The Changing Organization: Agency Theory in a Cross-Cultural Context

The Changing Organization provides a multidisciplinary approach for studying the management of change under conditions of complexity. Single-discipline approaches frequently miss essential elements that reduce the possibility of coherence within a multi-agency organizational setting. Combining a systems and cybernetic 'living system' perspective, Guo, Yolles, Fink, and Iles offer a new agency paradigm designed to model, diagnose and analyse complex, real-world situations. Its capacity to anticipate patterns of behaviour provides useful means by which the origin of crises can be understood, and resolutions reflected upon. Scholars and graduate students in fields as diverse as management, politics, anthropology and psychology will find numerous applications for this book when considering socio-political and organizational change, and it offers an invaluable guide for consultants who may wish to apply advanced techniques of contextual analysis to real-world situations.

Table of Contents:
Part I. The Agency: 1. The cultural agency; 1.1 Introduction; 1.2 The configuration approach; 1.3 Viable living systems and cultural agency; 2. The instrumental and strategic agencies; 2.1 Introduction; 2.2 The strategic agency; 2.3 Two views on strategic management; 2.4 The knowledge management paradigm; 2.5 Complexity and viable systems; 2.6 Knowledge cybernetics; 2.7 Agency pathology; 3. Agency personality; 3.1 Introduction; 3.2 Modelling the collective agency; 3.3 Agency trait theory and Maruyama types; 3.4 Intelligences and efficacy in agency traits; 3.5 Conclusion; 4. The intelligent agency; 4.1 Introduction; 4.2 Theories of intelligence; 4.3 Organisational intelligences; 4.4 Agency process intelligences and efficacy; 4.5 Knowledge strategy agency case; 5. Agency types and traits; 5.1 Introduction; 5.2 Traits, enantiomers and agency type; 5.3 Individualism and collectivism; 5.4 Some thoughts; 6. Agency consciousness; 6.1 Introduction; 6.2 Undecidability and generic system hierarchies; 6.3 Substructure modelling; 6.4 Illustration of superstructure modelling; 6.5 The case of negotiation and agency internalisation; Part II. Agency Change: 7. Joint alliances; 7.1 Introduction; 7.2 International alliances in Central Europe; 7.3 Knowledge management and knowledge transfer in a cross-cultural context; 7.4 Viable knowledge creation and learning in international alliances; 7.5 Modelling alliances; 7.6 Application of the model to a case study of the Czech Academic Link Project (CZALP); 7.7 Application of the model to a case study of the Czech Academic Link project (CZALP); The CZALP Project Phase 1; The CZALP Project Phase 2 and 3; 7.7 Outcome; 8. Agency dynamics; 8.1 Introduction; 8.2 Kuhn, Piaget: from paradigm crisis to transformation; 8.3 Understanding paradigms; 8.4 Paradigms under change; 8.5 Transformation and paradigms; 8.6 Trait system dynamics; 8.7 Baoshang Bank case study; 8.8 Some thoughts; Part III. Agency as Society: 9. The sociological and political agencies; 9.1 Introduction; 9.2 Parsons; 9.3 Luhmann; 9.4 Habermas; 9.5 Agency and socio-cultural processes; 9.6 The political dimension of agency; 9.7 Luhmann, Habermas, agency and practice; 10. The economic agency; 10.1 Introduction; 10.2 Economics and policy; 10.3 Macroeconomic modelling; 10.4 Economic agency; 10.5 Traits, policy and macroeconomics; 10.6 Case situation: the 2008 European Recession and mindscapes; 10.7 Observations; 11. The financial agency; 11.1 Introduction; 11.2 The Chinese context; 11.3 The impact of shadow banking; 11.4 Viewing banking through agency; 11.5 Agency pathologies and corruption; 11.6 Conclusions; Notes; References; Index.

About the Author :
Kaijun Guo is director of strategy at the Baoshang Bank in China, and associate chairman. He has a doctorate in Management from Liverpool John Moores University, and post-graduate teaching experience. He also has Asian responsibility for the Centre for the Creation of Coherent Change and Knowledge based at Liverpool John Moores University. Maurice Yolles is Professor Emeritus in Management Systems at Liverpool John Moores University. He heads the Centre for the Creation of Coherent Change and Knowledge. Within this context, he has also been involved in and is responsible for a number of international research and development projects in Europe and Asia. He has published three research books, with a fourth in preparation, and more than 200 papers. Among others, he is the Editor of the Journal of Organisational Transformation and Social Change. Gerhard Fink is a retired Jean Monnet Professor. During 2002–9, He was the Director of the doctoral programs at Vienna University of Economics and Business, Austria, from 2002–9 and the Director of the Research Institute for European Affairs from 1997–2003. His current research interests are in cybernetic agency theory, normative personality, organizational culture and cultural change in Europe. He has about 290 publications to his credit. He was editor and guest-editor of numerous journals, among others in 2005 guest editor of the Academy of Management Executive, and in 2011 of Cross Cultural Management: An International Journal. Paul Iles is Professor of Leadership and Human Resource Management at Glasgow School for Business and Society, Glasgow Caledonian University. Previously at Salford University, Leeds Metropolitan University, Teesside University, Liverpool John Moores University and the Open University, as a chartered psychologist, Associate Fellow of the British Psychological Society, and Chartered Fellow of the CIPD, he has a particular interest in leadership development, international human resource management and talent management, publishing many articles on these issues in leading refereed journals. Professor Iles has designed and delivered leadership and change programmes in the public, private and voluntary sectors, and worked on applied research programmes with the Learning and Skills Council, British Council and Standards Board for England.