The material turn in organizational studies: contributions from “On Justification”

Abstract

This essay aims to contribute to the debate on the so-called “material turn” in social sciences, more specifically, to sociomateriality in organizational studies, including spatiality. We advocate the proposition of the theory of justification that states that the moments of dispute experienced in organizations are not limited to speeches but use objects and spaces to reaffirm their action logic. The theory of justification is approached considering its application in organizational studies, emphasizing the engagement of objects, things, and spaces that are activated in moments of dispute or test situations in organizations, contributing to the advances of this perspective of analysis. The study offers a perspective that adds to existing research on sociomateriality in organizational studies at different levels of analysis. After discussing the theory of justification, its moral logics, sociomateriality, and space in organizational studies, we show correlated studies and point out paths and reflections for a research agenda on the subject. The debate helps to understand the interaction of materiality with cognition, discourse, and behavior in different organizational dynamics.

Keywords:
Sociomateriality; Objects; Space; Things; Theory of justification

Resumo

O objetivo deste ensaio é o de contribuir para o debate sobre a “virada material” nas ciências sociais e, mais especificamente, a respeito da sociomaterialidade nos estudos organizacionais, incluindo a espacialidade. Defendemos a proposição da Teoria das Justificações, que preconiza que os momentos de disputa vivenciados nas organizações não se reduzem apenas aos discursos, mas se valem de objetos e espaços para reafirmar sua lógica de ação. Para isso, abordamos a Teoria das Justificações aplicada ao estudo das organizações, com destaque para o engajamento de objetos, coisas e espaços que são acionados nesses momentos de disputa ou de prova, tão presentes nas organizações, contribuindo para os avanços dessa perspectiva de análise. Com isso, oferecemos uma perspectiva que se soma às pesquisas existentes sobre sociomaterialidade nos estudos organizacionais, em diferentes níveis de análise. Depois de discutir a Teoria da Justificação, suas lógicas morais, a sociomaterialidade e o espaço nos estudos organizacionais, mostramos estudos correlacionados e apontamos caminhos e reflexões para uma agenda de pesquisa sobre o tema. O debate em torno da temática auxilia na compreensão da interação da materialidade com a cognição, o discurso e o comportamento nas diferentes dinâmicas organizacionais.

Palavras-chave:
Sociomaterialidade; Objetos; Espaço; Coisas; Teoria da justificação

Resumen

El propósito de este ensayo es contribuir al debate sobre el giro material en las ciencias sociales y, más específicamente, sobre la sociomaterialidad en los estudios organizacionales, incluida la espacialidad. Defendemos la proposición de la teoría de la justificación de que los momentos de disputa vividos en las organizaciones no se limitan a los discursos, sino que utilizan objetos y espacios para reafirmar su lógica de acción. Para ello, abordamos la teoría de la justificación aplicada al estudio de las organizaciones, con énfasis en la participación de objetos, cosas y espacios que se activan en estos momentos de disputa o prueba, tan presentes en las organizaciones, contribuyendo a los avances de esta perspectiva de análisis Así, ofrecemos una perspectiva que se suma a las investigaciones existentes sobre sociomaterialidad en los estudios organizacionales, en diferentes niveles de análisis. Luego de discutir la teoría de la justificación, su lógica moral, la sociomaterialidad y el espacio en los estudios organizacionales, mostramos estudios correlacionados y señalamos caminos y reflexiones para una agenda de investigación sobre el tema. El debate en torno al tema ayuda a comprender la interacción de la materialidad con la cognición, el discurso y el comportamiento en diferentes dinámicas organizacionales.

Palabras clave:
Sociomaterialidad; Objetos; Espacio; Cosas; Teoría de la justificación

INTRODUCTION

The term “sociomateriality” has become popular in the fields of information systems and organizational studies based on research led by Wanda J. Orlikowski (Orlikowski, 2007, 2010; Orlikowski & Scott, 2008). The author’s statement that “the social and the material are considered to be inextricably related - there is no social that is not also material, and no material that is not also social” (Orlikowski, 2007, p. 1437), has been repeatedly used to introduce this broad theoretical concept that philosophically challenges the separation between the social and the material (Jarzabkowski & Pinch, 2013; Leonardi, 2013) - a relationship ontologically supported in philosophical discussions presented by Latour (1987, 1992, 2012) and Barad (1996, 2003, 2007).

In Latour’s (2012) actor-network theory (ANT), the empirical reality is formed by “people, ideas, objects, artifacts, nature and the like are all joined together in an intricate network of associations that develop momentum over time” (Leonardi, 2013, p. 60), i.e., no inherent differences are found between the social and the material. Although the application of the ANT may be challenging (Braga & Suarez, 2018), many Brazilian scholars in the field of organizations have used the theory (Alcadipani & Tureta, 2009; Andrade, 2004; Cavalcanti & Alcadipani, 2013; Cerreto & Domenico, 2016; Tonelli, Brito, & Zambalde, 2011). According to the ANT, society and technology and humans and non-humans belong to the same world and mutually act on it (Chiapello & Gilbert, 2019).

In Barad’s philosophical discussions, according to Orlikowski (2007), agential realism is complementary to the ANT (which starts from a more epistemological than ontological reflection). Barad postulates that objects and phenomena do not have agency; they receive agency when people use different apparatuses to understand them. In this sense, phenomena are discursively constructed with an epistemological stance that understands the individuals’ knowledge about the natural world as inseparably connected to the technologies they use to observe it (Leonardi, 2013).

Such debates have contributed to organizational studies in understanding the “material turn” in the social sciences (Carlile, Nicolini, Langley, & Tsoukas, 2013; De Vaujany, 2019; De Vaujany & Mitev, 2013; De Vaujany & Vaast, 2014; Leonardi, 2013; Leonardi, Nardi, & Kallinikos, 2012; Lorino, 2013; Robichaud & Cooren, 2013; Simpson, Cunha, & Clegg, 2015; Chiapello & Gilbert, 2019; Taylor & Spicer, 2007) and shed light on previously neglected organizational phenomena, enhancing the empirical dimension of academic research in this field (De Vaujany, 2019; Faraj &Azad, 2012). Against this backdrop, artifacts, mechanisms, and management tools that animate the administrative routine were recognized as devices confined within large companies, nonprofit organizations, public organizations, and society as a whole. They have become indispensable mediators in the analysis of social relationships (Chiapello & Gilbert, 2019).

However, the growing popularity of sociomateriality research in organizational studies occurred with the “uncomfortable lack” (Borges & Takahashi, 2021) of the spatial dimension i.e., the material turn in this field was not followed by a “spatial turn.” In this sense, this essay contributes to this theme by shedding light on sociomateriality encompassing material artifacts and the discussion about the role of the spatial dimension in organizational life, supported by the sociological theory of Boltanski and Thévenot (2006 ¹).

This sociologic theory was developed based on the theoretical principles of the economics of convention. It is a perspective starting from the analysis of actors in moments of dispute, assessing situations based on conventions around people, things, and actions (Boltanski & Thévenot, 2006). Although this theory is considered a form of pragmatic discourse analysis, in which justification logic is examined as actors’ interpretation and evaluation logic, they do not necessarily emerge in discursive form (Diaz-Bone, 2018). Thus, justifications are based on the engagement of objects or other elements of the situation and must offer proof of their claims. Objects, people, and events need to be qualified to be used as evidence according to the specific order of worth (grandeur) invoked by the actor (Thévenot, Moody, & Lafaye, 2000).

Such a perspective considers that justification orders cannot be reduced only to discourses. Thus, researchers can only identify and understand the worlds of justification by being present or fully understanding the spatiality around the actors at the moment of their “speech” or “expression.” This condition leads to research methods that capture such logic and makes it possible to gather what is said and the different objects, people, and artifacts invoked at that specific moment.

This research adopts the theory of justification as the theory has gained recognition in the field of organizational studies (H. Amblard, Bernoux, Herreros, & Livian, 1996; M. Amblard, 2003; Jagd, 2011; Krieger & Andion, 2014; Lafaye, 1996) and in sociomateriality research (Chiapello & Albert, 2019; Daudigeos & Valiorgue, 2018; Mitev, Morgan-Thomas, Lorino, De Vaujany, & Nama, 2018; Reinecke, Van Bommel, & Spicer, 2018; Salminen, 2018).

In line with this theoretical perspective, adopting pragmatic ontologies in sociomateriality research has been considered an opportunity to expand this debate in the field of organizational analysis (Holtz, 2021). Despite its remarkable relevance, research in organizational studies addressing sociomateriality in Brazil is still scarce. A systematic search in the SPELL and Scielo databases returned seven articles published on the subject, and none of them considered the spatiality dimension. Therefore, this study seeks to contribute by discussing the sociomateriality of objects, things, and spaces based on Boltanski and Thévenot’s (2006) theory of justification applied to the study of organizations, adding to the research agenda on the subject.

Therefore, this research aims to contribute to the debate on the “material turn” in the social sciences and, more specifically, include spatiality when addressing sociomateriality in organizational studies. The section below presents the theory of justification to support the sociomateriality research in the field of organizational studies, followed by a section discussing the space in organizational studies based on spatial sociomateriality. The last two sections present paths and reflections for a research agenda on the subject and final remarks.

JUSTIFICATION THEORY: MORAL LOGICS IN CONFLICT

Unlike other approaches to sociology, the sociological theory developed by Boltanski and Thévenot (2006) is based on the theoretical principles of the economics of convention. It focuses on actors who coordinate in situations where they need to achieve a common good and, therefore, seek to resolve the uncertainties regarding the quality and meaning involved in these moments. Boltanski and Thévenot (2006) adopt a pragmatist approach and consider that actors are competent to judge the adequacy of their choices to the situation and to develop stable compromises according to different orders of worth.

Boltanski and Thévenot (2006) seek to demonstrate that there is more than one form of creating value in society, corroborating Stark’s (2000) argument that modern economies present multiple principles of evaluation or multiple orders of worth. They observe beliefs, values, ​​and the representations of actors linked to test situations or disputes experienced.

They move away from the Parsonian institutionalists’ notions of culture and social group to follow people in their critical moments, moments of disruption of the order when people face circumstances that lead them to adjust their measures of worth. In this case, moral structures are central to sociological analysis, as they inform actors’ action, evaluation, and distribution of social value in their everyday practices (Boltanski & Chiapello, 2005, 2020; Boltanski & Thévenot, 2006, 2020; Thevenot, 2001).

The authors assumed that justifications descend from commonplaces or higher common principles and extracted from the analysis of canonical texts of political philosophy a set of six common goods, or polities, that operate in different types of social interaction in everyday life. They observed the operation of six polities or worlds: the inspired world (The City of God, Saint Augustine); the domestic world (Sacred Scripture, Bossuet); the world of fame (The Leviathan, Hobbes); the civic world (The Social Contract, Rousseau); the industrial world (On Social Physiology, Saint-Simon); and the market world (The Wealth of Nations, Adam Smith) (Boltanski & Thévenot, 2006, 2020). Two other world were observed later. The world “by project,” or networked, appeared in the 1990s and incorporated criticisms of the capitalist forms of work that emerged in the 1960s. Its main actors are qualified for their ability to form networks and design or manage a project (Boltanski & Chiapello, 2009, 2020). The other one - the “green” or ecological world - was developed by Thévenot in collaboration with other authors. It is a response to ecological criticism and highlights the concern for the preservation of the natural, biological, and climatic environment (Lafaye & Thévenot, 1993; Thévenot, Moody, & Lafaye, 2000).

Empirical data collected in the test situations allow forming a panorama of the types of justification most often used in daily confrontations, ordered according to moral logics and described by the authors as “worlds of justification” or cités, following the polities presented above: the inspired world (holiness, creativity, imagination, artistic sensibility); the domestic world (respect and reputation); the world of fame (self-esteem); the civic world (collective goods); the market world (desires of individuals; rare goods); the industrial world (technological objects; scientific methods; productivity and efficiency); the world “by project” (networked world); and the “green” world (ecological, environmentally sustainable, responsible). Such orders of worth can coexist in the same social space, being more or less relevant according to the nature of the material and symbolic objects involved in the situation (Boltanski, 2001).

Boltanski and Thévenot’s theory of justification (1999, 2006, 2020) takes into account the attempt to understand the plurality of logics guiding the coordination of actors at critical moments. People invoke moral reasons as evidence when justifying their actions or criticize the actions of others and use material artifacts to explain their choices. The “imperative of justification,” i.e., the use of arguments as justification to find agreements, is the foundation for sustaining and coordinating individuals’ behavior (Martins & Amaral, 2009).

An important feature of the moments when people enter into dispute is the establishment of equivalence. This operation allows those involved in a dispute to find a mutual understanding of the terms that establish an agreement between the parties. Different regimes of justification coexist in the same social space and are more or less relevant according to the nature of the material and symbolic objects involved in the situation (Boltanski, 2001). Thus, objects, spaces, and people invoked during moments of justification are material evidence of the state of worth in which the actor is supported at the moment of dispute. The gathering of these different elements is used to justify the actor’s position and clarify the principle of equivalence these items have in common. The equivalence is the main measure of worth to establish the regime of justice or regime of justification (Boltanski & Thévenot, 1999).

SOCIOMATERIALITY IN ORGANIZATIONAL STUDIES AND THE JUSTIFICATION THEORY

The so-called “material turn” in organizational studies observes how the organizations’ activities rely on “materialities that lace together social relations, physical structures, and organizational processes” (Simpson et al., 2015, p. 376). Several studies have sought to understand how materiality interacts with cognition, discourse, and behavior in organizational dynamics (Callon, 2013; Carlile et al., 2013; De Vaujany & Mitev, 2013; De Vaujany & Vaast, 2014; Leonardi et al., 2013; De Vaujany & Vaast, 2014; Leonardi et al., 2012; Mitev et al., 2018; De Vaujany, 2019). In this sense, it is possible to explore managerial techniques based on different approaches aiming to understand their relationship with the materiality of artifacts. The observation of material artifacts the actors use to guide collective activities in organizations may consider the different understandings of management techniques (such as tools, ideology, culture, or activities), which can overlap in certain situations (Mitev et al., 2018).

In particular, the approach that classifies managerial artifacts and techniques as activity (Mitev et al., 2018) corroborates Chiapello and Gilbert’s (2019) classification of investment in forms. This approach adopts an institutionalist perspective (Chiapello & Gilbert, 2019) grounded on Boltanski and Thévenot’s (2006) conventionalist approach. The term “conventionalist” is adopted in reference to the theory of justifications, also known as convention theory (Mitev et al., 2018). The main relationship of this theory with sociomateriality lies in Thévenot’s (2001) primary concern of understanding how objects can participate in the moral world, seeking to bring the understanding of “the good” and “the real” closer together.

The quality of artifacts and management tools, through the “investment in forms” approach, depends on the context and its relationship with individuals, groups, and society in general, based on the perspective of social analysis (Chiapello & Gilbert, 2019). The term “investment in forms” highlights Eymard-Duvernay and Thévenot’s understanding of the set of tools (norms, standards, regulations) necessary for any form of production, an essential characteristic of Boltanski and Thévenot’s (2006) order of worth. Adopting these tools always entails some form of cost or investment, but they save time, bring fluidity, and offer regularity of actions. This approach is based on three axioms of convention theory: the conventional nature of social life, the coexistence of a plurality of conventions, and their productive and interactive nature. The interest of conventionists in artifacts and management tools permeates the understanding that they incorporate and adopt conventions that guide actions. They also affect behavior and social cognition differently if other conventions are adopted (Chiapello & Gilbert, 2019).

An example of research that used the theory of justification in this context was the one developed by Daudigeos and Valiorgue (2018) when they observed the involvement of material devices in the coordination process in organizations with multiple and heterogeneous principles, i.e., with different institutional logics. Based on empirical examples, the authors proposed three categories of objects and devices involved in responses to the institutional pluralism of organizations: specific, composite, and settlement objects, each representing different forms of response.

The specific objects are those Boltanski and Thévenot (2006, p. 40) related to certain principles of action that form “a coherent and self-sufficient world, a nature.” These objects help the understanding of the worth of the people involved in test situations, i.e., in the identification of worth mechanisms, so that they can be presented as rules, diplomas, codes, tools, buildings, machines, or in other ways (Boltanski & Thévenot, 2006). According to the theory, objects of a specific logic conflict with objects that strongly represent other logic. The presence of objects with conflicting logics can generate tension in the environment since they suggest the existence of more than one effective way of evaluating and coordinating collective action. In this case, the elimination of institutional pluralism occurs when one world takes priority over the other and ends up dominating it (Daudigeos & Valiorgue, 2018).

Composite objects, on the other hand, embody and maintain organizational compromise over time. When there is tension between competing principles of two different worlds, the actors reach a compromise and, thus, agree to coexist in the same environment. In this sense, the situation remains composite, but conflict is averted (Daudigeos & Valiorgue, 2018). The stability achieved with the compromise between different orders of worth is supported by tools and devices that take on a “new form” based on the agreement (Thévenot, 1996). Such objects, now at the service of the compromise made between the actors, acquire a new identity that makes them recognizable to both worlds in a neutral, indivisible way. Compromises established with composite objects are more resistant to criticism, as the new common identity helps to form and maintain the more stable compromise (Boltanski & Thévenot, 2006).

The settlements or localized solutions represent temporary agreements between two worlds. In these cases, the agreement made between the actors aims to temporarily close the dispute, even if the issue is not resolved (Daudigeos & Valiorgue, 2018). The objects of these situations were called “settlement objects,” as they represent those used by the actors to achieve their personal interests. This type of situational agreement does not lead to a compromise about the common good but rather an agreement in which the parties involved get what they want (Boltanski & Thévenot, 2006).

For Chiapello and Gilbert (2019), the recognition of agency categories of objects and the transformations they produce starts from the identification of three functions of management tools. The epistemic function observes how the tools propose knowledge to (or impose on) people and their relationship with cognition and information processing. The pragmatic function understands how the tools allow action and propose/impose their practices, forms of action, and decisions regarding the relationship between workers and their activities. Finally, the political function describes how tools produce and reproduce power relations between people, even when they were not designed for that purpose (Chiapello & Gilbert, 2019).

The studies by Chiapello and Gilbert (2019), Daudigeos and Valiorgue (2018), and Mitev et al. (2018) are good examples of approximations between the materiality of artifacts, devices, tools, and objects with Boltanski and Thévenot’s theory of justification (2006). The next section presents the spatial dimension of sociomateriality - still little explored in organizational studies, based on Boltanski and Thévenot’s (2006) orders of worth.

BEYOND ARTIFACTS IN STUDIES OF SOCIOMATERIALITY: THE SPACE IN ORGANIZATIONAL STUDIES

For a long time, the spaces, and places where management occurs were portrayed in the literature as neutral spaces, usually researched as categories empirically and analytically separated from others. The approximation of the debate on the “spatial turn” to the reality of organizational studies revealed the possibility of explicitly observing space in field analyses rather than only being implicitly observed by traditional theories. Studies on the topic vary in focus and consider “organizational architectures” as constitutive elements of organizational structure (Lorino, 2013). They also theorize the “spatial legacies” formed by space and organizational legitimacy over time (De Vaujany & Vaast, 2014), allowing different aspects of the spatial dimension or “organizational spaces” to be observed based on different spatial levels (Taylor & Spicer, 2007).

“Organizational spaces” were the object of multilevel analysis theorized by Taylor and Spicer (2007), based on a review of studies in the management field. The authors consider the notions put forward by Lefebvre (1991), and the synthesis of their analysis suggests a definition of organizational spaces that starts from three analytically related dimensions: a) practices of distance and proximity - spatial practice - emphasizing the physicality of how people, materials, and products move in spaces, relating materiality to positioning; b) planning of spatialized power relations - spatial planning - which concerns the planning dynamics that sustain organizational spaces; and c) imagined experiences - spatial imagination - which refer to the symbolism and language expressed in spaces. Although the three dimensions present significantly different dynamics, they cannot be analytically separated. In this sense, Figure 1 seeks to represent the multilevel analysis of “organizational spaces” proposed by Taylor and Spicer (2007) and its relationship with the pragmatic, political, and epistemic functions of the proposed management tools of Chiapello and Gilbert (2019).

Figure 1
Spatial scales and organizational levels

The studies on space as a spatial practice start from the Euclidean geometric approach, from the absolutist understanding, with an observation of physical distance and the understanding that spatial distances can be objectively measured. From this perspective, it is possible to highlight studies aimed at analyzing the layout of workplaces, the spatial dynamics in industries, the strategic positioning seeking resources, clustering based on competitive dynamics, the approach to network analysis, and regional clustering. Despite the advantages and contributions to the field of organizational studies, understanding organizational space based on distances and proximities does not help explain the actors’ perceptions and experiences in organizational dynamics. Furthermore, this approach fails to explain how patterns of power and resistance influence the manifestation of distance and proximity, i.e., how the configuration of space takes shape and how it is practiced (Taylor & Spicer, 2007).

The approach of organizational space as the materialization of power relations - spatial planning - is based on the analytical categories that depart from Marx studies on economic space. In these analyses of the new spaces resulting from industrial capitalism in the United Kingdom in the mid-nineteenth century, the questioning revolves around how they represented the materialization of changes in power relations caused by the capitalist system. Studies based on this approach analyze the spatial arrangements of cities as mechanisms for controlling the workforce, observing the role of architecture, organizational layout and the work environment for the maintenance of power relations. Based on these observations, analyses also emerged regarding the use of space in a deviant way, and the relationship between work and non-work. These studies highlight the “blurring” phenomena of public (work) and private (domestic) space, based on new organizational boundaries, for example, borderless organizations, virtual organizations, and homeworking. Thus, this approach allows analyzing why spaces are configured, considering organizational and city spaces as mechanisms of power control and domination (Taylor & Spicer, 2007).

When examining the approach to space as experience - spatial imagination - Taylor and Spicer (2007) consider that studies of the previous approach (space as the materialization of power relations) may disregard spaces as a manifestation of the experiences and meanings of the inhabitants. This approach moves away from understanding organizational space as a physical manifestation. It proposes a symbolic and aesthetic analysis that can understand the influence of organizational spaces on the organizations’ culture and identity, the stories the spaces tell, and how users “rewrite” them. Criticisms of this approach are opposite to the previous one. For example, one of the arguments highlights that focusing only on the aesthetic dimensions of organizational spaces can limit the perception of the power relations that condition the symbols under analysis, just as the different experiences lived in a place can be related to different structural positions in the power relations that these individuals occupy (Cairns, 2002; Willmott, 1993).

De Vaujany and Vaast’s (2014) proposal argues that both organizational spaces and legitimacy are temporally imbricated through spatial practices. The authors conceptualize the idea of ​​“spatial legacies” “as enduring repositories of an organization’s spatial history” (De Vaujany & Vaast, 2014, p. 725). They understand that spatial legacies perform the material function of displaying traces of spaces and spatial practices from previous periods in the organizational space. Like a “memory,” spatial legacies can become materially obsolete. However, they can maintain the symbolic function used to reinforce legitimacy. Thus, their theorization starts from the approach of space as imagination and spatial practice (Taylor & Spicer, 2007) when they defend that the imbrication of organizational space and legitimacy occurs through internal spatial practices. Figure 2 represents this temporal imbrication process.

Figure 2
The imbrication over time of organizational space and legitimacy through spatial legacies and practices

The authors contribute to broadening the discussion regarding the spatial dimension in organizational studies when dealing with the imbrication of an organization’s space and its claims of legitimacy over time. They start from the idea that the spatial or sociomaterial legacies of the past can be imported into the future while they are constantly shaped and remodeled by appropriation, reappropriation, and dispossession practices. Thus, design, space redesign, and ongoing spatial practices respond to immediate organizational needs and changing institutional conditions (De Vaujany & Vasst, 2014). However, it is clear that the study highlights the intra-organizational dynamics, leaving aside the relationships between the organizational space and its broader geographic environment.

The study by Gaudin (2018) explores how the classical pragmatic view of sensory perception contributes to research in urban contexts in geography, anthropology, and sociology. Although its approach does not deal with organizational studies, it makes it possible to reflect on how to observe built environments in the urban spatial context “as a concrete conditioning factor of social interactions themselves” (Gaudin, 2018, p. 176). The study argues that physical space is responsible for constituting the scenario in which human interactions take place and also directly relates to how these interactions are shaped, approaching the perspective of space as experience - spatial imagination (Taylor & Spicer, 2007). The study is based on Dewey’s concept of “valuation” (1939), explaining that individuals develop practical preferences manifested in their bodily expressions - gestures, attitudes, and conduct. These preferences are formed even before the conscious claim to individuals’ values. Thus, values emerge from choices and preferences manifested in situations of conflict.

Studies based on the theoretical principles of the conventionalist approach, on which Boltanski and Thévenot’s theory of justification (2006) is based, approach the perspective of space as experience - spatial imagination (Taylor & Spicer, 2007). Using a bottom-up view, manifested by a pragmatic microsociology, the theory of justification understands that different regimes of justification can coexist in the same social space and are relevant according to the nature of the materiality involved in the situation. In this sense, gathering different objects, devices, spaces, and people used to justify the position of individuals in a given situation clarifies the principle of equivalence that such items have in common.

From this perspective, Salminen (2018) developed the analysis of the spatial aspect based on the theory of justification, demonstrating that the worlds of justification have distinct spatial logics. Since human thought is multimodal, this understanding assumes that spatial metaphors are used to argue and justify their views. Thus, the author reinforces the relationship between sociomateriality and the theory of justification when remembering that material objects - devices - are an important part of the argumentation or justification process during disputes at critical moments. Therefore, the objects invoked by people during justification represent the values ​​expressed or manifested by the corresponding worlds.

By bringing the space for analysis, Salminen (2018) proposes its interpretation based on the worlds of justification, using the image schemes inspired by Johnson (1987) and Lakoff (1987). According to these authors, people use image schemas when describing a real physical space and using metaphors to represent the space figuratively - they create visuospatial metaphors. Visuospatial metaphors are powerful argumentation tools that allow controversies to be analyzed using a new method.

Three image schemes are used to interpret the similarities and differences between the justification worlds: container, source-path-goal, and vertical scaling scheme.

Box 1shows that the domestic world and the world of renown have the spatial logic of the container image schema in opposite ways. While the domestic world is represented as an environment closed and protected from external threats, the world of fame values the outside and the opinions of those outside the circle of acquaintances (Salminen, 2018). This understanding transported to a multilevel analysis leads to the interpretation of a passage from the micro to the macro approach in organizational studies, i.e., how an intraorganizational action or activity is “escalated” or “transported” to other dimensions within or outside the organizational structure under analysis.

Box 1
Spatial logics and image schemas in the worlds of justification

The industrial world and the inspired world share the source-path-goal scheme but also in an opposite way. While, in the first, space is a means to an end, in the second, space is the end itself. In other words, in the industrial world, space is planned, controlled, and measured as a means to achieve goals. However, in the inspired world, it is valuable when it cannot be measured; the emphasis is on the journey itself. The vertical scale image schema represents the market and civic worlds, in which space in the market world allows financial exchanges for profit to expand the hierarchical order between people. Urban space, more specifically, cities, is the main arena that gives rise to competition. In contrast, in the civic world, cities are considered shared public forums, and meeting points, where differences between people are reduced (Salminen, 2018). Once again, research based on the theory of justification must pay attention to the different levels of spatiality considered in the observed situations.

PATHS AND REFLECTIONS FOR A RESEARCH AGENDA

Studies by De Vaujany and Vaast (2014), Gaudin (2018), and Salminen (2018) offer an alternative analysis of the controversies of Boltanski and Thévenot’s (2006) worlds of justification. The case of Salminen (2018) uses spatial metaphors in a street space dispute in the city of Tampere, Finland, and allows a new way of analyzing the multimodality of human thought based on image schemes. The analysis enables applying the method in cases in which the interference of spatiality seems to be less obvious.

Likewise, Lorino’s (2013) analogy suggests applying the sociomateriality approach in management systems based on the analysis of “organizational architectures.” The author demonstrates that organizational studies can address an organization’s “architectural instruments” - business tools and management models - framing them with the collective activities that transmit narrative - “architextures.” This context reinforces the role of “organizational architecture” as a mediator, which connects the reality of the activity performed to other things such as values, beliefs, norms, and institutions, allowing collective activity to be carried out effectively in organizations.

Based on these discussions, the theory of justification represents an important contribution to the field of sociomateriality in organizational studies. By moving away from the human/object, rational/substantive, fair/unfair dichotomies present in many studies in the field, the authors show how the multiplicity and complexity of logics can coexist, including non-humans as mediators of the actors’ justification processes. Thus, it is possible to observe the state of worth in which the actors are grounded in moments of dispute or conflict.

In addition, this theory highlights the absences, sacrifices, and losses in the daily confrontation of the organizational coordination processes. Boltanski and Thévenot’s (2006) logic allows us to understand the complex process of coordinating different artifacts, management techniques, resources, and spaces in the organizational process, as part of interdependent activities or tasks and as a fundamental part of conflicting activities belonging to a relational process of multiple compromises and agreements (Petani, 2016). The compromises between the different types of logics can be interpreted as the elements that integrate the organizational process as a whole, showing how they have competing types of logics that need to be reconciled for the organizational activity to develop.

In the literature, the arrangement of conflicting elements is explained by organizational hybridity as “the mixing of core organizational elements that would conventionally not go together” in the same organizational context (Battilana, Becharov, & Mitzinneck, 2017, p. 138). This coexistence of different interests in the same organization, or the persistent contradiction between interdependent elements - defined as paradoxes or tensions - is a prerogative in many forms of organization. This theme appears consolidated by the adoption of diversified theoretical perspectives. Recent studies adopt the perspective of pluralist institutional analysis, characterizing organizations through competing rationalities (Cloutier & Langley, 2007; Kalberg, 1980; Kraatz & Block, 2008); institutional logics (Pache & Thornton, 2020; Reay & Hinings, 2009; Thornton, 2004; Thornton, Ocasio, & Lounsbury, 2012); frame analysis (Grenier & Bernardini-Perinciolo, 2016; Millar, Hall, & Miller, 2020); conventionalist framework (Mitev et al., 2018; Reinecke et al., & Spider, 2017), and pluralist contexts (Denis, Langley, & Rouleau, 2007; Jarzabkowski & Fenton, 2006) to explain the coexistence of different rationalities (Jagd, 2011) in the same organizational context. The theory of justifications adds to these approaches, enriching them and showing how several worlds can coexist based on stabilizations that happen through intra and inter-organizational agreements in formal organizations, networks, and alternative organizational forms that use material objects and spaces to justify their different logic choices.

Against this backdrop and considering the gaps and advances in recent studies, we present possible research propositions that can contribute to the field, offering opportunities for new research paths, knowing that other possibilities may emerge.

The first line of research could focus on everyday practices and compromises that actors may establish in formal and/or informal organizational spaces to understand the complexity of the adjustments that encompass the situation’s complexity. Such analysis can help to understand the refusal of compromise, which is a way to understand the plurality of sacrifice in different situations in diverse organizational spaces.

Studies focused on spatial legacies can contribute to understanding worlds apprehended by the organization in spaces and spatial practices from previous periods to try to clarify the role of symbolism and the “memory” contained in these legacies. This reinforces legitimacy and strengthens the development of studies based on the approach to space as experience - spatial imagination.

Another perspective is the study of the controversies in many test situations or moral dilemmas experienced by organizations that propose to act in the field of social impact based on a social mission with financial return. Such studies could reveal a plurality of worlds, in addition to those commonly studied, namely, the social and the economic. In this sense, insights into the “world of fame,” for example, could be revealed, as well as the stabilization sought between the different worlds within the logic of the “new spirit of capitalism” - in which objects and spaces are activated.

Studies on sociomateriality in decision-making processes of coordination between paradoxical activities, such as activities that involve “autonomy and conformity,” “learning and mechanization of work,” “innovation and efficiency,” among others, could be sought.

The theory of justifications could be used to investigate sacrifices, absences, and trade-offs typical of the “organizational architectures” of collective and inter-situtional activities in organizations.

The perspective discussed here thus reveals the importance of pragmatic approaches in analyzing the materiality of artifacts, devices, tools, objects, and spaces, contributing to the debate on the “material turn” in organizational studies. In addition, by “embracing” the theory of justifications as “a theory that is worthy for its own sake” (Cloutier, Gond, & Leca, 2017), we expand the opportunities for research in the field of organizational studies to call attention to the actors’ justification process. Based on the rhetorical foundations of critique, it is possible to recognize the plurality of moral orders that involve the normative contradictions underlying individual, institutional, and social life at different levels of analysis.

FINAL REMARKS

The progressive regulation of society through artifacts reveals the importance of studies to understand the relationship of such regulation with human action. This phenomenon is evident in the field of administration and management since it is commonly found in management tools. This study realizes the importance of this issue and seeks to contribute to this discussion. It is grounded on the understanding of the mediators of social relations that require analyses that combine the concern with actors, social groups, power relations, and beliefs with conventions and models of judgment, political philosophies, and forms of knowledge that animate these objects (Chiapello & Gilbert, 2019).

This research aimed to contribute to the debate on the “material turn” in the social sciences and, more specifically, the sociomateriality in organizational studies (including spatiality), based on the theory of justification (Boltanski & Thévenot, 2006). The study observed the role of objects, things, and spaces, material or symbolic, in the actors’ justification process. These are essential material evidence for the theory, allowing us to demonstrate the state of worth through which actors support each other in moments of dispute or conflict. We show that the objects and objectivity of materiality support the link between cognition and coordination insofar as the different “forms of investments” offer the material evidence and the involvement of objects needed to clarify the different possibilities of access to reality (Thévenot, 2001).

Lorino (2013) observes how “organizational architectures” constitute elements of the organizational structure. De Vaujany and Vaast (2014) observe the temporal imbrication between space and organizational legitimacy in the so-called “spatial legacies.” Salminen (2018) explores the “spatial logics” of worlds of justification based on image schema inspired by Johnson (1987) and Lakoff (1987). Gaudin (2018), in turn, contributes to the debate on the observation of the manifestations of bodily expressions - gestures, attitudes, and conduct - in environments built in the urban spatial context as demonstrations of choices and preferences manifested in situations of confrontation. Taylor and Spicer (2007) reinforce the non-neutrality of different spatial levels of organizations by adopting the term “organizational spaces,” categorized by the possibility of studying space as distance, the materialization of power relations, or space as experience. All these perspectives demonstrate alternatives for using pragmatic approaches, contributing to the debate on the “material turn” in organizational studies.

By demonstrating that recently published studies - such as those by Chiapello and Gilbert (2019), Daudigeos and Valiorgue (2018), Mitev et al. (2018), Reinecke et al. (2018), and Salminen (2018) - are evidence of the relevance of analyzing the materiality of artifacts, devices, tools, objects, and spaces for organizational studies, we weave relevant theoretical and empirical approximations between these artifacts and Boltanski and Thévenot’s theory of justification (2006), suggesting a research agenda.

As highlighted by Lorino (2013) and Mitev et al. (2018), we hope that theoretical-empirical research in organizational studies can be enriched with the discussion presented in this article, adopting analytical approaches that include the material - whether an artifact, device, and tool, or an object, space, place, or bodily expression - in the observation of collective activities in organizations. These examples strengthen the initial argument of this article and the proposed research agenda, opening the possibility for further studies approaching the phenomenon of sociomateriality in the field of organizations.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

The authors are grateful for the financial support (research grant and scholarship) from the Brazilian Coordination for the Improvement of Higher Education Personnel (Capes) (Financing Code 001); the National Council for Scientific and Technological Development (CNPq); the Foundation for Support of Research and Innovation of the State of Santa Catarina- Brazil (FAPESC); and the Santa Catarina State University (Udesc).

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• 1
  Theory presented in the book On Justification: Economies of Worth (2006, English version), first published in 1987 with the the title Les èconomies de la grandeur and reprinted in a revised version in 1991 with the title De la justification: Les èconomies de la grandeur.

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

Publication Dates

• Publication in this collection
  13 Jan 2023
• Date of issue
  Nov-Dec 2022

History

• Received
  11 Nov 2021
• Accepted
  11 Apr 2022