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The Politics of the Behavioural Revolution in Organization Studies

School of Management, University of Leicester, Leicester, UK, mt66{at}le.ac.uk

This article addresses the behavioural revolution in organization studies of the 1950s. It tries to unravel, via Foucaultian ‘eventalization’, the conditions that made the ‘behavioural sciences’ emerge at that historical juncture. I argue that the relationship of the Ford Foundation with the Graduate School of Industrial Administration and concomitantly with Herbert Simon, James March and others, was firmly embedded in the Cold War politics of the time. These relationships mirrored governmental, public policy, education and foundation concerns with socialism, as well as communist infiltration in the universities at a formative period in the development of organization and management studies, contributing to functionalism and positivism being institutionalized in these disciplines.

Key Words: Carnegie School • Cold War • Ford Foundation • organization studies • positivism

Organization, Vol. 16, No. 5, 733-754 (2009)
DOI: 10.1177/1350508409338882


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