Prelude: The Sociomateriality and the Legacy of Structuration Theory

What has the concept of materiality, the latest meta theoriesMeta theory in the humanities and social sciences, brought to management studiesManagement studies? Recent management studies, which focus on materiality, try to overcome the dogma that postmodern management studies have fallen into, which looks for the beginning of the organizing process into subjective interpretation. Institutional organization theory focuses on the materiality on which the symbolism of institutions is inscribed. Organizational routine research seeks to unravel the material dimension of organizational performative practices. Organizational wrongdoing research critiques material measurement practice based on social constructionism. Critical management studies focus the material space as a way to counter the humanistic concept of time. Science based innovation challenges sociomaterialistic practices that originate from devices for MOTs that have not been able to penetrate into the workings of science and technology actually. In order to understand this issue systematically, it is necessary to understand how the studies referring to structuration theoryStructuration theory, which had much significant impact on management studies as a whole around the 1980s–1990s, have each solved endogenously generated issues. Up-and-coming researchers in Japanese management studiesManagement studies conduct empirical researches that draw out the implications of the concept of materiality.