ABSTRACT
What evidence is there that organizations have been influenced by science and scientific thinking? How far have the major organization theories been influenced by the dominant scientific paradigm? How far has interpretation of these theories and management practice been affected? This chapter considers some theoretical evidence of the influence of science and the scientific tradition in organization theory and the development of modern organizations. I use the term ‘modern’ to refer to organizations in the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries and today – since the rise of the complex, large-scale industrial and technological societies of western Europe and north America.
