ABSTRACT
As the chapters in this book demonstrate, action learning has traditionally been directed towards enabling professionals to learn and develop through engaging in reflecting on their experience in the company of peers as they seek to address real-life problems in their own organizational settings. What has received less attention is how action learning relates to academia, by which I mean university courses and research. There are many accounts of masters courses that engage through action learning. The three previous editions of this book contained such accounts as have issues of Action Learning: Research and Practice. This chapter takes a different focus and explores the more philosophical and conceptual territory of action learning and knowledge generation and the development of a philosophy of action learning research that is grounded in the notion of practical knowing. The chapter explores four themes in this regard. First, I discuss the how management and organizational research is being understood and practised. Second, I locate action learning in the field of knowing called practical knowing. Third, I articulate how action learning, particularly in the work of Revans, contains a rich research philosophy. Finally, I outline what an action learning dissertation would involve.
