been difficult to University of Leeds, Leeds UK publish in our leading journals,” more recently “business University of Sydney, Sydney, Australia University of Stavanger, Stavanger, Norway schools are becoming more oriented to making research and University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, USA education more relevant to their broader societies, which will University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA, USA in turn encourage scholars to pursue under researched topics Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA of critical importance” (Tihanyi et al., 2022, p. 712). We University of Hamburg, Hamburg, Germany believe that recent events in Ukraine demand that management Humbolt Institution for Internet and Society, Berlin, Germany University of California, Berkeley, CA, USA scholars once again look beyond more traditional management University of California, Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA, USA themes and focus their attention on a topic that is highly socie- University of Alberta, Edmonton, Canada tally relevant and globally important: the rise of authoritarianism University of Toronto, Toronto, Canada and the threat this poses to democratic governments and the WU Vienna University, Wien, Austria international rule of law. Corresponding Author: When Russia invaded Ukraine in February of this year, Nelson Phillips, University of California, Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA, the Western world reacted with shock and disbelief, and as USA. days, weeks, and now months have passed, this shock has Email: nelson_phillips@ucsb.edu 4 Journal of Management Inquiry 32(1) sanctions and an ever increasing supply of arms are helping the rule of his father. Even in the United States, the election Ukraine defend itself, the war continues and Ukrainians con- of Donald Trump, and his subsequent refusal to accept his tinue to die. What the people of Ukraine currently face—the election loss, rang alarm bells for many observers concerned invasion of their country and a direct threat to their democra- about the direction of American democracy. tically elected government—is something that was thought to All of these new authoritarian governments are led by what be a thing of the past in Europe, but nonetheless highlights Rachman (2022) calls “strong man” leaders. These leaders, the growing challenges facing the rule based international including Putin, Xi, Bolsanaro, Duterte, and Trump, share order that developed after World War 2 (Lounsbury & defining characteristics: “the creation of a cult of personality; Wang, 2020). contempt for the rule of law; the claim to represent the real These challenges have become manifest in a multiplicity people against the elites (otherwise known as populism); and of ways. In Russia, citizens are facing repression and an a politics driven by fear and nationalism” (Rachman, 2022, unprecedented disinformation campaign as the Russian gov- p. 10). Importantly, these leaders are able to thrive in both ernment seeks to prevent dissent over the invasion of more traditional dictatorships and systems that are, at least at Ukraine. Perhaps surprisingly for many international observ- the beginning of their leadership, democratic: a frightening ers, it seems that the Russian government’s control of the prospect for many existing democracies. press and the Internet has proven sufficient to keep the major- We believe that these profound challenges growing out of ity of Russians convinced of the justice of an invasion to the twinned rise of populism and authoritarianism, and the reverse the “Nazification” of Ukraine and protect the concomitant decline of institutional trust in liberal democracy Russian speaking minority. in the early twenty-first century, provide an important focal In China, there is a very different kind of authoritarian point for new management scholarship. To encourage discus- government and a different kind of challenge to liberal sion and new research in this area, we have assembled a col- democracy; but one that is spreading around the world via lection of short essays that highlight a variety of important their Belt and Road initiative and their increasingly sophis- issues and questions that are worthy of more systematic ticated use of soft power. At the same time, tension around inquiry. the status of Taiwan continues to grow as China attempts to assert its sovereignty over an independent and democratic country despite the warnings from the West that Taiwan has Authoritarianism at the Organizational Level the right to govern itself. China’s authoritarian regime has publicly set the return of Taiwan as a key goal and, at least In the first piece, Davis emphasizes how authoritarianism has in public discourse, refuses to accept the idea that profoundly worked its way into corporations, highlighting Taiwanese citizens have the right to self-governance. “founder friendly” authoritarian structures inhabited by Further evidence of the erosion of the liberal democratic leaders such as Mark Zuckerberg who embrace an autocratic model can be found in the Middle East. The many govern- ideology that resists any form of democratic oversight. His ments affected by the Arab Spring democracy movement arguments provide a useful corrective to considering the have mostly reverted back to authoritarian systems. The renaissance of authoritarianism as something that we hope of the Arab Spring has fizzled as democracy has should examine only at the level of the nation state. receded in country after country. Even more worryingly, Instead, the same ideology and leadership style is happening surveys indicate that support for democracy is waning and in some of the world’s most important companies. more and more citizens believe that a strong leader is Next, Gartenberg and McGahan argue that we have more needed to take control of the situation in their countries. tools in our toolkit than we perhaps recognize and suggest Liberal democracy is no longer seen as the solution to the that we find inspiration from foundational organizational challenges facing their countries and countries like the thinkers such as Coase, Barnard, and Selznick who worked UAE and Singapore are commonly cited as attractive at a time when authoritarianism was even more visible and models where strong authoritarian leaders have succeeded dangerous. They argue that our field has evolved in a way in creating economic growth and stability. that makes it difficult for us to deal with the realities of author- In a number of newer democracies, like Brazil and India, itarianism and therefore propose adding in a humanistic populist leaders with authoritarian tendencies are winning concern for values, stories, and the experiences of individuals. elections over more liberal contenders and eroding the insti- The resulting combination will, they suggest, help us to tutional underpinnings of democracy. For example, in a explore critical questions such as when does authority frightening turn of events for democracy in the Philippines, become authoritarianism and how do people within authority- Ferdinand Marcos Jr., the son of the former dictator of the based organizations experience freedom and tyranny? Philippines Ferdinand Marcos Sr., has managed to rehabili- Adler and Bodrož ic suggest a research agenda that tate the image of his family and has been sworn in as the explores the interaction of regimes of public policy (contrast- new President to the horror of citizens who lived through ing more laissez-faire or more transformative regimes) and Adler et al. 5 models of organizational management (contrasting more sets of cultural elements in authoritarianism and democracy hierarchical or more collaborative models). Combining the and then highlights how the logic of democracy can be two dimensions, they identify four alternative responses to eroded in small steps and authoritarian tendencies can the current period of crisis: authoritarianism, oligarchy, local- develop in even the most established democracy. She ends ism, and democratization. A disturbing number of liberal with a strong call to action for management researchers to democracies have evolved into oligarchies (see Davis’s con- focus more on the perils of authoritarianism. tribution in this forum), and the resulting aggravation of Highlighting examples such as Trump’s recent activities various crises has encouraged the reemergence of authoritar- promoting “The Big Lie,” Glynn argues that the cultural anal- ianism. In the face of this twin danger, many put their faith ysis of symbolic and linguistic frames can shed light on the in localist alternatives. Adler and Bodrož ic argue for the growing success of modern authoritarian governments. She fourth option—democratization, based on a democratic- begins with an analysis of the two contrasting world orders transformative state and an organizational model privileging on display during the riots at the U.S. Capitol—the “illiberal” bottom-up problem-solving. versus the “liberal.” She uses frame analysis to examine the Battilana and Sheppard-Jones begin by arguing that way that Trump was able to convince his followers of the ille- though past generations of organization scholars greatly gitimacy of his election loss. Interestingly, she also shows advanced our understanding of power, today, dominant man- how the frames created by Trump have become disconnected agement research largely focuses on the performance of from him and discusses the frightening ramifications of this shareholder-value maximizing and largely hierarchical cor- development. porations, without systematically accounting for power and Clegg points to the need for further research that compares inequality. They then offer a solution: to counter the authori- varieties of state-led versus market-led systems, but main- tarian turn in organizations and society, the field must revive tains that neo-economically liberal and democratic states research on power sharing and accountability in organiza- weather crisis much more effectively than do states in tions. This entails studying organizations beyond the firm, which system integration is subordinate to authoritarian such as social movements, bureaucracies, and social enter- social integration. He draws on the concept of circuits of prises, and collaborating with political scientists to test inno- power to unpack the key differences between authoritarian vations in democracy that can strengthen democracy at work regimes today and Western democracies. and in government. The Role of Digital Technologies in Modern Authoritarian Systems Authoritarianism Meyer begins her contribution by making the important point The final two contributions focus on the connection between that authoritarianism is actually a perversion of authority as new forms of authoritarianism and digital technology. First, authority requires the consent of those who are governed. Gümüsay begins by highlighting the various crises and con- She then draws on the ideas of Arendt to begin to unpack flicts that pervade contemporary society and economy. He the increasing inability of democratic societies to uphold goes on to argue that they can be usefully understood as the capacity to act in the face of authoritarian crises. She forms of institutional contestation and argues that our theo- emphasizes the need to more deeply understand the changing ries need to better account for how digital technologies nature of institutional trust in core liberal, democratic institu- play a key role in shaping institutional processes—especially tions that sows the seeds for authoritarianism. as related to civic and political engagement such as in Armanios and Adly argue for a systematic research Russia’s disinformation efforts as well as Ukrainian resis- agenda on authoritarian systems themselves, unpacking tance. He closes with a call for rethinking what we study, their variegated nature to understand why some forms of why we are studying what we study, and how we study the authoritarianism are more resilient than others. They intro- topics we choose to study. duce a “varieties of authoritarianism” typology based on In the final contribution, Leonardi focuses on social media two characteristics of an authoritarian regime that leads to and their use both in spreading democracy and, more four categories of regime with varying degrees of resilience. recently, in efforts to undermine democracy and further the The two dimensions—degree of professionalization of the goals of the authoritarian leaders. He goes on to argue that bureaucracy and whether or not the territorial boundaries the power of social media lies in how they let people see are aligned with the authoritarian logic of the regime—high- how other people respond to their messages. He further light important aspects of regimes that have been so far argues that the algorithmic nature of social media platforms largely ignored. plays a key role in their impact on political processes. He Haveman highlights how institutional and relational theo- closes with a discussion of the importance of social media ries can be leveraged to enhance our understanding of the rise and their effects on organizations as an area of further inves- and fall of authoritarian governments. She focuses on related tigation for management scholars. 6 Journal of Management Inquiry 32(1) The idea of giving a 28-year-old college dropout Wrapping Up uncontestable control of a major global corporation might While we realize that the question of authoritarianism lies seem like a surprising choice. Yet in recent years nearly some distance from the traditional topics that management half the tech startups listing shares on the stock market researchers have focused on, management scholarship has have included similar structures, driven by an Ayn amassed a considerable toolkit of theories that we believe Rand-inflected theory of corporate governance (Davis, have the potential to provide real insight into this important 2021b). According to this theory, widely shared in Silicon phenomenon. Furthermore, the research capacity of our field Valley, founders are makers pursuing their unique vision is tremendous: the array or methods, resources, and expertise and should not be held back by moochers and takers and reg- that has been developed to understand the social world is ulators—including their own shareholders. Thanks to truly impressive. We have the opportunity to contribute signif- enablers in the world of venture capital, particularly Peter icantly to our understanding of authoritarianism and the ability Thiel of Founders Fund and Marc Andreessen of of our institutions and citizens to respond to authoritarian Andreessen Horowitz, Silicon Valley today is awash in cor- leaders in our midst and authoritarian countries running porate dictatorships. In 2021, an astonishing 46% of tech IPO amok in the world. Our discussion here will hopefully pique firms had dual-class voting shares, according to data com- the interest of management scholars and inspire more of our piled by Jay Ritter (https://site.warrington.ufl.edu/ritter/ community to think, write, and research aspects of authoritar- files/IPOs-Tech.pdf). ianism that will help to reduce the threat to liberal democracy The same venture capitalists and entrepreneurs who pro- at organizational and societal levels. mulgate these “founder friendly” authoritarian structures have recently taken a strident stance against ESG, that is, the movement to measure corporations on their environmen- Authoritarianism with Silicon Valley tal, social, and governance impacts and to reward those who Characteristics orient toward sustainability, equity, and accountability. In Gerald F. Davis April 2022 Elon Musk tweeted “I am increasingly convinced The spread of authoritarianism in the political realm is that corporate ESG is the Devil Incarnate” (https://twitter.com/ paralleled by trends in the American technology sector, elonmusk/status/1510485792296210434), while venture capi- where CEOs increasingly exercise authority without mean- talist Marc Andreessen quotes Peter Thiel approvingly: “ESG ingful structural oversight or accountability. The mythology is just a hate factory. It’s a factory for naming enemies, and we of the visionary founder, exemplified by Steve Jobs, Mark should not be allowing them to do that. When you think ESG, Zuckerberg, and Elon Musk, has existed for generations. you should be thinking Chinese Communist Party” (https:// Today, however, this mythology is increasingly buttressed twitter.com/pmarca/status/1512213405511286784). Former by formal structural devices that centralize power in the Vice President Mike Pence joined the fray, claiming that hands of one or two top executives and provide few formal ESG is a movement of corporate wokeism that “allows the channels to serve as checks and balances. As ever more of left to accomplish what it could never hope to achieve at the our economy and society are mediated by online platforms ballot box or through competition in the free market. ESG originating in Silicon Valley, corporate authoritarianism empowers an unelected cabal of bureaucrats, regulators and becomes a greater threat to everyday democracy (Davis, activist investors to rate companies based on their adherence 2017; Davis, 2021a). to left-wing values” (Pence, 2022). Once again, corporate Google and Facebook pioneered this trend, giving their leaders need to be protected from accountability to their founders (Larry Page and Sergei Brin at Google and Mark own “unelected” shareholders. Zuckerberg at Facebook) super-voting shares that essentially At the same time tech firms are protecting their leaders guarantee them corporate control in perpetuity. When from outside accountability, some of them are creating or Facebook went public in 2012, Zuckerberg controlled 60% deploying workplace surveillance tools best suited to a cor- of the votes via his Class B shares and lockup agreements. porate Stasi, in which employee actions are monitored in As the IPO prospectus noted, “Mr. Zuckerberg has the extravagant detail from the moment they log in to work. In ability to control the outcome of matters submitted to our 2009 Peter Thiel’s Palantir implemented a surveillance stockholders for approval, including the election of directors program for JP Morgan where their engineers “vacuumed and any merger, consolidation, or sale of all or substantially up emails and browser histories, GPS locations from all of our assets. In addition, Mr. Zuckerberg has the ability to company-issued smartphones, printer and download activity, control the management and affairs of our company as a and transcripts of digitally recorded phone conversations. result of his position as our CEO and his ability to control Palantir’s software aggregated, searched, sorted, and ana- the election of our directors” (https://www.sec.gov/ lyzed these records, surfacing keywords and patterns of beha- Archives/edgar/data/1326801/000119312512034517/d2879 vior” that merited scrutiny (Waldman et al., 2018). Electronic 54ds1.htm). This structure still holds to this day. employee surveillance has greatly accelerated since then, Adler et al. 7 particularly after Covid induced a vast increase in remote the quality of the lives of those involved. From these insights, work. AI-enabled “bossware” has turned virtual workplaces we learned about the myriad ways in which authority is exer- around the world into corporate Panopticons, enabling cised, and the relative advantages and shortcomings of those at the top to monitor and control laborers in exacting authority over alternative mechanisms of cooperation. In detail through tentacles reaching directly into workers’ doing so, the field has advanced significantly over the past homes and cars (Corbyn, 2022). Perhaps unsurprisingly, decades, not only in expanding our body of knowledge, but some tech firms are using the ability to monitor employee also moving from a focus on productive efficiency and ratio- communications to root out discussions of politics under nal, self-interested agents to a broader set of recognized out- the rubric of “mission protocol” (Savodnik, 2021). comes and behavioral assumptions. Coinbase CEO (and Ayn Rand admirer) Brian Armstrong Despite these advances, the field is not yet equipped to offered severance packages to any employees who wanted explain the challenges of our times. In general, the social to talk about politics at work—social activism was distracting scientific orientation of the field has moved us toward from the company’s core mission of enabling the crypto methods that are evidence-based, statistically valid, replica- economy (Barber, 2020). (Skeptics might wonder why dis- ble, and that yield cumulative findings. This evolution is cussions of Black Lives Matter count as political, while pur- welcome in almost every respect and resolves many of the suing a crypto-libertarian vision informed by “Atlas deficiencies of earlier eras. However, one consequence of Shrugged” does not—see Popper, 2020.) the credibility revolution is that it has crowded out humanis- Authoritarianism—centralized power without democratic tic analysis: the view that each individual is, sui generis,in accountability—has long characterized corporate America, possession of unique traits, dignity, and agency. In contrast as philosopher Elizabeth Anderson has documented so to methods common in our field, humanistic analysis is not well. Recent trends in technology and tech firms have concerned with average treatment effects or explaining vari- taken this tendency to radical new levels. Call it authoritar- ance across large populations of people engaged in compara- ianism with Silicon Valley characteristics. ble activities. Instead, it is focused on considerations such as narratives, experiences, meanings, and understandings of the moral dimensions of situations. In the humanities, scholars seek insights on, for example, how people within organiza- Organizations, Authority, and the tions grapple with right versus wrong, and good versus Humanities bad, to use Sigdwick’s categorizations of moral reasoning. Claudine Gartenberg and Anita M. McGahan This approach involves asking questions such as: When In the early 1930s, the young economist Ronald Coase does authority become authoritarianism? How do people spent a year in America observing capitalism in action. As within authority-based organizations experience freedom a socialist caught between the allure of Russian authoritarian and tyranny? How should competing claims among individ- planning and American exuberant liberalism, he saw a uals be adjudicated in organizations or in society at large? paradox in the vast operations of Ford and General Motors. These are some of the core questions of our time, and ones “Lenin had said that the economic system in Russia would that our current approaches to research are not designed to be run as one big factory… Economists in the West [main- address. tained] that to run the economy as one big factory was an This has not always been true. Foundational organiza- impossibility. And yet there were factories in England and tional thinkers such as Coase, Barnard, and Selznick devel- America. How did one reconcile the impossibility of oped their ideas during the tumultuous first half of the running Russia as one big factory with the existence of fac- twentieth century. Each witnessed authority manifest both tories in the West?” (Coase, 1988, p. 8) In other words, in capitalist enterprises that served as unprecedented even within the most liberal systems in the world, much of engines of growth and in authoritarian regimes that attracted human cooperation occurred with hierarchical organizations millions to their cause while simultaneously slaughtering in which employees willingly ceded control to a centralized millions of others. The two faces of authority likely informed authority. How could authoritarianism be an engine of their complex views of the relative benefits and dangers of liberalism, and how could liberalism be an engine of centralized power in ordering human cooperation. authoritarianism? Echoes from those times are reverberating today. Once In the near century since Coase’s trip, the field of manage- again, we are witnessing the allure of authoritarianism, not ment and organizations has offered extensive insights on this only in Russia and its invasion of Ukraine, but also in popu- paradox. Rich streams of research emerged during the late list responses to liberalism across the globe, in the fracturing 20th and early 21st centuries on a wide range of organiza- of realities and rise of conspiratorial narratives within online tions, and especially on corporations. This research has con- communities, in the need for belonging in an increasingly tributed to our understanding of the conditions, activities, technology-mediated world, in the generalized disaffection decision-making processes, and effects of organizations on with institutions across liberal societies. These portentous 8 Journal of Management Inquiry 32(1) trends highlight the two faces of authority and the urgent prosperity. But the climate emergency makes it imperative need to study the organization as places through which that we discontinue heavily polluting activities and invest people actualize meaning in their lives, and in which moral in sustainable alternatives—even though the former repre- questions are raised, discussed, and sometimes argued, sents great losses to investors and the latter may not be prof- buried, abandoned, or elevated. itable for many years to come. We cannot hope to meet the The structure of our field today—evolving through the last climate challenge if we rely only on the limited “win-win” half of the life and career of Coase—has rendered us ill- solutions that are within the reach of private enterprise. prepared to address authoritarian challenges at a geo-political Government action seems essential. But what form of gov- level. For the field to engage fully in these and other globally ernment action would be adequate to this challenge? significant issues, we must combine our social scientific Looking for parallel situations, we have reviewed previ- methods with a humanistic approach to making sense of ous periods of crisis as they emerged in the course of each the world. Just as the field of management has benefitted of the five major technological revolutions to date in the immensely from integrating ideas from economics, sociol- most advanced capitalist countries (Bodrož ic & Adler, ogy, and psychology over the past few decades, we must sim- 2018; Bodrož ic & Adler, 2022). This review suggests that ilarly incorporate perspectives from history, anthropology, we can map the possible trajectories of development of philosophy, and other humanistic fields to grapple fully advanced capitalist economies in the face of such crises with the social changes that define our times. along two axes. The first axis is defined by whether the dom- We know a lot—and have the potential to know a lot more inant public policy regime orients us toward greater laissez- —about how the same practices designed to promote finan- faire, relying on the primacy of private value creation and cial prosperity can also make people vulnerable in a wide the market as the primary coordinating mechanism, or range of ways, contributing to the pathologies of our times. toward a regime in which the state would play a transforma- Our field has much to add to public understanding of how tive, system-building role by advancing missions aimed at this vulnerability may accumulate in communities. Whether creating public value. The second axis is defined by these potential contributions come to fruition depends on whether the dominant model of organization in public and the openness of our field to embracing approaches that private sectors is more coercive, relying on hierarchical have historically been the domain of other fields, placing authority as the primary organizing principle, or more human dignity, agency, and the moral dimensions of organi- enabling, relying on community collaboration rather than zation at the center of our work. As Philip Selznick wrote in hierarchy. Combining in a 2 × 2 matrix the two main alterna- 1994: tive choices, we identify four alternative futures for resolving the current period of crisis: authoritarianism, oligarchy, local- We cannot do without authority, nor can we forgo rationality in ism, and democratization—see Figure 1. the management of resources. But authority and rationality are Authoritarianism pulls public policy toward system- highly problematic ideas, and no particular way of doing building and pulls organization toward coercion and hierar- things can be considered inevitable or beyond question. chy. An authoritarian-transformative state might indeed Therefore we should ask: What kinds of purposive organizations attempt to address the climate crisis. We see one form of are justified by the nature of the institution? What kinds of this type of state in China; but it might well also emerge in authority? What kinds of subordination? (Selznick, 1994, the wealthy countries of the global North, where authoritari- p. 262–263.) anism is already mounting (Alizada et al., 2022) and shoots of eco-fascism are growing (Kamel et al., 2020). Given the limitations of this model—the costs in civil rights and the Authoritarianism, Oligarchy, Localism, or opportunity costs in lost bottom-up engagement if we take Democratization? Alternative Futures for a top-down approach to climate adaptation and mitigation Resolving the Climate Crisis —the authoritarian response to the climate crisis points us Paul S. Adler and Zlatko Bodrož ic down a costly and risky path (Shahar, 2015). The governance weaknesses of the advanced economies Widespread distrust of central government encourages of the global North are becoming ever more apparent—and one alternative path: perhaps government should step back, dangerous. While the Covid epidemic might pass notwith- and we should entrust our future to the market process and standing the ham-fisted government responses, the climate wisdom of CEOs whose ideas can be implemented through crisis seems only to accelerate in the absence of stronger gov- corporate hierarchies. Under a laissez-faire policy regime, ernment action. The currently dominant public-policy however, market competition tends toward concentration, responses to climate change—relying on modest industry through both economies of scale and scope and the accumu- regulation—aim to nudge us toward sustainability while lation of extra-economic influence (as witnessed, for ensuring the continued profitability and growth of the example, in the success of big oil firms in shaping public private sector and thereby maintaining the country’s opinion and policy on climate change—see Washington Adler et al. 9 Figure 1. Four responses to the climate crisis. (2013)). The result is a self-reinforcing path toward Advocates for what we call democratization embrace a oligarchy. If the authoritarian response to the climate crisis system-building role of the state, but in contrast to seems risky, the oligarchy response seems suicidal, albeit Authoritarianism, they call for the state to play an enabling all too possible. Over the last four decades, the United rather than coercive role. Such a democratic-transformative States has largely ceded leadership in responding to the state is embedded within society, rather than standing apart climate crisis to the corporate sector, and it has brought us from and hierarchically above it. This would take the form of to the brink of disaster, notwithstanding the positive gestures an expanded public sector and of government policies aimed of the more forward-looking faction of the business commu- at strengthening and activating bottom-up problem-solving nity. Oligarchy portends a world where the very affluent will within that sector as well as within independent enterprises and be able to protect themselves from the worst consequences of civil society. In contrast to localism, all levels of government the climate crisis, while the rest flounder on their own in an and society are activated and coordinated to advance the sustain- ever-more inhospitable world. ability agenda, harnessing network effects and other positive Advocates of localism accept (sometimes reluctantly) the externalities on national as well as local levels, for example overarching laissez-faire policy regime and argue that the through a series of missions that could drive the green transition best path forward is through innovations at the local level. (Mazzucato, 2021). This path might take the form of much- Some jurisdictions will allow oligarchies to dominate, but in strengthened Nordic social-democracy or a reimagined demo- other places, we might see local movements push for more cratic socialism. The proponents of either are, however, as yet democratic and environmentally sustainable forms of commu- politically very weak. nity wealth-building (Dubb, 2016). Local businesses, commu- At present, we see China and Russia exemplifying the nity organizations, and government can work together to authoritarian response—China with some notable successes address local effects of climate change. The “transition with respect to climate action, but also serious limitations towns” movement is one example (Barry & Quilley, 2009). (Li et al., 2019; Smith, 2017). The US seems to be leaning However, forced by the overarching laissez-faire regime to toward oligarchy (Winters & Page, 2009), with a still compete with jurisdictions taking the low road, local largely passive response to the climate crisis. Localist community-based efforts face impediments to diffusion. approaches such as those in transition towns are remarkable Moreover, it is difficult to see how these bottom-up initiatives but seem limited to incremental changes (Heikkinen et al., cohere into the national and international transformation that 2019). Looking toward the future, given the inevitability of is so urgently needed. In the face of the climate crisis, we serious climate-induced crises, and given the weakness of will need major investments programs that only national gov- the oligarchy and localism options, the risk of authoritarianism ernments can orchestrate. The localism scenario foregoes the is growing even in the advanced economies of the global necessary benefits of nation-level scale and interconnectivity. North. The only effective alternative to authoritarianism, we 10 Journal of Management Inquiry 32(1) argue, is democratization. But we do not see any major a result, they stopped problematizing and theorizing them. country moving in that direction. Though as organization scholars, we know too well that the While we as scholars cannot choose the future of our process of institutionalization of dominant organizational countries, we can choose the topics of our research. Given archetypes is a political one, we fell into our own trap by the stakes and the prospects, we hope we will see more taking for granted the archetype of large profit-maximizing research on the system-building role of governments and companies (Greenwood & Hinings, 1993). This evolution on opportunities for widening and deepening democratic has had serious implications for the field of organization participation. studies as a whole: We came to consider politics as usual as business-as-usual. This shift has left us with a dangerous and partial perspective on organizations, one that over the past decades has too often failed to account for the role of Centering Power to Resist Its organizations in the reproduction of power inequalities. It Concentration: On the Need to Account has also opened the way to legitimate critiques from philos- for Power in Organization Studies ophers like Elizabeth Anderson. In her book, Private Julie Battilana and Kara Sheppard-Jones Government (2017), she provocatively states that modern The year 2021 marked the 16th consecutive year of dem- corporations are akin to authoritarian regimes: They concen- ocratic decline globally (Repucci & Slipowitz, 2022). With trate power in the hands of shareholders and management the rise of authoritarian strong-men, and instances of demo- while providing little, if any, power to workers over the orga- cratic backsliding around the globe (Waldner & Lust, nization’s strategic decisions. 2018), the distribution of power and its implications in orga- At present, the field of organization studies must urgently nizations and in society has re-emerged as a central question. renew its commitment to studying power and its distribution Previous generations of organization scholars would have in organizations and in society. We must join the vibrant and had much to say about these worrisome trends, but do we, vital discussion on building organizations and societies that the new generation? are fairer and more democratic at a time when power concen- The field of organization studies has played a critical role tration and authoritarianism are on the rise. The actions of cit- in advancing our understanding of power dynamics in inter- izens and organizers on the ground reinforce the importance personal relationships, in organizations, and in society (for of such a renewed commitment. Indeed the #metoo and reviews see Clegg et al., 2006; Fleming & Spicer, 2014; Black Lives Matter movements have transfused into the Ocasio et al., 2020). In the 1950s and 1960s, early thinkers academy, spurring a new wave of engagement, attention, of organization theory, including Richard Emerson, and resources dedicated to the study of gender and racial Richard Cyert, James March, Michel Crozier, and Erhard justice in organizations, as well as diversity, equity, and Friedberg were seminal contributors to theorizing power. inclusion. Then, in the 1970s, organization scholars like Jeffrey Building on the momentum of this important field of Pfeffer, Gerald Salancik, and Stewart Clegg advanced this research, organization studies must revive research on genealogy, further refining the study of power relationships power sharing and accountability in organizations more within and between organizations. These contributions broadly (Casciaro & Battilana, 2021). While in the past from the field of organization studies even cross-pollinated decades we have taken for granted that decisions in organiza- with other disciplines, feeding broader theorizing on tions ought to be made by those at the top, such organizing power. But interestingly, even though these organization the- models are far from the only ones that exist. For instance, orists continued their foray, in the following decades, power the COVID-19 pandemic has brought renewed attention to drifted to the margins of organization studies and manage- the democratization of firms (Ferreras et al., 2022). More ment, leaving the subject mostly to critical theorists democratic forms of organizing, such as cooperatives or (Alvesson & Deetz, 2006). codetermination models, which are prominent in some Increasingly, research published in dominant publications European countries, have existed for over a century and in the field turned toward the study of shareholder-value point to alternative forms of power sharing between maximizing and largely hierarchical corporations, focusing workers, top executives, and shareholders that require mostly on the factors affecting their performance, without more attention and are worthy of study (Battilana et al., systematically accounting for the role of power and inequal- 2022). Additionally, a field of research at the intersection ity in these analyses (Amis et al., 2020). Organization schol- of political science and organization studies could empiri- ars did recognize the inherently political nature of cally test propositions put forth, for instance, by delibera- organizations—that they are embedded in broader societal tive scholars in organizations. Innovations in open power hierarchies. They did so in their discourse about orga- democracy (Landemore, 2020), direct democracy, and par- nizations in general, but, where they came short is in center- ticipatory democracy (Dryzek et al., 2019) applied and ing on these political dynamics in their empirical studies. As studied in organizations could provide workers with a Adler et al. 11 say in the decisions that affect them directly, while dee- Ann Swidler (1986) observed that in unsettled times pening our understanding of these innovations and their people turn to explicitly articulated, highly organized potential to invigorate democracy in society and, in meaning systems that claim to offer unified answers to prob- doing so, resist authoritarianism. lems—ideologies—while taken-for-granted traditions lose This ambitious agenda must be pursued across various their capacity to guide action. At any point in time, she organizational settings. This entails moving beyond the argues, the structural opportunities for ideologies to thrive study of the single dominant archetype of the corporation. differ. Times of crises are a fertile breeding ground for autho- Instead, we must study various types of corporations, from tra- ritarian ideologies. Whether all crises of the last decades ditional profit-maximizing ones to benefit corporations and deserve the denotation or have been rendered crises as their equivalents across the world. We must also invest once outcome of political and rhetorical rent seeking notwithstand- again in studying other forms of organizations whose func- ing, there has been an accumulation of crises and the general tioning is critical to a healthy and resilient democracy, includ- sense of societal fragility is high. Although we know that dis- ing social movements, public bureaucracies, not-for-profits, tributed decision-making, collective action, and collabora- cooperatives, and social enterprises among others. It is critical tions are the way forward (Frey-Heger et al., 2021; these studies account for the evolution of both offline and Kornberger et al., 2019), with their sense of urgency and virtual forms of organizing, as the emergence of new online high stakes for a large number of people, crises facilitate a platforms raises important questions regarding power and direct display of state muscle, and justify order-obedience inequality that also merit further inquiry (Bernholz et al., relationships. 2021; Tufekci, 2017; Vallas & Schor, 2020). However, the growing authoritarianism is not rooted in As organizations and societies across the world grapple the necessities of crisis response, nor in the strength or per- with growing power concentration up the corporate ladder suasiveness of the underlying regimes and their ideologies and in the halls of government, it is urgent that organization or the charisma of their leaders, but in the weakness of the scholars rise to the occasion and recenter power at the core of institutions that embody democratic values and the organiza- their research endeavors. The stakes could not be higher. tions that support them. It is the mistrust toward traditional authorities and core cultural institutions that clears the way for autocratic phantasies. The institutions and organizations that should guide us through uncertain times are in crisis Organizing Against Authoritarianism themselves. Sources of the weakness are the polarization Renate Meyer and fracturing of society that produce, amidst virtual mass Ultimately, authoritarianism—for the sake of space I connectivity and an explosion of social media communities, subsume under this term various forms of autocratic the loneliness that, according to Hannah Arendt (1986), is the regimes—is a perversion of authority. Authority, as soil for totalitarianism and its results. Totalitarian regimes, defined, e.g., by Max Weber (1978), is the ability to rule she notes, are built on movement and acceleration—stable over people based on their consent, that is, authority is institutions of any sort are their enemies. They are character- grounded in their believe in the legitimacy of the rule and ized by a loss of a shared reality and truth gaps (“everything trust in its representations—institutions, actors, and organiza- is possible and nothing is true”), the isolation of people from tions alike. Authoritarianism elevates the ruling center above each other, and the complete absence of authority. the people, swaps belief in the legitimacy of the rule with the Consequently, the contributions of organization scholars fear of sanctions and renders the potency of the ruler abso- are essential in three areas. First, we need to study how lute. In order to give authoritarian regimes a coating of authoritarianism is organized, its characteristic features, authority, higher powers, such as God or Patria—the autho- relationships, its distinct institutions and organizations ritarian leader rules in their direct lineage and tradition—or during emergence and upholding, the (re)sources of its sha- the super-natural charisma of “born” leaders are evoked, peshifting capacities. On a societal level, we need to better often in an unholy assemblage. The sacralization and sym- understand the growing amalgamation of previously differ- bolic overloading of politics—the staging of secular leaders entiated institutional orders, such as, for instance, state and together with the highest religious dignitaries, or the adorn- religion, and its consequences. While it may seem that such ment of those who only recently attained power with the developments promise a de-fragmentation of society, they insignia of eternal rule—is accompanied by a conspicuous may actually prepare the ground for comprehensive ideolo- distain for constitutional law and courts as the prime custodi- gies to grow. ans of the people-authorized rule of law. The aspiration of Second, authoritarianism has a high degree of active orga- showcasing authority makes control over and totalization nization and an equally high degree of active disorganization: of history a collateral conditio sine qua non—there can be Disconnection, splintering, prevention of networking, mis- nothing outside of the authoritarian rule, no alternative, not trust is as organized as are their counterparts (Meyer & in the present, not in the past, not in eternity. Quattrone, 2021; Pawlak, 2022). We need to know more 12 Journal of Management Inquiry 32(1) about how disorganization is accomplished, how the manu- authoritarian systems subjugate their civil societies to the facturing of isolation and fracturing is achieved amidst the will of a small cadre of political elites (Linz, 1964). In partic- technologically possible hyper-connectivity. ular, authoritarian state logic seems more predicated on con- Third, authoritarian regimes thrive on the inability of stricting distribution to those in power and their cronies, or on people to act collectively and to collaborate across divi- selective redistribution to appease the general public to the sions. We need to advance our knowledge on how the will of that cadre (Beblawi & Luciani, 1987; Ross, 2001). capacity to act in concert among equals can be maintained, Legitimacy is based on the leader’s charismatic authority how a pluralist public space can be kept open across all (Weber, 1968), and/or wielding tools of extreme violence cleavages, how horizontally organized societal institutions that can forcibly suppress anti-regime activities (Linz, can regain power and trust in the face of crises and unsettled 1964; Slater & Fenner, 2011). times. One way perhaps to incorporate greater variation is to con- sider the alignment or misalignment between authoritarian logics (and despotic power) and their perceived territorial Varieties of Authoritarianism claims and/or territorial integrity. This is not to say that Daniel Erian Armanios and Amr Adly such misalignments do not impact other political systems; On February 24, 2022, as Russia launched airstrikes we simply observe here that such misalignments seem across Ukraine, we were taking stock of another region salient in characterizing different authoritarian actions. For some 2,000 km south. Just before the Russian invasion of instance, Putin’s ambitions reflect the wider territorial Crimea in 2014, the Arab Spring was concluding its first reaches of the former Tsarist empire from the 1700s. We wave that started in Tunisia and swept through Egypt, can also see similarities to other countries such as Turkey, Libya, Yemen, Syria, Morocco, and Bahrain. In 2019, a whose ambitions reflect those of their former Ottoman second wave swept through Algeria, Lebanon, Iraq, and Empire. On the other hand, Egypt’s territorial claims have Sudan. The result has been varied to say the least. Egypt, largely remained similar to their present-day boundaries, Syria, and Bahrain have all remained or reverted back to with the exception of a brief loss of the Sinai from 1967− authoritarianism. Tunisia and Morocco initially incorporated 1973. The same for Iran whose territorial boundaries still revolutionary representation toward a democratic transition reflect the historic core of ancient Persia. before reverting to more authoritarian tactics. Libya, Prior work shows how institutional carriers underpin the Algeria, Iraq, Lebanon, Yemen, and Sudan all had their shared understandings and standards of a system systems transition or collapse; their outcomes remain unre- (Armanios & Eesley, 2021). To bring this concept into our solved. In the short span of just over a decade, we observe inquiry around authoritarianism, we link it to notions of infra- everything from authoritarian resurgence to transformation. structural power, or the degree to which civil society depends This begs the question: how are some authoritarian regimes on state institutions for the delivery of goods and services so resilient, while others are not? (Mann, 1984). To do this, we focus on carriers that operate To better account for this variation, we seek to introduce within the state’s civil society such as state banks, hospitals, the possibility of developing a more multifaceted “varieties and bureaucratic agencies—those state entities for which cit- of authoritarianism” approach. Scholars recognize authoritar- izenry rely for goods and services and hence the means by ian systems have varied capacity to withstand uprisings which authoritarian subjugation is sustained. (Skocpol, 1979; Slater & Fenner, 2011; Tilly, 1978). One way to incorporate greater variation is to perhaps con- However, these exercises still tend to treat authoritarian sider the degree to which the institutional carrier is profes- regimes along a single conceptual spectrum, being all sionalized to global standards. The degree to which state lumped as non-democratic. To attempt here to commence civil sector is professionalized will likely decide how effi- this process, we leverage organizational theory, namely ciently state bureaucracy can enact the needs of the authori- from the institutional perspective, to add conceptual variation tarian system. However, this comes at a potential cost to the to the scholarship around authoritarianism that has largely regime. If revolution successfully detaches state bureaucracy been the preoccupation of political science. More specifi- from its authoritarian logic, even temporarily, these carriers cally, we see the notion of institutional logics as allowing have the ability to operate autonomously along global stan- us to add heterogeneity to despotic power, and the notion dards rather than regime interests, thereby becoming an of institutional carriers as allowing us to add further hetero- enabler of further disruption (Armanios & Adly, 2022). As geneity to infrastructural power. such, different authoritarian systems may be more or less Prior work argues that state institutional logics aim to willing to professionalize their civil society. For instance, redistribute resources in the public interest and their legiti- Egypt and Iran increasingly professionalized their state macy is based on democratic participation (Thornton et al., sectors to global standards, such as banking (Adly, 2020; 2012, Table 3.2). We must expand that notion of state Mihret et al., 2020). However, Libya under Gaddafi largely logic to one that includes despotic power, or how suppressed such professionalization (Basir et al., 2021). Adler et al. 13 While not having the territorial integrity issues of Libya, have critical contributions to provide and the need for Gabon and Trujillo’s Dominican Republic are arguably doing so is only increasing. We hope initiating such a typol- examples of a lack of professionalization due to a desire to ogy as the one we present here will help us get off the side- heavily concentrate power around a single family and its lines of these increasingly critical issues and begin to cronies. So much so, that the Trujillo regime even refused enhance our impact in these domains for which we have to professionalize occupations needed for even the most largely neglected in our scholarship. basic of healthcare, such as nursing (Zeller, 2018). From these two possible sources of variation, we could Organizing the Authoritarian State then begin to envision a 2 × 2 typology that begins to charac- terize different kinds of authoritarian regimes and potentially Heather A. Haveman their differential resilience (or fragility) to disruption. One Governments, like many other elements of modern socie- axis would be the degree to which existing territorial bound- ties, consist of organizations: elected or appointed assemblies aries are aligned or misaligned with authoritarian logics (and that write and pass laws, staff departments that interpret laws despotic power). The other axis would be the degree to which and develop rules to enforce them, law-enforcement agencies institutional carriers (infrastructure power) are professional- that are authorized to use force to uphold laws, and judicial ized to global standards. bodies that evaluate both laws themselves and compliance Table 1 presents examples of authoritarian systems for each with laws. This holds true across the spectrum from the cell in our typology. Greater professionalization arguably most authoritarian government to the most democratic. increases the efficiency of state institutions to deliver goods Authoritarian governments are headed by individuals or orga- and services. This may potentially better prevent internal dis- nizations that wield (almost) absolute control over their juris- ruptions as such efficiency arguably enhances citizen depen- dictions. In practice, authoritarianism is a continuum ranging dency on the authoritarian state. Those whose logics operate from complete leader control (as in North Korea) through within current territorial boundaries can prevent external dis- partial leader control (as in Singapore) to democratic control ruptions to their systems. Authoritarian logics that are mis- (by the people themselves, as in Norway). To understand the aligned with territorial claims perhaps are more likely to rise of authoritarian governments, then, we need to understand experience credibility crises that will drive them to reconfigure the degree of authoritarianism, the extent of rulers’ power. territorial boundaries in greater alignment with their logic. This Here, I will focus on the logics of governments. Logics, will only induce perennial conflicts with neighbors. related sets of cultural elements (norms, values, beliefs, and As we reflect on the current Russia incursion into the symbols) that help individuals and organizations make Ukraine, let’s not make the same mistakes we did amidst sense of their everyday activities and order those activities the Arab Spring and assume all authoritarian regimes are in time and space, define the rules of the political game. the same. Nor should we continue to observe from afar. Logics determine both what should be done in order to Almost 11.6% of the world’s economic activity comes out achieve desired outcomes and what is good to do. In other of areas of civil unrest just like these (Institutes for words, they encompass both instrumental (means-end) ratio- Economics & Peace, 2021). As organizational scholars, we nality and value rationality. Logics are most powerful when they are institutionalized—accepted as normal, natural, proper, even taken for granted. Table 1. Potential Typology for Classifying Variety in Authoritarian The logic of democracy is egalitarian, as exemplified by Regimes. the slogan “one person, one vote.” This focus on equality of access to politics is central to democracy, even though Authoritarian Logic in practice the definition of “person” is sometimes highly (Despotic Power) restrictive, limited by gender, race or ethnicity, religion, or Aligned Misaligned economic status. The democratic logic became institutional- Territorial Territorial ized in many parts of the world in the 150 years following the Boundaries Boundaries French and American Revolutions. Its institutionalization was reinforced by three sets of events: (i) the 1945 victories Institutional More Examples: Examples: of the Allies over the Axis in World War II; (ii) the hatching carriers professionalization Egypt and Iran Russia and (infrastructural Turkey of fledgling democracies in Africa, Latin America, and parts power) Less Examples: Examples: of Asia as European empires slowly crumbled; and (iii) the professionalization Dominican Libya and breakup of the Soviet Union from 1988 to 1991. Republic Sudan The democratic logic celebrates equality, social solidarity, (under and mutual respect (“we the people” in the U.S.; “liberté, Trujillo) and égalité, fraternité” in France), and denigrates self-seeking Gabon behavior (corruption) and favoritism. Embodying this logic, 14 Journal of Management Inquiry 32(1) democratic governments strive to be “of the people, by the expertise to understand organizations, inside and outside people, for the people,” as Abraham Lincoln famously put government, in all their variety and complexity. If we don’t it. This means that democratic governmental organizations take on the charge of analyzing and (I hope) helping resist are expected to serve voters and their families, and demo- the rise of authoritarianism, who will? Who else could do it cratic governmental officials, elected or appointed, are as well as we can? expected put voters and their families first. Although long institutionalized, the democratic logic has The Authoritarian Legacy of Trumpism been under siege for several decades. In many countries, it has been gradually, through many small steps, replaced by Mary Ann Glynn the logic of authoritarianism, which celebrates centralized power. To justify centralized power, often in the guise of [There is] an ongoing struggle between two sets of habits … One… is represented by the Capitol -- that competing interests can be democracy, the authoritarian logic relies on sharp, resolved through reason, and that when the people decide to transfer Manichean distinctions between “us” and “them,” usually power, we affirm the system that allows it by gathering on the based on religion or morality, geography, or race or ethnicity. Capitol steps for the handover. The rioters brought other habits. “Us,” however it is defined, is good; “them” is viewed with …“The mob was fed lies … They were provoked by the president suspicion—sometimes utterly maligned. Pitting “us” and other powerful people, and they tried to use fear and violence to against “them” puts governments on a war setting and justi- stop a specific proceeding of the first branch of the federal govern- fies centralizing power: political elites are assumed to know ment which they did not like. Never before had the president, the best how to safeguard “us” from the clear and present most powerful person in American government, taken aim at a dangers posed by “them.” core feature of that government. … for the first time in American How do would-be authoritarians undermine the logic of History.” (Dickerson, 2022) democracy and replace it with the logic of authoritarianism? th They leverage existing organizations, both inside and The deadly January 6 2021 assault on the U.S. Capitol, outside government. Inside government, they create cults of which the FBI viewed as “domestic terrorism,” was a shocking personality around strong, charismatic men (rarely women). and vicious “war scene” (Amiri, 2022) where two contrasting They then institutionalize those cults by taking over estab- world orders—the “illiberal” versus the “liberal” (Lounsbury lished political parties or launching new ones and appealing & Wang, 2020)—were in literal and figurative battle. The to voters though emotion-laden polemics that surface latent war was predicated on Trump’s delusion that the election fears or invent new ones. They use the electoral power was stolen from him and his intention to thwart the peaceful they’ve gained to control legislative assemblies, passing transition of power. Even more startling, perhaps, was the laws and devising rules to limit voting by “them,” ostensibly reveal of his increasingly authoritarian leadership. to clean up the electoral system. They also co-opt the courts Although authoritarianism is often thought as rule being under the guise of improving judicial efficiency. And they inflicted on others, it is, ironically, actively fueled by “antic- classify opponents as traitors, using laws, police and armies, ipatory obedience”: “Most of the power of authoritarianism is and the courts to detain and punish (sometimes kill) them. freely given. … individuals think ahead to what a repressive Outside government, would-be authoritarians co-opt news government will want, and then offer themselves without media, persuading (or forcing, using police and armies as being asked” (Snyder, 2017, p. 17). Initially, this involves levers) media outlets to parrot authoritarians’ ideas and opin- an unreflective adaptation to new leadership, a process that ions, and to report “alternative facts” as true. Co-opting news redounds to Milgram’s experiments on obedience where he media is easiest when media ownership is highly concen- found that people were remarkably willing to follow an trated—when a small number of sites or companies dominate authoritarian’s directives, even to the point of harming or the delivery of information and opinion to the public. killing others (Snyder, 2017, p. 21). Would-be autocrats often co-opt another trusted source of Nowhere was this as evident as in the responsiveness of information and opinion: religious authorities. This is Trump’s followers to his signature slogan: Make America easiest when religious tenets are instantiated in a hierarchical Great Again (MAGA). It was a siren call to a new way of organization with centralized power, such as the Roman thinking, with new rules, “depicting a nation in crisis, Catholic or Eastern Orthodox Church. Would-be autocrats while positioning himself [Trump] as the nation’s hero – also co-opt business organizations in exchange for favors. the only one who can conquer our foes, secure our This is easiest when industry, and thus economic power, is borders.” Urging his followers to “trust him,” claiming he highly concentrated. is “really smart” and “I alone can fix it,” paired with errone- My challenge for organizational theorists is to take this ous claims that he won the election, the anger of the MAGA bare-bones argument, flesh it out, and test it empirically. movement was key in the storming of the Capitol. Two of our tools—institutionalist and resource-dependence Trump’s authoritarianism influence was predicated on his theories—should be especially useful. We possess the “rhetorical brilliance” in framing situations or events to his Adler et al. 15 advantage. Framing involves “the packaging and organiza- (Clegg, 1989). Societies of Western Europe and the United tion of information … for shaping others’ understandings States are based on a post-modern organically liquid solidar- and behaviours … [which] brings attention to a few stylized ity in which electoral competition is central. System integra- dimensions of reality, while hiding others” (Giorgi, 2017, tion also differs markedly. In contemporary Russia it flows p. 712). In his classic work, Frame Analysis, Goffman through pipelines of oil and gas that are the major network (1974, p. 24) argues that framing results in “social frame- resource forming the basis for a network of system integra- works” used by collectives; Trump’s frames explicitly tion that is state controlled. While the EU imports about aggrandized himself and demonized his perceived enemies. 45% of its gas and 25% of its oil from Russia, the combina- The Mueller Report (2019) made this point: “Trump has mar- tion of sanctions and voluntary withdrawals from the market keted himself as the apotheosis of American exceptionalism will have destabilizing effects not only on them but more so —as the nation’s hero—by using rhetorical tactics more often on Russia. If Russian integration of its pipeline network to associated with unheroic authoritarian leaders” to attack the Europe is ruptured, the consequences will be extreme for investigation and Mueller himself as politically illegitimate. Russia, starved of foreign capital from export sales. The effect of repeated falsehoods is to numb the audience Western reduction of gas and oil demand is a major shock to a preferred framing, normalizing aberrations. Reinforcing to Russian system integration. this rhetoric was Trump’s admonition “not to trust our own In the west, the USA and Europe’s primary means of eyes and ears—that what we see is not what is real” and system integration is through complex global market net- instead, to simply trust him. It was chillingly Orwellian in works that are far less material, more digital and much its framing. In his dystopian novel on the dangers of totalitar- more pervasive, with the sanctions regime these afford ianism, Orwell warns: “The Party told you to reject the evi- having the potential to shut Russia’s oligarchy out of dence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most global capital markets. These western counties have every essential command” (1984, p. 69). Ignore what your eyes motive to divest from the carbon economy; Russia has not. might tell you; only trust in the authoritarian leader. Some counties in Europe, especially Norway, are showing Much of Trump’s rhetoric creates a new or different how it can be done. Others, such as Germany, are slowly reality in which “alternate facts” are common and critiques following. are routinely castigated as hoaxes or witch hunts. Trump pro- Social integration works through different solidarities, fusely promoted false and misleading information; by the end ideal typically represented as modern and postmodern, or of his presidency, he had lied 30,573 times, about 21 times one could say Russian and western. Of course, social integra- per day (Higgins, 2021). The Big Lie—Trump’s claim that tion can always construct an Other on whom the unleashing a corrupt conspiracy robbed him of a second term as of episodic power can be justified: for Russia, at the present, President—diffused widely within his base who embraced the Ukrainian state is the Other. It is the irruption of episodic it fully; it took on a life of its own, apart from Trump. power spilling into this state that strengthens social integra- Many now embrace his demagoguery, ideology, and authori- tion at home, through opposition, antagonism, and violence tarian style, but not necessarily his personality. to the western European oriented political projects of the The decoupling of the man from the movement suggests that majority fraction of the Ukrainian political elites. The minor- authoritarianism can continue well beyond the authoritarian’s ity fraction maps its support closely onto social identity rule. The most enduring vestige—apart from the democratic claims premised on language, religion, and ethnicity sprung institutions attacked—is Trumpism. It has metastasized from Mother Russia, claims that have little external legiti- from Trump’s delusional framing on his inauguration day in macy in the face of Russian barbarism. 2017—with the biggest crowds ever—to a widespread and Power does not normally work through coercion except ambient movement, amplified by disinformation and distortion, when the order ordinarily secured breaks down. An implication broadcast in social and right-wing media, aggressively militant, of this is that social systems that intervene forcibly to reform and framed with falsehoods. “Authoritarianism is surging” “deviance” are not, in fact, powerful. The claims of Russian (Lozada, 2022) and liberalism needs to meet the moment. and Ukrainian social integration are fused in language and its sense of national identity—yet these are clearly not resonating. The paradox is that the war becomes a civil war in its own terms: if Russian social integration is pan-national, then the Circuits of Power and the Crisis of Russian invasion of Ukraine is a declaration of war on a shared social Authoritarianism identity. It is important to note, as did Parsons (1963), that cre- Stewart Clegg ation of power within a system normally presupposes consen- Updating Durkheim (1893), contemporary Russia is sus on goals, providing a framework within which facilitative based, ideologically, on modern mechanical solidarity. It is power operates. The Ukrainian state has not shared goals not a liquidly modern society (Bauman, 2000). The contrast with Russia since at least 2014 and the Maidan Revolution. with the West is striking; the circuits of power quite different Social and system integration clash on Ukrainian soil. 16 Journal of Management Inquiry 32(1) To summarize: in the east, where there is centrality of cir- destroyed (Lawrence & Suddaby, 2006). Institutions and conflict cuits of social integration, social ordering is marked by too relate intimately to each other: Institutions shape conflict and much state and too little market, while in the west’s most neo- conflict shapes institutions. As a result, institutional tensions, liberally economic expressions, there is centrality of circuits turmoil, and upheaval emerge. Conflict and war uproot lives, of system integration and social ordering is marked by less organizations, and institutions. For Friedland and Alford state and more market. As circuits of social and system inte- (1991, p. 256): “Institutional contradictions are the bases of the gration traverse these relations each is liable to circuit break- most important political conflicts in our society.” These conflicts ing from events. Where social integration is central, power may be between nation states and their values, beliefs, convic- over deviant subjects defined in terms of dominant concep- tions, and interests, or across different types of institutions, tions of normal power/knowledge will be forcibly exercised, such as the state, market, profession, family, religion, and even against resistance. Where system integration is central community. and achieved not just through material but also digital infra- If we see conflicts as being about institutions, we can see structure with its abstract coding, the system may be con- how the Ukrainian government has tried to uphold state insti- founded when confronted with events but not face rupture. tutions. The digital war over what happens in Ukraine and Crisis in either market-led system integration or in state-led how it is interpreted also becomes a war about diverse and social integration can destabilize existing knowledge, resource contradictory narratives and understandings—and questions dependencies, and pattern of interaction. In such conjunctures, of authority. All this is central to upholding both the function- while system disintegration can be fixed by states learning new ing of institutions and their legitimacy. routines, such as quantitative easing, social disintegration is far It is important to see and analyze these institutions and the more problematic where no higher order organization (other struggles over them. Some may argue that zones of conflict than potentially religious institutions such as the Orthodox are devoid of institutions. Institutions break down, and one Church in Russia) exists to fix internal problems of integration. day, they seem to be simply gone. However, in most cases, However, these can be displaced externally through a projec- they do not disappear entirely but merely change and shift tion of episodic power, in the name of social integration, into —possibly into other forms. Take the market as the institu- other systems, disintegrating them in the process, as in Ukraine. tion underpinning transactions for goods and services. In Neo-economically liberal and democratic states weather wars, such transactions are inhibited but not stopped. crisis much more resiliently than do states in which system inte- Informal markets pop up, where people purchase necessary gration is subordinate to authoritarian social integration. The goods and services. Likewise, nonmarket mechanisms— former situations are far less ideological while the latter are for such as the sharing of food, water, and shelter—may more ideological, contrary to the lessons of Western Marxism. replace market mechanisms. The institutions of the family, Contradictions in system integration have not destroyed capital- community, and state substitute for the market in such ism becauseof its relative autonomyas a circuit of power/knowl- cases. Institutions hence remain present and central. edge, especially in the most central global states; in addition, the A period of war and conflict is high time for radical insti- plurality and diversity of social integration within such nations tutional work—to reproduce, alter, and destroy institutions. It make them far more resilient, even when all the preconditions entails a struggle over symbols, identities, physical and of fiscal and legitimation crisis are present, matters attended to digital infrastructures, and social relations. It is also high at more length, elsewhere (Clegg, forthcoming). time for new forms of organizing such as hackathons. Hackathons can be used to swiftly coordinate and collabo- rate. The term hackathon is a portmanteau of hacking and Organizations, Institutions, and War marathon. Hacking indicates a focus on technological solu- Ali Aslan Gümüsay tions. Marathon is really a misnomer, as hackathons are Nowadays, few would deny that we have reached the end rather design sprints. So, hack-sprint would be more fitting. of the “end of history.” Change, not stability, is constant. At these events, whether analog or virtual, software and hard- Crisis mode is the new normal, whether it is due to ware are co-developed to “hack the crisis.” In the Ukraine COVID-19 or the war in Ukraine—or the ever-looming war, the solutions thus developed attempt to stop or inhibit climate crisis. And, of course, these crises are interrelated: violent attacks or alleviate their consequences. Examples Fossil fuel dilemmas show us how deeply interlinked include software that allows residents who remained in global sustainability and national sovereignty are. Ukraine to report damage to public buildings and apartment As nation states and authoritarian leaders seem to be celebrat- blocks, and software that acts as a propaganda filter by flag- ing a comeback, it is apt to ask: What is the role of organization ging social media posts that are likely fake news. studies in general and institutionaltheoryinparticular? Perhaps The role of the digital should not be underestimated. Digital unsurprisingly, I believe that, now more than ever, they have an technologies, and the affordances they provide, can significantly important one. As crises unfold, organizations and institutions shape institutional processes. In the last decade, social media come to the fore. They are maintained and disrupted, built and and other digital platforms have redefined civic and political Adler et al. 17 engagement by enabling new ways of connecting, collaborat- spread of organizing that fueled democracy in areas known ing, and mobilizing. For instance, in the Ukrainian war, politi- not only for its absence, but also for social movements cians have leveraged the technological features of social demanding it. media platforms. The president of Ukraine uses Twitter to Flash forward just one decade. Social media platforms like report on the current situation, offer praise and criticism, and Facebook and Twitter are once again at the nexus of massive enter into dialogue with other politicians—effectively opening social change. Yet the use of such tools for the spread of up discussions to a world-wide audience. As popular opinions democracy has been replaced by their deployment for the globally are largely on his side, this form of diplomatic conver- enactment of authoritarianism. It turns out that those social sation puts additional pressure on world leaders to act in line media affordances that make it possible for (dis)information with Ukrainian interests and requests. The digital arena thus to spread quickly, for people to easily organize into self- becomes a space in which institutional work is performed. referential communities, and for online sentiment to We see how debates in traditional and social media frame the spill-over into offline action have been the primary tools war in certain ways. These debates are part of processes of insti- that have enabled leaders like Putin, Bolsonaro, and Trump tutionalization and deinstitutionalization. They can be seen as to wield such strong influence over so many. attempts to legitimize and delegitimize actions. In my view, the core engine driving action in both direc- To conclude, we need to update what we study, how we do so, tions—democratization on the one hand and authoritarianism and why. Regarding what we study, we see how globally inter- on the other—is the same. Sure, social media are phenome- connected societal grand challenges are (Gümüsay et al., 2020) nally efficient at allowing the person on the street (or the and the need to study them on a very macro level (Lounsbury authoritarian leader in the country’s capital) to create and dis- & Wang, 2020). United Nations Sustainable Development seminate messages nearly instantaneously without any Goals 16 on “peace, justice and strong institutions” and17on vetting or filtering. But were that the only thing that social “partnerships for the goals” attest to the significance of effective, media did, it would not be enough. The primary affordance inclusive, and sustainable worldwide institutions. Regarding that makes social media unique among other forms of how we study, the risk is that our findings may be outdated media and communication technology is that they make before they are codified due to the pace of change. We thus visible how other people respond to those messages. need to engage with the future before the future catches up Nearly half a century of study in the fields of social and with us. This requires us to rethink and transform theory, empir- I/O psychology have shown how our own thoughts and ics, and our scholarly community. Timeliness is an ingredient of actions are fundamentally shaped by the perceptions, attri- relevance. For instance, we may need to move from studying butions, and inferences we make about other people’s what is (not) to what if (not). And our peer review process behaviors. And, the evidence is compelling that when we may need updating to ensure rigor while making it more applica- are acting in public (or believe that we are), our thoughts ble to this new normal. I could envisage fast track models—like and actions tend to converge toward our beliefs about at airports—but not just for academic passengers who pay what is normative or popular. Social media enables us to business-class rates but for those who serve a more immediate see how people who we believe are like us and those public interest. Lastly, as to the why, we cannot leave the who we believe are very different from us, react to future to authoritarian leaders, as we sweep up their messes various stimuli. For example, do they post incendiary com- and thendo our theorizing.Instead, I thinkweneedtoco-create ments about political figures I revere, or do they “like” a the future (Gümüsay & Reinecke, 2022)—with modesty, deep news story that affirms my beliefs? Although one can humility, and continuous reflection on the role of academia. never know for sure why other people act the way they As the future is unfolding in front of us, we need to play our do, that certainly does not stop us from making inference part—or in this post-truth world, we will be taken apart. about their motives and rationalizing their actions. Because social media make visible what people do, we believe we can know what they think. And because we know Social Media our own behaviors are visible to others who are also making Paul Leonardi inferences about us, any action we make on a social media plat- Starting in December 2010 and continuing into the Spring form is the equivalent of doubling down on “this is who I am.” of 2011, people across Northern Africa and the Middle East The bottom line is that the visibility of actions enabled by social began to engage in massive social protests demanding polit- media platforms plays an incredibly powerful role in our inter- ical reform. Using social media platforms like Facebook and pretation of the world and our place in it. Twitter on their mobile devices, protesters spread word, It is precisely this strong sense of “I know what other recruited, and mobilized in public squares and at State capi- people think and I know who I am in relation to such think- tals from Cairo to Damascus. Observers of this Arab Spring ing” that can accelerate democratization as it did in the Arab that toppled dictators such as Mubarak and Qadhafi argued Spring, while also fueling authoritarianism as it now appears that social media was the tool that allowed for this rapid to be doing in the COVID era. 18 Journal of Management Inquiry 32(1) If social media is the spark that ignites behavioral visibil- 3. Note that governments can be strongly authoritarian even if they have the trappings of democracy, such as elections and ity, algorithms are the accelerant that allow visibility to do its elected legislative bodies. Opposition candidates can be work. We don’t just happen to be exposed to, or arbitrarily harassed, convicted on trumped-up charges, even killed; oppo- stumble across, random people reacting to information and sition parties can be outlawed; and electoral results can be disinformation on our social media platforms; a sophisticated manipulated or faked. set of algorithms are making decisions about whose actions will be made visible to us (and to whom our own actions will be made visible) based on their predictions about what References we are most likely to click on or share. In other words, algo- rithms determine, in large part, what is made visible to us and Adly, A. (2020). Cleft capitalism: The social origins of failed market making in Egypt, Stanford studies in Middle Eastern what remains invisible. 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Journal

Journal of Management InquirySAGE

Published: Jan 1, 2023

Keywords: institutional theory; business & society; ethics

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