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5 - Supersessionism and the Politics of Time

Reforming Organisational Studies with Gadamer’s Hermeneutics of Trust

from Part II - Re-orienting Critique in Organization Studies? Exploring Jointly Time and Politics

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 June 2023

By
Gabriel J. Costello
Edited by
François-Xavier de Vaujany ,
Robin Holt  and
Albane Grandazzi
François-Xavier de Vaujany
Affiliation:
Universite Paris Dauphine-PSL
Robin Holt
Affiliation:
Copenhagen Business School
Albane Grandazzi
Affiliation:
Grenoble Ecole de Management
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Summary

The doctrine of historical supersessionism proposes that the distant past is of no importance to the present. This chapter argues that Positivism, a child of the Enlightenment, and a dominant paradigm in management and organisational research has resulted in the supersessionist rejection of Aristotelian thought. The chapter will draw on Alasdair MacIntyre’s apologia for Aristotle, and the contemporary discovery of phronesis in the social sciences. It will discuss how Gadamer’s hermeneutics of trust can facilitate dialogue between Positivist and Aristotelian scholars. Consequently, Gadamer’s concept can contribute to the study of organisations, artefacts, and practices, as it advocates the necessity for cultivating hermeneutic sensitivity and phronesis in all dimensions of human life. The study also proposes Husserl’s idea of epoché as a methodology to examine historical supersessionism and assist the work of resolving contemporary prejudices and misunderstandings.

Keywords

SupersessionismAristotlephronesisPositivismMacIntyreGadamerEnlightenmentepochéhermeneutics
Type
Chapter
Information
Organization as Time
Technology, Power and Politics
 , pp. 99 - 115
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2023

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