Durkheim and the Limits of Corporate Culture: Whose Culture? Which Durkheim

Ken Starkey

Journal of Management Studies, 1998, vol. 35, issue 2, 125-136

Abstract: Recent years have seen a resurgence of interest in Durkheimian perspectives on management. P. Dahler‐Larsen uses such a perspective to critique theories of corporate culture. He is particularly critical of corporate culture’s claim that the locus of morality can exist in organizations. This, he argues, is inimical to Durkheim’s view of morality as a societal phenomenon. This paper argues that this criticism of corporate culture is limited on two counts. First, it is limited in its failure to deal with those proponents of corporate culture who are themselves critical of culture as a form of ideological control. Secondly, it is based on only one of several possible readings of Durkheim. In his later work, Durkheim analyses the construction and destruction of social solidarities. A Durkheimian reading of organizational culture and the related phenomenon of the learning organization allows us to develop a view of management and organization in which culture is conceived as a heterogeneous rather than homogeneous.

Date: 1998
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