IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/hal/journl/hal-02313299.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Postcolonialism, Organization, and Management Theory : The Role of "Epistemological Third Spaces"

Author

Listed:
  • Tapiwa Winston Seremani

    (EM - EMLyon Business School)

  • Stewart Clegg

    (UTS - University of Technology Sydney, Newcastle University Business School, NOVA SBE - NOVA - School of Business and Economics - NOVA - Universidade Nova de Lisboa = NOVA University Lisbon)

Abstract

This article contributes a critical discussion of postcolonial theory. It opposes the binary nature of much contemporary discussion of the topic in theory and in organization and management theory in particular. We identify the challenges facing postcolonial theory, which we identify in epistemological terms. The dualism of "colonial" and "postcolonial" theory masks considerable diversity that the binary logic occludes. In place of this dualism, we introduce the notion of epistemological third spaces. As a theory of this third space, we introduce the indigenous theory of southern Africa, Ubuntu, discussing its interaction with more conventional Western management and organization theory. We also highlight a case in which the notion of epistemological third spaces would have been valuable had it been applied to the spread of the Nile River virus. We conclude the article with a discussion of the potential links between epistemological third spaces.

Suggested Citation

  • Tapiwa Winston Seremani & Stewart Clegg, 2016. "Postcolonialism, Organization, and Management Theory : The Role of "Epistemological Third Spaces"," Post-Print hal-02313299, HAL.
    • Handle: RePEc:hal:journl:hal-02313299
    DOI: 10.1177/1056492615589973
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    To our knowledge, this item is not available for download. To find whether it is available, there are three options:
    1. Check below whether another version of this item is available online.
    2. Check on the provider's web page whether it is in fact available.
    3. Perform a search for a similarly titled item that would be available.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:hal:journl:hal-02313299. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: CCSD (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.