Reception of Bourdieu in Management and Organization Studies

Pierre Bourdieu is a sociologist who has received increasing attention in management and organization studies (MOS) in English since the development of the ‘organizational field’ concept in 1983 inspired by his ‘field theory’. And since 2008, there has been a growing secondary literature on the uses of Bourdieu in this field. This literature seeks to guide future studies by grouping and interpreting works that cite Bourdieu. Which Bourdieu concepts are most often cited in this field? Is the attention limited to management fashions? Are these concepts referred to separately or in their theoretical integrity with other concepts? Do studies briefly refer to concepts or significantly engage with them? How much and in what ways does Bourdieu differ from his original works and their inner logic when being transferred to the management and organization literature? In this study, the qualitative meta-analysis technique has been adopted to analyze the content of 11 articles on Bourdieu’s uses in MOS found through a semi-systematic literature review. In the research, the long-term interest in Bourdieu is considered as the periods between 1983 and 2008 when ‘free reception’ and ‘diversification’, and after 2008, ‘guided reception’ and ‘ossification’ tendencies were dominant. In addition to these categories, critiques on the ways in which Bourdieu’s concepts are referred to by different researchers are discussed by classifying them under types of ‘selective reception’ and ‘contradictory reception’. Efforts to guide future Bourdieu’s receptions based on these critiques are classified as ‘flexible guidance’ and ‘strict guidance’. The aim here is to create an analytical framework regarding receptions of a social scientist’s theory and concepts in different languages and scientific disciplines, and efforts to understand and guide these receptions.