Critical organisational history

Ryan T. MacNeil

Chapter 37 in Elgar Encyclopedia of Historical Organisation Studies, 2026, pp 136-141 from Edward Elgar Publishing

Abstract: Critical organisational history (COH) is a label for historical scholarship aimed at making sociopolitical change in present-day organisations. Durepos, Shaffner and Taylor (2021) advocated the term COH to encourage a set of critical, post-positivist perspectives that denaturalise mainstream assumptions about the organisational past. Beginning inside critical management studies during the late 1990s (e.g., Burrell 1997; Jacques 1996), these perspectives became a more identifiable genre and community during the 2010s. Many point to the ‘historic turn’ (Clark and Rowlinson 2004) as an underrealised origin point. But the turn from postmodernism to relationalism has been similarly foundational to COH.

Keywords: Critical management studies; Business history; Historiography; Organisation studies; Postmodernism; Relationalism (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2026
ISBN: 9781035332922
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