Administration and indigenous people in Brazil: knowledge and interest in master and Ph.D. research

Abstract

Although relevant in historical and current contexts, topics related to indigenous people have received limited attention in the field of Administration Science in Brazil, which motivated this research. An epistemological approach was used by systematizing intellectual efforts and knowledge production in academic research. This paper aims to delimit analytical categories of research on topics related to indigenous people based on interest and knowledge derived from academic production in master and Ph.D. programs in Brazil, in the field of Administrative Science. It is an integrative bibliographic review anchored in lexical analysis with the aid of the Iramuteq software. The processing of the information generated four classes: “University and minority access to higher education,” “Land and conflicts,” “Organizations, management, and sustainability,” “Indigenous socio-political organization, state, and public policies.” The classes bring together theoretical and empirical bases, research procedures, locus, and focus, with non-managerial profiles and hybrid sociological approaches that harmonized in practical, technical, and emancipatory interests in the light of “Knowledge and Interests” from Habermas and the “Circle of Epistemic Matrices” from Paes de Paula. They reveal diversity in the epistemological choices of research in Administration, on indigenous themes, with hermeneutic, empirical-analytical, and critical bias.

Keywords:
Indigenous; Administration science; Organizational studies; Knowledge and interest; Postgraduate research; Stricto sensu.

Resumo

Apesar de relevante nos contextos histórico e atual, temas indígenas detêm limitada atenção no domínio da ciência administrativa no Brasil, fato que motivou a análise aqui sintetizada. A abordagem é de natureza epistemológica, sob a forma de sistematização de esforços intelectuais e produção do conhecimento na pesquisa acadêmica. Desse modo, o artigo objetiva delimitar categorias analíticas da pesquisa em temáticas indígenas, tomando como base interesse e conhecimento derivados da produção em nível de pós-graduação stricto sensu no Brasil, no domínio da ciência administrativa. Trata-se de revisão bibliográfica integrativa, ancorada em análise léxica com auxílio do software Iramuteq. O processamento das informações gerou quatro classes: “universidade e acesso de minorias ao ensino superior”, “terra e conflitos”, “organizações, gestão e sustentabilidade” e “organização sociopolítica indígena, Estado e políticas públicas”. As classes reúnem bases teóricas e empíricas, procedimentos de pesquisa, lócus e foco, com perfis não gerencialistas e abordagens sociológicas híbridas que se harmonizaram em interesses prático, técnico e emancipatórios à luz de Conhecimento e interesse, de Habermas, e de Círculo das matrizes epistêmicas, de Paes de Paula. Elas revelam diversidade nas escolhas epistemológicas da pesquisa em administração, em temas indígenas, com vieses hermenêutico, empírico-analítico e crítico.

Palavras-chave:
Indígenas; Ciência administrativa; Estudos organizacionais; Conhecimento e interesse; Pesquisa na pós-graduação stricto sensu

Resumen

A pesar de su relevancia en los contextos históricos y actuales, los temas indígenas reciben una atención limitada en el campo de las Ciencias Administrativas en Brasil, hecho que motivó la investigación aquí resumida. El enfoque es de carácter epistemológico en forma de sistematización de esfuerzos intelectuales y producción de conocimiento en la investigación académica. Así, este artículo tiene como objetivo delimitar categorías analíticas de investigación sobre temas indígenas a partir del interés y conocimiento derivado de la producción a nivel de posgrado stricto sensu en Brasil, en el campo de las Ciencias Administrativas. Se trata de una revisión bibliográfica integradora anclada en el análisis léxico con la ayuda del software Iramuteq. El procesamiento de la información generó cuatro categorías: “Universidad y acceso de minorías a la educación superior”; “Tierra y conflictos”; “Organizaciones, gestión y sostenibilidad” y “Organización sociopolítica indígena, Estado y políticas públicas”. Reúnen bases teóricas y empíricas, procedimientos de investigación, locus y foco, con perfiles no gerenciales y enfoques sociológicos híbridos que se armonizan en intereses prácticos, técnicos y emancipadores a la luz de “Conocimiento e Interés” de Habermas y el “Círculo de Matrices Epistémicas” de Paes de Paula. Revelan diversidad en las opciones epistemológicas de la investigación en Administración, en temas indígenas, con sesgos hermenéutico, empírico-analítico y crítico.

Palabras clave:
Pueblos indígenas; Ciencias administrativas; Estudios organizacionales; Conocimiento e interés; Investigación en estudios de posgrado; Stricto sensu

INTRODUCTION

In Knowledge and Human Interest, Habermas (1982) presents a theory of knowledge inspired by the interest underlying knowledge processes, taken as guidelines that adhere to fundamental conditions - work and interaction - of humans’ possible reproduction and self-constitution. Interest precedes knowledge and is related to actions. All knowledge derives from interest as a consequence of a self-interested action. We adopt this assumption to delimit analytical categories of research on indigenous populations based on interest and knowledge produced at Brazilian graduate programs called stricto sensu (i.e., leading to research and academic career) in administrative science.

Paes de Paula (2016) used Habermas (1982) to present an alternative proposal to Burrell and Morgan’s (1979) sociological paradigm diagram, conceiving the Circle of epistemic matrices. The author adopted the three interests - technical, practical, and emancipatory - and the respective logical-methodological rules addressed by Habermas (1982) - empirical-analytical, hermeneutic, and critical - to reconfigure these paradigms. In this study, such bases are applied to administrative science to delimit categories of organizational studies on indigenous populations in Brazil based on the following question: how is knowledge and interest manifested in administrative science regarding studies on indigenous populations produced in stricto senso graduate research in Brazil?

We point out paths of knowledge in administrative science anchored in ideals such as Southern epistemologies, ecology of knowledge (Santos, 2007), decolonial pedagogies (Walsh, 2013), and the role of knowledge in nationalist movements, as proposed by Ramos in the context of sociology for local problems (Ramos, 1965). We focus on research interests, principles, and results to synthesize the foundations of the relationship between object and inquiring subject when focused on indigenous populations in administrative science. Like Filgueiras (2012), our main contribution is returning to the post-colonial position of Ramos (1965) by valuing the role of culture in the constitution of real independence, of meaning for nationalism in the context of Brazilian development.

We are motivated by the purpose of reconciling, in administrative science, the Brazilian academic research on indigenous peoples and communities under a national panorama that allows, on the one hand, to indicate trends and possibilities for academic research and, on the other, to stimulate knowledge advances. Our study reveals that national production is scarce in terms of research and publication in indexed journals. For example, a search in administration journals in the Spell and Scielo databases using the descriptor (in Portuguese) “indígena” (indigenous) returned 14 publications¹ evaluated according to the Brazilian evaluation system as Qualis B1 and above. The journal Cadernos EBAPE.BR published by Fundação Getulio Vargas (FGV), was the journal with the most articles published (4). The epistemological interest in decoloniality appears timidly in authors such as Abdala and Faria (2017) and Wanderley (2015).

The research adopted an integrative bibliographic review, supported by lexographic analysis produced by the free software Interface de R pour les Analyses Multidimensionelles de Textes et de Questionnaires (Iramuteq). This article is structured into five sections. After this introduction, we present a synthesis of epistemological subsidies for research in administration, followed by a third section describing the study’s methodological outline. Section four presents the results with the description of the revealed thematic categories, and the analysis of these results in interfaces with knowledge and human interest (Habermas, 1982) and circle of epistemic matrices, by Paes and Paula (2016). The fifth and last section brings the final considerations. We summarize the findings and indicate the study’s limitations, suggesting a research agenda on elements of management and community organization of indigenous peoples, expanding the scope of organizational studies.

ADMINISTRATION AND KNOWLEDGE: DISCUSSING EPISTEMOLOGICAL BORDERS

Abdalla and Faria (2017), when approaching decoloniality in organizational studies, defend their perspective (Brazilian and Latin American), detached from Eurocentric fundamentalisms and colonialism to free researchers below the equator of European frameworks and the predominance of an occidentalist view. The authors point out a vision of “promoting critical dialogues and establishing legitimate bases for the co-construction of a pluriversal global academy” (Abdalla & Faria, 2017). Such positions can still be seen as decolonial pedagogies, that is, “pedagogies that stimulate being alive, existing, doing, thinking, seeing, listening and knowing in different ways, pedagogies directed to and anchored in decolonial processes and projects, vision and objective” (Walsh, 2013, p. 28, our translation).

In administrative science and for critical organizational studies, Salgado (2010) defends the construction of a form of thinking that is originated from the global South. This proposition encompasses the construct “good living” (sumaq kawsay), from the indigenous cosmovision. For the author, the proposition fits, in administrative science, the theory delineating social systems developed by Ramos (1981), the sociological reduction (Ramos, 1965), and the interface of social management with deliberative citizenship, as pointed out by Tenório (1998). The sociological reduction is evoked to understand sumaq kawsay in contexts different from its original (Native American) and for its development in the broader Latin American context as a locally contextualized theory.

Sociological reduction (Ramos, 1965) is designed to enable scholars to transpose knowledge and experience from one perspective to another, and it is inspired by the systematic awareness about the particularity of every national culture. Sociological reduction is a restricted form of a general attitude that any culture must assume. According to Ramos (1965), there is no institutionalized sociology if no awareness of concrete local problems exists. Based on this assumption, this study harmonizes researchers’ interests for concrete problems in Brazilian society, notably related to indigenous peoples, synthesizing logical-methodological, empirical-analytic, hermeneutic, and critical biases, based on the circle of epistemic matrices (Paes de Paula, 2016), which has been used in administrative science by Santos (2020), Scheibeler, Mello, Benini, and Espejo (2018), and Scussel (2017).

METHODOLOGICAL PROCEDURES

This research is an integrative bibliographic review anchored in lexicological analysis processing abstracts of dissertations and theses collected using the descriptor (in Portuguese) “indígena” (indigenous). The search was conducted in the Coordination for the Improvement of Higher Education Personnel’s theses and dissertations catalog (Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior [CAPES], 2016) in the areas of administration, business administration, and public administration. This method synthesizes the past of empirical or theoretical literature to comprehensively understand a particular phenomenon, aiming to analyze the knowledge already produced on a given topic (Botelho, Cunha, & Macedo, 2011). These authors register two types of bibliographic review - narrative and systematic - with distinct characteristics and goals.

The authors’ choice of bibliographic review is justified because it includes ordered methods (Figure 1) to jointly identify, select, assess, and critically analyze data from selected studies. It can incorporate purposes such as the definition of concepts, review of theories and evidence, as well as analysis of methodological problems of a given topic (Souza, Silva, & Carvalho, 2010). Thus, given the multiplicity, it must generate a consistent and understandable panorama of concepts.

Another quality is that the integrative review allows grouping different theoretical and empirical perspectives based on a unified goal. Due to diversity, Souza et al. (2010) suggest using measures to eliminate inaccuracies through reduction, exposure, and comparison, using general classification systems, the division into groups, and care with primary data extraction. This study observed these elements using the Iramuteq tools.

The software Iramuteq was chosen to support the analysis because it allows handling a large volume of texts (Justo & Camargo, 2014; Salvati, 2017) with diffuse qualities. The software converges dispersed information but requires, afterward, critical and interpretive assessment from researchers. The tool was validated after we verified its capacity to generate significant data.

Figure 1 illustrates the six steps adopted for the bibliographic review (Botelho et al., 2011; Souza et al., 2010): definition of the research question and theme, selection of the texts forming the sample (inclusion and exclusion criteria), collection of data from the texts, critical analysis and categorization of selected studies, discussion/interpretation of results, and presentation of the review/synthesis of knowledge.

Figure 1
Steps of integrative review

The first step dealt with the definition of the research question and the objective, universe, and basic methodological parameters. In the second step, we searched the CAPES’ theses and dissertations catalog, using the descriptor “indígena” (indigenous) and the filter “knowledge area,” selecting “administration, public administration, and business administration.” We chose the descriptor to converge the research to the theme of interest, in line with the epistemological bias. The search returned 39 texts until 2019, compared to 7,740 publications found when not applying the filter. The studies conducted before the organization of CAPES information in the so-called Sucupira platform were searched in other databases. In most cases, they were located in repositories of the institutions of origin. One of the 39 studies was not found, and it was disregarded.

The third step involved evaluating the abstracts and skimming the texts to verify the relationship with the research question. Two other studies were excluded in this step for not dealing with the theme. Overall, 36 texts remained, which were coded for processing and analysis. Reading enabled the classification of texts and the identification of qualities relevant to the research.

The fourth step consisted of the lexical analysis supported by the software Iramuteq to obtain thematic classes. Before using the software, we manually performed the initial categorization of texts into seven items (Souza et al., 2010): objective, type of research, methodological approach, data collection instruments, data analysis instruments, theoretical-conceptual references, and results (Table 2).

The lexical analysis originated from the process conducted through Iramuteq, based on statistics obtained after gathering lexical groups into classes that preserve common or approximate qualities in terms of vocabulary. Justo and Camargo (2014) pointed out that the main difference between this type of analysis and conventional content is that the data are initially categorized in the software for later interpretation. As recommended by Salvati (2017), the processing phase required, previously, the preparation of the corpus, which was formed by 36 duly coded abstracts in the order generated in CAPES’ theses and dissertations catalog.

After the lexical analysis, two results were obtained: the descending hierarchical classification (DHC) and similitude analysis (SA). DHC groups words by text segments (TS) similar to each other and significantly different from others, forming specific classes of words. The TS are basic analytical units of the software formed by fragments of abstracts from the entire corpus.² The software analyses are carried out within each TS; all statistical data was grouped later, determining the most relevant words, as well as the relationship established between them. The significance of differentiation or similarity is measured by the chi-square of each word, calculated as a measure of the context within the TS. This result allowed us to categorize the text thematically, creating a hierarchical class system. In turn, SA makes it possible to infer the construction structure of the text and the themes of relative importance by the co-occurrence between the words. They help the researcher identify the structure of the database (corpus), distinguish common parts and specificities, and verify them as a function of the synthesized variables.

The fifth step validated the classes based on the words of each group formed in the DHC. This procedure required considerations on a case-by-case basis after consulting the entire study, requiring the authors to verify the texts according to the classes created; the consistency of each thesis or dissertation within the content of the class supported by software indicators (such as chi-square, adherence of the TS to each class, and level of use of the TS in data processing); relocation of text, when necessary, taking into account the first two requirements.

Seven studies required relocation. As their exclusion would not change the result, they were kept in the sample and reclassified to avoid information loss. Another seven texts were not automatically classified due to the limited use caused by the restricted strength of the TS in the set (measured by the chi-square) and were included manually. These inconsistencies arose because several abstracts did not comply with NBR 6028 of the Brazilian Association of Technical Standards (ABNT) that states the items that must be included in the summary of academic texts - either because of the inclusion of unnecessary information or because of the lack of required information.

The sixth step corresponds to the synthesis presented in this article, part in the analysis section and part in the final considerations. In this article, we qualify the classes according to the objective of the study in order to address the research question.

DATA PROCESSING RESULTS: CHARACTERIZATION OF THEMATIC CATEGORIES

The geographical and temporal distribution of the 36 theses and dissertations is not homogeneous. The first record was Añez (1994), in the doctoral program in administration at FGV SP. Quantitative advances occurred from 2012, with an average of 3.6 theses or dissertations until 2019, against an average of 0.4 in previous years (from 1994 to 2011). The most frequent occurrences are eight at FGV SP, six at the Federal University of Rondônia Foundation (UNIR), and three at the Federal University of Santa Catarina (UFSC).

Añez (1994) stood out for being a pioneer study. The author analyzed the historical-institutional development of the Bolivian public administration, based on administrative reforms originating from plans, programs, systems, and service provision models with a paradigm shift in the government. The research refers to the informal administration inherited from the pre-Inca indigenous communities and the logic of power of the Inca Empire, focusing on indigenous traditions to explain Bolivia’s contemporary structure and operation. The thesis is manually included in class 3 due to its adhesion to the set because it did not have an abstract to be inserted in the corpus.

Table 1 summarizes data from the corpus processing on the number of texts (number of abstracts analyzed by the program), number of occurrences (number of words processed), number of forms (number of different words in the analysis), number of active forms (words selected by the software to compose the analysis, according to grammatical class - prepositions and articles were excluded), hapax (number of terms that appear only once), average occurrences per text (average words in each abstract), average of forms per text segment (TS) and number of classified segments (number of TS used by the software compared to the total).

Table 1
General processing data

Number of texts	36
Number of occurrences	11,382
Number of forms	2,017
Number of active forms	1,795
Hapax	991
Average occurrences per text	316.17
Average forms per TS Number of classified segments	34.18
Número de segmentos classificados	238 to 333 (71.5%)

• Source: Elaborated by the authors.

Box 1shows the four DHC classes. Class 1 has greater independence and, based on the words gathered, we called it “university and minority access to higher education.” It concentrates 30.7% of the TS and refers to theses and dissertations focused on affirmative action, equity, quotas, and the permanence of students in higher education in vulnerable situations (black, indigenous people, quilombolas, settlers, immigrants).

Box 1
Dendogram of DHC per class, words, and texts of reference

Class 1 also contains: a) one research on affirmative action assessment by the Federal University of Tocantins (UFT); b) two studies with dilemmas experienced by indigenous students caused by dichotomies between academic dynamics and originary culture, featuring double belonging and discussing recognition and identity; c) one research addressing the goal of the National Education Plan to increase higher education rates and respective strategies to reduce inequalities in access for excluded populations, which includes high school graduates from public schools, made up of different audiences; d) one research focusing on the Affirmative Actions Program with the perspective of university managers regarding access to undergraduate programs at UFSC; e) one dissertation focusing on differentiated academic performance among white students and students from other population segments - including indigenous - entering the Federal University of Uberlândia (UFU); f) one Ph.D. dissertation focusing on agenda-setting for the permanence of minorities at the Federal University of Fronteira Sul (UFFS); g) one master thesis evaluating didactic-pedagogical organization, faculty and infrastructure of undergraduate programs, highlighting the relevance of the Federal University of Amazonas (UFAM) in the development and transformation of traditional Amazonian communities, with a focus on university assessment and administration. In this last study, minority access to higher education is indirectly referred to. In this class, only three studies address the situation of indigenous students in a specific and exclusive way.

Class 4 (land and conflicts) concentrates 16.4% of the TS. It comprises research on rights, contradictions, dilemmas, resistance, and struggles for land. The topics that stood out were a) the approach to indigenous populations as a segment involved in conflicts over the construction of hydroelectric plants on the Madeira River, dealing with these populations indirectly (it is the only one in the class with such indirect approach); b) conflicts involving indigenous populations in several Brazilian states, with emphasis on the Guarani people. Two in Mato Grosso do Sul, two in Paraná, one in Rondônia, and one in the State of Rio Grande do Sul; c) one research addressing conflicts around an organization representing some indigenous populations: the Guarani-Yvyrupa Commission.

Of the eight studies in class 4, only two do not directly refer to Guarani people, one of them referring to indigenous peoples in the state of Rondônia and another to populations in the national context. The class reveals situations of indigenous peoples in states in the North, South, Central-West, and Southeast, evidencing the lack of research in communities in the Northeast region.

From class 4 onwards, the corpus is subdivided into two other classes: “Organizations, management, and sustainability” (class 2), containing 23.5% of the TS, and “Indigenous people’s sociopolitical organization, state, and public policies” (class 3), containing 29.4% of the TS. These two classes are closely related to each other, and, following the structure of DHC, the direct link of both to technical issues of administrative science is well-known from the perspectives of public management and social management. In both classes, there are conceptual overlaps that, to some extent, tend to hybridize (as observed by Paes de Paula, 2016).

Class 2 gathers research works with a socio-environmental and ecological bias, also addressing economic activities of collective organizations. Three studies deal with tourism, although one does not highlight specific activity in indigenous territory. Another deals with diverse activities related to handicraft, meliponiculture, and fish farming in the context of tourism in a municipality in the state of Mato Grosso do Sul, not focusing exclusively on indigenous people.

Box 2
Characterization of classes according to categories of analysis

Three studies in this class deal with the organization of networks of indigenous farmers - two address the production and marketing network of the Amazon nut in Rondônia, and another refers to a broader public (not exclusively indigenous), analyzing how indigenous people resist external processes, seeking to preserve culture, identity, language, religious rites, and connection with the territory. These two studies also emphasize leadership in resistance and maintenance processes and explicitly assuming a position within organizational studies with a non-managerial approach.

Another two studies deal with extractivist activities, one with a clear bias in social management - ​​although without reference to the concept - focusing on habits, behaviors, and customs in the institutionalization of cooperation, in research with four collective productive organizations. The two studies do not address indigenous themes directly. Their objects are collective economic enterprises with the involvement of indigenous people.

Seven of the twelve studies in this class do not directly involve indigenous populations. Among them stood out a study focused on environmental management in a religious location (terreiro) and another examining a carnival group. Both studies addressed African and indigenous cultural influences as contextual elements.

Class 3 reveals collective organizations, indigenous political participation, and their relationships with Brazilian federative entities (states and local governments), mediated by a wide range of public policies. Class 3 covers: a) four research works on sectoral public policies regarding indigenous school education, indigenous health, and universal and multicultural relations; b) one study on relations between indigenous populations and the state government, from the perspective of indigenous leaders, in regional and national conferences of these populations; c) one study addressing the political dimension of the administration of the Brazilian National Foundation for Indigenous People (Funai), with regard to the appointment or not of specialists for the management of the body; d) one research on the formation of a national government based on pressure from social reality (Añez, 1994); e) one research addressing the Ecological ICMS (one of the Brazilian sub-national taxes) for the sustainable development of a municipality. The last two deal indirectly with topics regarding indigenous populations (the only ones in this condition in class 3).

ANALYSIS OF RESULTS: EPISTEMOLOGICAL TRENDS REVEALED

This section outlines epistemological trends - related to the DHC classes reported in the previous section - with complementary support from the similitude analysis (SA) of Iramuteq, whose representation is shown in Figure 2. The size of each circle of the SA is proportional to the strength of the word in the interaction network (information generated by the chi-square of each word in relation to the others). The width of the links between words represents the frequency of the relationship, indicated by numbers on the lines. Colors represent word communities, i.e., groups composed of words with more relevant relationships.³ The words in Figure 2 are presented in Portuguese since the studies were originally produced in this language. However, the discussion in this section will adopt the words translated into English.

The similitude analysis provides typical sets of words that indicate epistemological trends based on knowledge and human interest (Habermas, 1982) and the circle of epistemic matrices (Paes de Paula, 2016, p. 33, our translation). We agree with Paes de Paula that “social phenomena are presented according to a combination of interests since there is no way to separate what is technical, practical, and emancipatory.” Likewise, we recognize the need to consider them together. However, we dare to identify significant elements of each class that, even in hybrid situations, allow the identification of striking characteristics that qualify a comprehensive segmentation.

Figure 2
Similitude analysis

Sets of central words that express harmonic systems of knowledge production stood out, evidencing uniformities of interests of administrative science in research in indigenous communities and populations. Figure 2 reveals, in perspective, conformity among six sets of words through colors that, at first, compose different strata. However, the DHC classes enable the interpretation of the image by the three biases of interests of Habermas’ (1982) taxonomy, which we carry out below.

In the first part of this section, we raise the classification of Habermas’ human interests (first three sub-items), ending with Paes de Paula’s circle of epistemic matrices (2016).

The Technical Interest

Figure 2 shows, on the right, the words that have greater intensity in the SA. The word “social” unites around itself, directly, the words “organization,” “actor,” “place,” and “form,” and, with less intensity, “area,” “environmental,” and “practical.” Indirectly, “social” (in a larger circle) anchors all themes, with greater or lesser strength, from a chain of links with different intensities. There is a strong link with “social” and the community-region axis, the highest relationship of SA with strength 10. From this word, two other less strong axes are derived, both with strength 5: “public,” which goes on to “politics” and “school,” and “people,” which is connected to “public policies” and “Brazilian.”

The words “community” and “region” appear connecting “tourism,” “condition,” “resource,” “activity,” “leadership,” and “strategy”. All the words closely gathered around “social,” “community,” and “region” refer to classes 2 and 3, reinforcing the two thematic categories of DHC focusing on organizational studies, management, and public and social policies. In “social,” hybrid and diffuse topics predominate in terms of approach, generically relating management, public policies, and some social situation. The last word expresses the entire analyzed set with variations in terms of the strength of the link to the formed subsets. The analysis, therefore, must focus on the texts that, with greater precision, qualify the key word “social” in the context of close nucleation, with a similar procedure for “community-region,” “land,” and, on the left, “student.”

Classes 2 and 3 are formed by content from 20 research works, among which nine support the word “social” in SA, which is also driven, in the background, by studies from class 1, but in lower quantity and incidence. It is important to reveal the technical interest in research in indigenous communities and peoples based on the most prominent word of the analyzed set. With this first set, we deduce that the interest of administrative science in indigenous themes has a socio-technical, and not exclusively technical, nature. This presupposes approximations with the social management domain, even though such a construct does not appear in the studies.

The technical interest is focused on organizations and public policies, emphasizing education, environment, income (tourism, extractivism, crafts), and health (as described above for classes 2 and 3). They deal with practices of indigenous leaders and people in the administration of specific sectors, with locus both in organizations constituted exclusively by indigenous populations and, more broadly, in community interests that involve other public and private actors.

The word “social,” in the technical interest, strongly refers to local/community organizations. In this class, we identified the use of a theoretical-analytical framework linked to management tools and organizational analysis with tendencies towards functionalism, which characterizes the empirical-analytical matrix (Paes de Paula, 2016). This trend is also present in class 3, using various quantitative and qualitative instruments to analyze public policies via research marked by empiricism and formalism, emphasizing causal explanations (Paes de Paula, 2016). On the other hand, the references support research on reducing inequalities, inclusion, and emancipation, incorporating conflicts and resistance, which distances the analyzed research from the typically managerial bias. We do not locate an exclusively instrumental, economistic reading in a market-centric perspective (Ramos, 1981). Following Paes de Paula’s understanding, we place classes 2 and 3 in “border theories and methodologies, a result from an embryonic reconstruction, which brings together technical interest and emancipatory interest” (Paes de Paula, 2016, p. 40, our translation), characterizing them as hybrid sociological approaches.

The Practical Interest

On the left of Figure 2 (red color), we identified two branches of words around “student”: one bringing together “academic,” “program,” “recognition,” and the other, “university,” “action,” “group.” Here we find the practical interest in direct interface with class 1, clearly centered on inclusion and access and permanence of students in higher education through policies such as quota and other affirmative actions. Unlike the technical interest, which emphasized community organizations, here the (indirect) link with the “social” (the preponderant circle) resides in actor, subject, and vulnerability, with six of the eight studies in the class.

In practical interest, there was a strong emphasis on products of political decisions to expand the conditions of access and permanence of vulnerable students (or students benefited from quota policies). The studies’ practical interest goes, on the one hand, toward the structure and operation of educational institutions and, on the other hand, toward the action and conditions of vulnerable (or benefitted from quotas) students within universities.

Choices based on hermeneutics qualify practical interest (Habermas, 1982; Paes de Paula, 2016). Therefore, there is a strong correlation between legal frameworks (national and/or regulations internal to educational institutions) and references to symbolic interactionism, life history, double belonging, theories of social recognition, and critical discourse analysis. The hermeneutic bias emerges in questions, interpretations, and evaluations of decisions and actions of higher education institutions, alluding to the regulation of the quota policy and affirmative actions, in addition to the consequent impacts on students and their life history. Therefore, almost all studies (seven out of the eight in the class) were based on documentary research.

The research of practical interest, located in the hermeneutic matrix, preserves the knowledge of autobiography and collective tradition through the mediation among individuals, groups, and culture, as Paes de Paula (2016) recorded referencing Habermas. In the cases observed in this research, practical interest takes on post-structuralist perspectives, which defend micro-emancipation for not considering the possibility of expanded emancipation in the post-modern context (Paes de Paula, Maranhão, & Barros, 2009). In this set, there are research works that approach the emancipatory interest and others that approach the technical interest, configuring a hybrid matrix.

The Emancipatory Interest

Following Rodrigues (2004), we expanded the understanding of criticism to include interpretative, constructivist, and other similar perspectives, seeking to identify reflexive epistemological positions. The core of studies with emancipatory interest is “land,” although the word anchors research in all classes in the SA, adopting particular perspectives that reflect different natures of interest.

The weakest link to the word “land” is in class 1, with only one TS connected, referring to the name of an academic unit in a given university, i.e., without any relation to the indigenous territory. However, the link of the word to three studies in class 2, and three in class 3, occurs mainly to mention the place where the studies were carried out (locus).

With emancipatory interest, the word “land” gains another qualification. Seven of the eight studies that make up class 4, the core of emancipatory interest, are linked to this word. Except for one study (Box 2) adopting a functionalist perspective, the others take a critical sociological approach, with theoretical-methodological references that follow this alignment. We highlight that class 4 is the only one that categorically concentrates research with indigenous populations (in seven out of eight cases).

Research works classified as emancipatory interest debate rights and seek to understand dilemmas and resistances in various spheres. It questions the effects of economic activities imposed from the outside in and debates conflicting relationships between squatters and indigenous populations. However, some of the studies followed both a technical-instrumental bias and a critical-reflective perspective. There is also an interface with the hermeneutic matrix in two studies, which move towards post-structuralist approaches. In other words, the emancipatory interest in the word “land” predominates. However, it is possible to establish a relationship between the word and technical interest and practical interest. It is worth noting Paes de Paula’s (2016) observation that emancipation must be taken beyond a utopian face, going from theory to reconstruct public demands, arguing that the critical matrix does not exist independently.

Synthesis of Epistemic Matrices in the Research

This section seeks to conform the studies analyzed to Paes de Paula’s (2016) circle of epistemic matrices. Figure 3 illustrates the predominance of epistemological bases and sociological approaches aligned with the theoretical and methodological choices of the theses and dissertations examined.

Figure 3
Approximated position of classes in the circle of epistemic matrices

Most research is in a hybrid or border situation (Paes de Paula, 2016), as seen above by the overlap between the circles. The overlap occurs in all classes but can be especially evidenced in classes 2 and 3, in which technical interest predominates and is demarcated by the empirical-analytical matrix.

Studies in class 3 that interpret the indigenous view to formulate or analyze regulatory instruments are examples of the relationship with practical interest. In the differentiation between classes 2 and 3, we show that, while class 2 deals with research in collective economic organizations, with the presence of indigenous people - with full or partial participation - class 3 emphasizes their relationship with public issues and public policies, sectoral, or general. The insertion of the two classes in this sector of the diagram is justified by the interest in understanding indigenous organizations regarding instrumental aspects. Class 3 concentrates on functionalist approaches but at interfaces with approaches of critical and hermeneutic matrices. This situation is helpful to create new sociological methods by exploring the integration of knowledge from different matrices (Paes de Paula, 2016).

In turn, class 1 - “University and minority access to higher education” - is predominantly located in “practical interest”, as described in the previous item. It is in line with hermeneutic philosophy and interpretive logic (Paes de Paula, 2016). As for class 4, it is in “emancipatory interest,” centered on the critical matrix. Consequently, these studies are predominantly marked by critical sociological approaches, portraying conflict situations between indigenous people and society/state. For the most part, they assume a “denounce” nature that exposes situations experienced by indigenous communities and peoples.

Most of the studies of the analyzed sample used a qualitative approach (62.5% of the total), as opposed to 12.5% ​​that used a quantitative approach. This indicates the epistemological preferences of the field since qualitative methods are associated with interpretive and subjectivist conceptions of reality and hermeneutic and critical matrices. In contrast, the functionalist view traditionally uses quantitative methods, which are predominant in academic production in the area of ​​administration in Brazil (Godoi & Balsini, 2004).

We did not see uniformity in the use of theoretical references, the concepts evoked, or the authors cited in the analyzed sample. It was possible to observe a trend regarding these elements when taking the studies separated into classes. This is the case, notably, of class 1, with a practical character and studies focused on instruments for regulating the access and permanence of minorities (not exclusively indigenous populations) in higher education.

FINAL CONSIDERATIONS

This article analyzed theses and dissertations on indigenous populations in administrative science. It distinguished four classes of studies based on their common elements, delimited by epistemological characteristics read according to the references of knowledge and human interest by Habermas (1984) and circle of epistemic matrices, by Paes de Paula (2006).

Some challenges were identified, posing theoretical and methodological limitations to this study. The first is that of the 36 studies analyzed, only 21 (58%) directly addressed themes related to indigenous populations. Thus, this research examined a set of studies that partially maintained thematic uniformity. Theses and dissertations grouped in class 4 demonstrated emancipatory interest and critical bias and addressed the issues of the indigenous population more strongly and directly, with a predominance of cases involving Guarani peoples. It is worth mentioning the absence of research on indigenous populations in graduate programs in administration in the Northeast of Brazil.

Another limitation concerns the quality of the abstracts, which made the lexical analysis difficult, as pointed out in the methodological procedures. The analysis was equally hampered by a factor quite common to this type of study: the difference in languages used to refer to the same phenomenon. As this situation tends to disperse the results, adjustments were made to harmonize the textual corpus and classes, replacing words with synonyms.

The information obtained when using the software Iramuteq helped in the classification process and contributed when analyzing in-depth the groups of studies by reading the texts (which required interpreting the results obtained with the software). These procedures did not affect the value of the product in terms of epistemological choices and tendencies in administrative science, concerning the studies about indigenous populations.

This article points out the possibility of building innovative sociological approaches based on the field studied, integrating different epistemological matrices, and combining technical, practical, and emancipatory interests. Future research could bring together forms of organizational structure and strategies that collectively develop indigenous populations in movements for the struggle over land in the terms presented by the studies grouped in class 4.

Future studies could also focus on the systematization of experiences and conflicts of indigenous students, not exclusively in higher education, as observed in class 1, but also in non-indigenous schools at other levels of education. In this case, the theoretical basis could enter the domain of management and public policies. Another possibility, based on class 1, is the mapping of national researchers interested in indigenous themes within the scope of administrative science. At the graduate level, as in this study, it is interesting to systematize the reasons explaining the interests of advisors and students on topics regarding indigenous populations, qualifying academic origins, and paths.

In the technical and social management domains, the results of classes 2 and 3 identified possibilities for future research in terms of economic practices and collective organization of indigenous peoples in daily work aimed at their autonomy. Also, concepts could be incorporated from the matrices of such populations, embodied in their cosmovision and ethics, such as epistemologies based on sumaq kawsay (good living). This is the path we intend to follow in the continuity of the research that unfolds based on the findings highlighted in this article.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

We would like to thank the Coordination for the Improvement of Higher Education Personnel (CAPES), for funding researchers Eduardo Vivian da Cunha (n. 2026/2016) and Washington José de Sousa (n. 0344/2016) in the PGPSE program.

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• 1
  We listed 18 articles. Four of them cannot be considered as dealing with indigenous populations as delimited in the scope of this article.
• 2
  For this analysis, the TS size was parameterized to 40 words. Table 1 shows detailed information about these results.
• 3
  Some words were excluded in the process of building the similitude analysis. They are listed here in English to facilitate comprehension, but they were analyzed in Portuguese. The first was “indigenous,” excluded due to its high frequency and relationship concentration (which overshadows the other relationships). Other words excluded were: research, analysis, study, start, result, perform, consider, process, relation, analyze, objective, data, use, main, and larger.

• [Translated version] Note: All quotes in English translated by this article’s translator

Publication Dates

• Publication in this collection
  11 Mar 2022
• Date of issue
  Jan-Feb 2022

History

• Received
  03 Sept 2020
• Accepted
  25 Mar 2021