Scandinavian Working Papers in Business Administration

GRI-rapport,
University of Gothenburg, Gothenburg Research Institute GRI

No 2005:10: Organizing / Arguing: For Nuclear Power in the Name of the Environment

Hervé Corvellec ()
Additional contact information
Hervé Corvellec: Gothenburg Research Institute, Postal: School of Business, Economics and Law, Göteborg University, Box 600, SE 40530 Göteborg, Sweden

Abstract: Braiding organization theory and argumentation theory, I unfold in this article how argumentation contributes to organizational sense-making and how organizations act as social loci for the production, diffusion and development of arguments. A Swedish association dedicated to the defense and promotion of nuclear power, Miljövänner För Kärnkraft (approximately Environmentalists For Nuclear Power) serves as a case study. I describe the association’s argumentative activity with a particular focus on its argument that “nuclear power is environment friendly as it produces no greenhouse gases emissions”. The manner in which the association contextualizes this key argument illustrates the inter-relationships there exist between organizing and arguing. The two are each other’s conditions of possibility and I therefore argue for a symmetric understanding of the argumentative character of organizing and the organized character of argumentation.

Keywords: Sense-making; Argumentation; Organization; Nuclear power

27 pages, December 20, 2005

Note: Published in Society and Business Review Vol. 1 No. 3, 2006, pp. 248-265. Please contact the author for more information.

Download statistics

Questions (including download problems) about the papers in this series should be directed to Lise-Lotte Walter ()
Report other problems with accessing this service to Sune Karlsson ().

RePEc:hhb:gungri:2005_010This page generated on 2024-09-13 22:18:16.