ABSTRACT

This book is based on the idea that organization is about attempts at some ordering, redirection or stabilization in a fluid world forever in a state of becoming, where nothing is ever accomplished in a final state. The idea embodies basically two assumptions. The first of these is a mere ontological assumption; that the world exists as flows in which entities are in a state of becoming rather than as a final state of being. The second assumption relates to epistemology; actors intervene in the world of flows equipped with their understandings of how it works, and equipped with models of how to bring about some order, either by continuing doing what they are doing already or by attempting to stabilize the worlds that surround them into some intended pattern. This pattern is never fully achieved, but without the idea that some pattern will be achieved, nothing is likely to take place. Doctors and nurses work to save lives even when they know that the odds are stacked against them; managers try to implement reform although they know that the intended reform will not materialize the way it looks on paper or in PowerPoint presentations. Actors intervene on the assumption that something will become; they assume that there is something there to be reckoned with, and they assume that through organization something will be achieved in a tangible state. In the process they connect things that they assume to be in a tangible stable, state. When I use the word ‘actors’, I do not have in mind singular actors such as managers. To be sure, persons in management positions take part in organizing activities, but they do not stay constant, nor are they the sole architects of processes.