Dear colleagues,
This is a reminder of the approaching deadline for the mini-conference on "Organization Theory
and Workplace Politics under Globalization" at the 2010 Society for the Advancement of Socio-
Economics (SASE) Annual Meeting in Philladelphia, June 24-26, 2010. Interested scholars may
propose papers and/or a panel. We are particularly interested in getting scholars seeking to
bridge critical strands of organization theory and sociology of work.
The deadline for the submission of an extended abstract (approx. 1000 words) or a panel proposal
(2 to 6 panels available) is January 30, 2010. Selected participants will have to submit a completed
paper by June 1, 2010. If a paper proposal cannot be accommodated within a mini-conference, it
will be forwarded for consideration as a regular conference submission.
Here is the description of the mini-conference:
In a context of global competition, internationalized production, and neoliberal state regulation,
workplace politics have undergone profound transformations. The sociology of work (including
labor process analysis, studies of occupations and professions, work redesign, and gender) has
documented and theorized changing workplace politics under globalization. Meanwhile,
organization theory has generated insights regarding routines, capabilities, institutions and
organizational environments that can provide a powerful view of organizational change implied by
globalization, but has largely failed to account for the operation of power relations within or
between organizations under competitive pressures. A more explicit integration of the two broad
disciplines - organization theory or sociology of work - offers a promise to better understand and
explain the wide variation in work organization, relationships, and practices (e.g. reconciling the
seemingly contradictory processes of upskilling or collaborative work in a context of ongoing
pressures for cost cutting, externalization, work intensification, short-termism, etc). We invite
contributions from scholars developing approaches that combine insights from different
theoretical traditions of organization theory (e.g. new institutionalism, social-network analysis,
sense-making, practice perspectives) with concerns about power and politics in shaping the
worlds of work. Examples could range from qualitative research on particular workplaces to
quantitative research on broader trends or forces shaping workplace change; from a focus on
independent SMEs to firms (and unions) in global supply chains, to employment practices in
multinational corporations. This mini-conference is open to a wide range of empirical foci so long
as authors seek to integrate insights from organization theory with a focus on power and politics
at work.
The deadline for the submission of the extended abstract is January 30, 2010. For more
information and to submit a panel or a paper, see the SASE website:
http://www.sase.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=228&Itemid=46#Theme5.
Yours,
Gregory Schwartz (University of Bath School of Management),
g.schwartz@bath.ac.uk
Matt Vidal (Kings College, University of London),
matt.vidal@kcl.ac.uk