From Common Sense to Non-Sense: Placing institutional cracks, (in)stability, and absence center stage in institutional theory
Friday, July 31, 2026, 10:45 AM–12:15 PM
Sheraton, Seminar Room A
OMT PDW at AOM 2026 (Philadelphia)
Why this PDW, why now?
Philadelphia's Liberty Bell is a powerful institutional symbol precisely because it does not ring. Its silence and visible crack invite projection, interpretation, and collective attachment. We use this metaphor to ask a parallel question in institutional theory: what if institutions persist-and become unstable-through cracks, gaps, and absences as much as through shared meanings and articulated values?
What we will explore
- Cracks and voids as constitutive features of institutions: how absence can bind as well as fragment.
- Non-sense and alternative realities: for example, how AI can produce outputs presented as legitimate while also multiplying competing realities.
- (In)stability in times of crisis: tensions, disorder, natural disasters, and geopolitical fragmentation as contexts where institutional gaps become normal.
- Methods for studying what is hard to see: silence, invisibility, illusion, mystery, and the 'no-thing' in organizational life.
- Implications for institutional architectures: what changes in our theorizing when we start from absence rather than presence?
Why it matters for OMT (and beyond)
This PDW invites OMT scholars to treat absence as data and to consider how power, legitimacy, and institutional persistence are shaped through:
- Non-sense (breakdowns of meaning; institutional effects without shared sensemaking)
- Mystery and the unknowable (things enacted yet not fully knowable)
- Silence (what cannot be spoken; who is silenced)
- Invisibility and omission (what is ignored, unrecorded, or strategically absent)
Methodologically, we will discuss approaches for "reading between the lines" (e.g., interpretive, ethnographic, historical, visual, and material approaches) and for engaging non-sense without prematurely forcing coherence. Participants will leave with sharper concepts and practical strategies for designing studies on cracks, voids, and absences.
Structure and Registration
Structure
Two 45-minute segments, followed by a voluntary group excursion to the Liberty Bell.
Part 1 (45 min): Framing + Panel Conversation
Chairs introduce the theme and key questions, followed by a panel discussion with facilitators.
Part 2 (45 min): Breakout Roundtables (Participant-Driven)
Participants join themed roundtables chaired by facilitators and organizers.
No formal pre-registration is required, but you should register for the AoM Annual Meeting.
Optional Excursion (after the PDW)
Group visit to the Liberty Bell Center.
We will walk together to the Liberty Bell Center (Market Street). After security checks, the chairs will briefly introduce the Bell's history and invite participants to connect it to the roundtable objects as a way to extend the conversation on gaps, absences, and the nonsensical in institutions.
Places are limited, so registration to the PDW via this Google Form is strongly encouraged.
Organizers
- Elena Giovannoni - University of Birmingham, UK
- Paolo Quattrone - Manchester University, UK
- Stefan Schwarzkopf - Copenhagen Business School, DK
Facilitators
- Joel Gehman - George Washington University, USA
- Dennis Jancsary - University of Liverpool, UK
- Trent Williams - Brigham Young University, USA
- Sunny Mosangzi Xu - Aarhus University, DK
Sponsors
Primary Division Sponsor: OMT
Other Interested Sponsors: SIM and CMS