ABSTRACT
This chapter is a reflection on some of the conditions associated with having or not having the identity of ‘Australian’ Management scholar in the Organisation Studies field (whilst being recognised in other respects as being Australian). Our argument is rooted in our irritation that, whilst recent critical accounts of diversity in organisations recognise that the concept of difference is used to classify, position and perpetuate in disadvantage those very groups that it should have advantaged, it is rarely if ever acknowledged that in Organisation Studies itself this process has been occurring for the best part of a century. This chapter takes a reflexive look at one aspect of this process-the position of the Australian scholar of organisation from Elton Mayo onwards, and the way in which being Australian has been silenced or marginalised-cast out, even to the ends of the Earth. We argue that, as being Australian has functioned symbolically for other cultures for decades, it might begin to do so for Organisation Studies, to alert us to the everincreasing centrist influence of North Atlantic Theory of Organisation (NATO), felt through career advancement, the allocation of research funds and the acceptance of papers in scholarly journals. This is more than just a problem of identity, and more than just an Australian problem.
