Top

Journal of Business Ethics

Published in:

07-03-2016

Ideology in HRM Scholarship: Interrogating the Ideological Performativity of ‘New Unitarism’

Authors: Michelle Greenwood, Harry J. Van Buren III

Published in: Journal of Business Ethics | Issue 4/2017

Activate our intelligent search to find suitable subject content or patents.

search-config

AI-assisted search

Off

Abstract

In this paper we seek to uncover and analyse unitarist ideology within the field of HRM, with particular emphasis on the manner in which what we call ‘new unitarism’ is ideologically performative in HRM scholarship. Originally conceived of as a way of understanding employer ideology with regard to the employment relationship, unitarist frames of reference conceive a workplace that is characterised by shared interests and a single source of authority. This frame has continuously evolved and persistently formed thinking about HRM; however, this influence has been largely covert and unexamined. Using an epistemic analysis informed by theories of knowledge, we examine new unitarism against three types of validity claims—descriptive, normative, and instrumental—in order to understand how it has been ideologically constitutive of HRM scholarship. We consider the implications of this analysis for HRM research and practice and contend that an alternative frame, namely ‘new pluralism’, has potential to offer a more valid account of the employment relationship, to provide a framework for assessing how power affects the pursuit of employee interests, and to allow space for taking up deeply ethical questions related to employment.

previous article Contextualizing Corporate Political Responsibilities: Neoliberal CSR in Historical Perspective

next article Cultural Diversity in Business: A Critical Reflection on the Ideology of Tolerance

Dont have a licence yet? Then find out more about our products and how to get one now:

Springer Professional "Wirtschaft+Technik"

Online-Abonnement

Mit Springer Professional "Wirtschaft+Technik" erhalten Sie Zugriff auf:

über 102.000 Bücher
über 537 Zeitschriften

aus folgenden Fachgebieten:

Automobil + Motoren
Bauwesen + Immobilien
Business IT + Informatik
Elektrotechnik + Elektronik
Energie + Nachhaltigkeit
Finance + Banking
Management + Führung
Marketing + Vertrieb
Maschinenbau + Werkstoffe
Versicherung + Risiko

Jetzt Wissensvorsprung sichern!

inform now

Springer Professional "Wirtschaft"

Online-Abonnement

Mit Springer Professional "Wirtschaft" erhalten Sie Zugriff auf:

über 67.000 Bücher
über 340 Zeitschriften

aus folgenden Fachgebieten:

Bauwesen + Immobilien
Business IT + Informatik
Finance + Banking
Management + Führung
Marketing + Vertrieb
Versicherung + Risiko

Jetzt Wissensvorsprung sichern!

inform now

In expounding what he means by the neologism ‘governmentality’, Foucault (1991, p. 88) says, somewhat rhetorically, ‘the problem [of government] comes to pose itself with this peculiar intensity, of how to be ruled, how strictly, by whom, to what end, by what methods, etc.

For a comprehensive overview in the context of organisational studies of paradigms (meta-theoretical assumptions) see Burrell and Morgan (1979) or of epistemology (the study of ‘justified true belief’ or knowledge) see Scherer et al. (2015).

We avoid the word ‘technical’ favoured by Lyotard (1984, p. 44) to describe this type of language game as Habermas (1972, p. 308) used the same term to refer to the category of interests associated with different game, namely the ‘truth’ game.

We thank the editors of this special issue for raising this important point.

Ackers, P. (2014). Rethinking the employment relationship: A neo-pluralist critique of British industrial relations orthodoxy. International Journal of Human Resource Management, 25(18), 2608–2625.CrossRef

Ackers, P., & Payne, J. (1998). British trade unions and social partnership: Rhetoric, reality and strategy. International Journal of Human Resource Management, 9(3), 529–550.CrossRef

Althusser, L. (1971). Ideology and ideological state apparatuses (Notes towards an investigation). Lenin and philosophy and other essays (pp. 127–186). New York: Monthly Review Press.

Arrowsmith, J., & Parker, J. (2013). The meaning of “employee engagement” for the values and roles of the HRM function. The International Journal of Human Resource Management, 24(14), 2692–2712.CrossRef

Beer, M. (2009). High commitment high performance: How to build a resilient organization for sustained advantage. San Francisco: Jossey Bass.

Benford, R. D., & Snow, D. A. (2000). Framing processes and social movements: An overview and assessment. Annual Review of Sociology, 26, 611–639.CrossRef

Berman, S. L., & Van Buren, H. J, I. I. I. (2015). Mary Parker Follett, managerial responsibility, and the future of capitalism. Futures, 68, 44–56.CrossRef

Bévort, F., Darmer, P., Mogensen, M., & Muhr, S. L. (2015). ‘Managing the human? Towards diverse, engaged and critical HRM studies’, ephemera theory & politics in organization, cfp submission deadline 1 dec 2015.

Bidwell, M., Briscoe, F., Fernandez-Mateo, I., & Sterling, A. (2013). The employment relationship and inequality: How and why changes in employment practices are reshaping rewards in organizations. The Academy of Management Annals, 7(1), 61–121.CrossRef

Boselie, P., Dietz, G., & Boon, C. (2005). Commonalities and contradictions in HRM and performance research. Human Resource Management Journal, 15(3), 67–94.CrossRef

Boswell, W. R., Bingham, J. B., & Colvin, A. J. S. (2006). Aligning employees through “line of sight”. Business Horizons, 49(6), 499–509.CrossRef

Budd, J. W., Gomez, R., & Meltz, N. M. (2004). Why a balance is best: the pluralist industrial relations paradigm of balancing competing interests (pp. 195–227). Theoretical Perspectives on Work and the Employment Relationship, Champaign, IL: Industrial Relations Research Association.

Burrell, G., & Morgan, G. (1979). Sociological paradigms and organizational analysis. London: Heinemann.

Caldwell, R. (2005). ‘Things fall apart? Discourses on agency and change in organizations’, Human Relations, 58(1), 83–114.

Callon, M. (1998). The laws of the markets. Oxford: Blackwell Publishers.

Chreim, S. (2006). Managerial frames and institutional discourses of change: Employee appropriation and resistance. Organization Studies, 27(9), 1261–1287.CrossRef

Clegg, H. A. (1975). Pluralism in industrial relations. British Journal of Industrial Relations, 13(3), 309–316.CrossRef

Coase, R. H. (1937). The nature of the firm. Economica, 13(16), 386–405.CrossRef

Combs, J., Liu, Y., Hall, A., & Ketchen, D. (2006). How much do high-performance work practices matter? A meta-analysis of their effects on organizational performance. Personnel Psychology, 59(3), 501–528.CrossRef

Cooke, W. N. (1994). Employee participation programs, group-based incentives, and company performance: A union-nonunion comparison. Industrial and Labor Relations Review, 47(4), 594–609.CrossRef

Cotton, J. L., Vollrath, D. A., Froggatt, K. L., Lengnick-Hall, M. L., & Jennings, K. R. (1988). Employee participation: Diverse forms and different outcomes. Academy of Management Review, 13(1), 8–22.

Cullinane, N., & Dundon, T. (2014). Unitarism and employer resistance to trade unionism. The International Journal of Human Resource Management, 25(18), 2573–2590.CrossRef

Delbridge, R., & Keenoy, T. (2010). Beyond managerialism? International Journal of Human Resource Management, 21(6), 799–817.CrossRef

Dundon, T., & Gollan, P. J. (2007). Re-conceptualizing voice in the non-union workplace. The International Journal of Human Resource Management, 18(7), 1182–1198.CrossRef

Fama, E. F., & Jensen, M. C. (1983). Separation of ownership and control. Journal of Law and Economics, 26(2), 301–325.CrossRef

Fiss, P. C., & Hirsch, P. M. (2005). The discourse of globalization: Framing and sensemaking of an emerging concept. American Sociological Review, 70(1), 29–52.CrossRef

Foucault, M. (1988). Technologies of the self. In L. Martin, H. Gutman, & P. H. Hutton (Eds.), Technologies of the self (pp. 16–49). London: Tavistock.

Foucault, M. (1991). Governmentality. In G. Burchell, C. Gordon, & P. Miller (Eds.), The Foucault effect: Studies in governmentality (pp. 87–104). Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Fox, A. (1966). Industrial sociology and industrial relations. London: HMSO.

Fox, A. (1974). Beyond contract: Work, power and trust relations. London: Faber.

Friedman, M. (1962/1982). Capitalism and freedom. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Gardner, T. M., & Wright, P. M. (2009). Implicit human resource management theory: A potential threat to the internal validity of human resource practice measures. International Journal of Human Resource Management, 20(1), 57–74.CrossRef

Geare, A., Edgar, F., & McAndrew, I. (2006). Employment relationships: Ideology and HRM practice. International Journal of Human Resource Management, 17(7), 1190–1208.CrossRef

Geare, A., Edgar, F., McAndrew, I., Harney, B., Cafferkey, K., & Dundon, T. (2014). Exploring the ideological undercurrents of HRM: workplace values and beliefs in Ireland and New Zealand. International Journal of Human Resource Management, 25(16), 2275–2294.CrossRef

Ghoshal, S. (2005). Bad management theories are destroying good management practices. Academy of Management Learning & Education, 4(1), 75–91.CrossRef

Greenwood, M. (2002). Ethics and HRM: A review and conceptual analysis. Journal of Business Ethics, 36(3), 261–279.CrossRef

Greenwood, M., & Freeman, R. E. (2011). Ethics and HRM: The contribution of stakeholder theory. Business and Professional Ethics Journal, 30(3/4), 269–292.CrossRef

Greenwood, M., Holland, P., & Choong, K. (2006). Re-evaluating drug testing: questions of moral and symbolic control. In J. Deckop, B. Giacalone, & C. L. Jurkiewicz (Eds.), Human resource management ethics (pp. 161–180). Greenwich: Information Age.

Gruman, J. A., & Saks, A. M. (2011). Performance management and employee engagement. Human Resource Management Review, 21(2), 123–136.CrossRef

Guest, D. E. (1994). Organizational psychology and human resource management: Towards a European approach. European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology, 4(3), 251–270.CrossRef

Guest, D. E. (1999). Human resource management—the workers’ verdict. Human Resource Management Journal, 9(3), 5–25.CrossRef

Guest, D. E. (2011). Human resource management and performance: Still searching for some answers. Human Resource Management Journal, 21(1), 3–13.CrossRef

Guest, D. E., & Peccei, R. (2001). Partnership at work: Mutuality and the balance of advantage. British Journal of Industrial Relations, 39(2), 207–236.CrossRef

Habermas, J. (1972). Knowledge and human interests. Boston: Beacon Press.

Habermas, J. (1996). Between facts and norms. (W. Rehg, Trans.). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

Habermas, J. (1998). On the pragmatics of communication. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

Heath, J. (1998). What is a validity claim? Philosophy & Social Criticism, 24(4), 23–41.CrossRef

Hirschman, A. O. (1977). The passions and the interests: Political arguments for capitalism before its triumph. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

Horwitz, F. M. (1990). HRM: An ideological perspective. Personnel Review, 19(2), 10–15.CrossRef

Jack, G., Greenwood, M., & Schapper, J. (2012). Frontiers, intersections and engagements of ethics and HRM. Journal of Business Ethics, 111(1), 1–12.CrossRef

Janssens, M., & Steyaert, C. (2009). HRM and performance: a plea for reflexivity in HRM studies. Journal of Management Studies, 46(5), 143–155.CrossRef

Jensen, M. C., & Meckling, W. H. (1976). Theory of the firm: Managerial behavior, agency costs and ownership structure. Journal of Financial Economics, 3(4), 305–360.CrossRef

Johnson, P., & Duberley, J. (2003). Reflexivity in management research. Journal of Management Studies, 40(5), 1279–1303.CrossRef

Jones, C., Parker, M., & Ten Bos, R. (2005). For business ethics. Abingdon: Routledge.CrossRef

Kamoche, K. N. (2001). Understanding human resource management. Buckingham: Open University Press.

Kaufman, B. E. (2008). Paradigms in industrial relations: Original, modern and versions in-between. British Journal of Industrial Relations, 46(2), 314–339.CrossRef

Keenoy, T. (1990). HRM: A case of the wolf in sheep’s clothing? Personnel Review, 19(2), 3–9.CrossRef

Keenoy, T. (1999). HRM as hologram: A polemic. Journal of Management Studies, 36(1), 1–23.CrossRef

Khurana, R. (2007). From higher aims to hired hands: The social transformation of Ameruican business schools and the unfulfilled promise of management as a profession. Princeton: Princeton University Press.

Kieser, A., & Wellstein, B. (2008). Do activities of consultants and management scientists affect decision making by managers. In G. P. Hodgkinson & W. H. Starbuck (Eds.), The Oxford handbook of organizational decision making (pp. 493–516). Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Knudsen, H., Busck, O., & Lind, J. (2011). Work environment quality: The role of workplace participation and democracy. Work, Employment & Society, 25(3), 379–396.CrossRef

Kochan, T. A. (1980). Collective bargaining and industrial relations: From theory to policy and practice. Homewood, IL: Irwin.

Kochan, T. A. (2007). Social legitimacy of the HRM profession: A US perspective. In P. Boxall & J. Purcell (Eds.), The Oxford handbook of HRM (pp. 599–619). Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Kochan, T. A. (2012). Collective bargaining: crisis and its consequences for American society. Industrial Relations Journal, 43(4), 302–316.CrossRef

Laclau, E., & Mouffe, C. (2001). Hegemony and socialist strategy: Towards a radical democratic politics. London: Verso.

Legge, K. (1995). Human resource management: Rhetorics and reality. Hampshire: Palgrave Macmillan.CrossRef

Lengnick-Hall, M. L., Lengnick-Hall, C. A., Andrade, L. S., & Drake, B. (2009). Strategic human resource management: The evolution of the field. Human Resource Management Review, 19(2), 64–85.CrossRef

Lyotard, J. F. (1984). The postmodern condition: A report on knowledge. Manchester: Manchester University Press.

Mayo, E. (1933). The human problems of an industrial civilization. New York: Macmillan.

Miller, R. W. (1975). Knowledge and human interests by Jurgen Habermas. The Philosophical Review, 84(2), 261–266.CrossRef

Moore, B., & Gardner, S. (2004). HR managers SHRM and the Australian metals mining sector: Embracing the unitarist vision. Asia Pacific Journal of Human Resources, 42(3), 274–300.CrossRef

Nienhueser, W. (2011). Empirical research on Human Resource Management as a production of ideology. Management Revue, 22(4), 367–393.

Oliver, P., & Johnston, H. (2000). What a good idea! Ideologies and frames in social movement research. Mobilization, 5(1), 37–54.

Paauwe, J. (2009). HRM and performance: Achievements, methodological issues and prospects. Journal of Management Studies, 1(46), 127–140.

Provis, C. (1996). Unitarism, pluralism, interests and values. British Journal of Industrial Relations, 34(4), 473–495.CrossRef

Putnam, H. (2002). The collapse of the fact/value dichotomy and other essays. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

Rhodes, C., & Harvey, G. (2012). Agonism and the possibilities of ethics for HRM. Journal of Business Ethics, 111(1), 49–59.CrossRef

Scherer, A. G., Does, E., & Marti, E. (2015). Epistemology: Philosophical foundations and organizational controversies. In R. Mir, H. Willmott, & M. Greenwood (Eds.), The Routledge companion to philosophy in organization studies. London: Routledge.

Searle, J. R. (1964). How to Derive “Ought” From “Is”. Philosophical Review, 73(1), 43–58.CrossRef

Sennett, R. (2012). Together: The rituals, pleasures and politics of cooperation. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.

Siebert, S., Martin, G., Bozic, B., & Docherty, I. (2015). Looking “Beyond the Factory Gates”: Towards more pluralist and radical approaches to intraorganizational trust research. Organization Studies,. doi:10.1177/0170840615580010.

Snow, D. A., & Benford, R. D. (1988). Ideology, frame resonance, and participant mobilization. International Social Movement Research, 1(1), 197–217.

Snow, D. A., & Benford, R. D. (2000). Clarifying the relationship between framing and ideology in the study of social movements: A comment on Oliver and Johnston. Mobilization, 5(2), 55–60.

Tapia, M., Ibsen, C. L., & Kochan, T. A. (2015). Mapping the frontier of theory in industrial relations: The contested role of worker representation. Socio-Economic Review, 13(11), 157–184.CrossRef

Taylor, F. W. (1911). Shop management. New York: McGraw-Hill.

Taylor, F. W. (1914). The principles of scientific management. New York: Harper.

Therborn, G. (1980). The ideology of power and the power of ideology. London: Verso.

Timming, A. R. (2014). The “reach” of employee participation in decision-making: exploring the Aristotelian roots of workplace democracy. Human Resource Management Journal,. doi:10.1111/1748-8583.12050.

Townley, B. (1994). Reframing human resource management: Power, ethics and the subject at work. London: Sage.

Van Buren III, H. J. (2001). If fairness is the problem, is consent the solution? Integrating ISCT and stakeholder theory. Business Ethics Quarterly, 11(3), 481–499.CrossRef

Van Buren III, H. J. (2008). Fairness and the main management theories of the twentieth century: A historical review, 1900–1965. Journal of Business Ethics, 82(3), 633–644.CrossRef

Van Buren III, H. J., & Greenwood, M. (2011). Bringing stakeholder theory to industrial relations. Employee Relations, 33(1), 5–21.CrossRef

Walton, R. (1985). From control to commitment in the workplace. Harvard Business Review, March–April, pp. 76–84.

Weick, K. E. (1999). Conclusion: Theory construction as disciplined reflexivity: Tradeoffs in the 90s. Academy of Management Review, 24(4), 797–806.

Weiskopf, R., & Munro, I. (2011). Management of human capital: Discipline, security and controlled circulation in HRM. Organization, 19(6), 685–702.CrossRef

Wilcox, T. (2012). Human resource management in a compartmentalized world: Whither moral agency? Journal of Business Ethics, 111(1), 85–96.CrossRef

Title: Ideology in HRM Scholarship: Interrogating the Ideological Performativity of ‘New Unitarism’
Authors: Michelle Greenwood
Harry J. Van Buren III
Publication date: 07-03-2016
Publisher: Springer Netherlands
Published in: Journal of Business Ethics / Issue 4/2017
Print ISSN: 0167-4544
Electronic ISSN: 1573-0697
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-016-3084-z

Springer Professional

Abstract

Please log in to get access to your license.

Dont have a licence yet? Then find out more about our products and how to get one now:

Springer Professional "Wirtschaft+Technik"

Springer Professional "Wirtschaft"

Other articles of this Issue 4/2017

Registering Ideology in the Creation of Social Entrepreneurs: Intermediary Organizations, ‘Ideal Subject’ and the Promise of Enjoyment

Ideologies in Markets, Organizations, and Business Ethics: Drafting a Map: Introduction to the Special Issue

Ideology and the Balanced Scorecard: An Empirical Exploration of the Tension Between Shareholder Value Maximization and Corporate Social Responsibility

Cultural Diversity in Business: A Critical Reflection on the Ideology of Tolerance

Contesting a Place in the Sun: On Ideologies in Foreign Markets and Liabilities of Origin

Risking the Sustainability of the Public Health System: Ethical Conundrums and Ideologically Embedded Reform

Premium Partner