Revista Gestão & Conexões

Management and Connections Journal

VITÓRIA (ES), VOL. 12, N. 3, SET./DEZ. 2023.

ISSN: 2317-5087

DOI: https://doi.org/10.47456/regec.2317-5087.2023.12.3.40800.166-187

Organizational studies in Brazilian context: New directions of knowledge or epistemic dependence?

Estudos organizacionais no contexto brasileiro: novos rumos do saber ou dependência epistêmica?

Anderson Gois Marques da Cunha Universidade Federal de Pernambuco agmcunha10@hotmail.com

ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0128-2911

José Luiz Alves Universidade de Pernambuco luiz.alves@upe.br

ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2049-2084

ABSTRACT

Organizational studies incorporate the political, socioeconomic and historical-cultural transformations of a nation. In the Brazilian context, such research brought greater autonomy through the work of Alberto Guerreiro Ramos, Maurício Tragtenberg and Fernando Claudio Prestes Mota, precursors of the onto- epistemological construction prior to the Anglo-Saxon criticism based on the administration mainstream. The study aims to conduct a systematic literature review on organizational studies in the Brazilian context that criticize Westernization in their theoretical construction and theorization, from 2018 to 2022. This review allowed mapping studies that bring a legitimized ideology for national theorization. The relevance of national researchers and the influence of their studies in Latin America and in the world contributed to a disentangling of dominant theories. Finally, the national constructs allowed a dialogue with the theme, and bequeathed pluriverse lenses in the analysis of discourses and contexts that keep organizational studies in evidence.

Keywords: Organizational studies; Critical management studies; Brazilian context.

RESUMO

Os estudos organizacionais incorporam as transformações políticas, socioeconômicas e histórico- culturais de uma nação. No contexto brasileiro, tais pesquisas trouxeram maior autonomia através dos trabalhos de Alberto Guerreiro Ramos, Maurício Tragtenberg e Fernando Cláudio Prestes Mota, precursores da construção onto-epistemológica anterior à crítica anglo-saxã lastreada no mainstream da administração. O estudo visa realizar uma revisão sistemática da literatura sobre estudos organizacionais no contexto brasileiro que criticam a ocidentalização em sua construção teórica e teorização, de 2018 a 2022. Tal revisão permitiu mapear estudos que trazem um ideário legitimado para uma teorização nacional. A relevância de pesquisadores nacionais e a influência de seus estudos na América Latina e no mundo contribuíram para um desvencilhamento das teorias dominantes. Por fim, tem-se que os constructos nacionais permitiram um diálogo com a temática, e legaram lentes pluriversas na análise de discursos e contextos que mantem os estudos organizacionais em evidência.

Palavras-chave: Estudos organizacionais; Estudos críticos organizacionais; Contexto brasileiro.

Introduction

This study aims to conduct a systematic literature review on organizational studies in the Brazilian context that emphasize a critique of Westernization in their theoretical construction and theorization. For this, it was adhered to the analytical and reflective understanding under the organizational theories considered conventional (Paula, Maranhão, Barreto, & Klechen, 2010). The idea is to emphasize the plurality of critical thinking embedded in the organizational context and peculiar administrative behavior spread by the Administration mainstream.

By understanding this process of theoretical and practical enrichment of administrative thought, we try to confront an alienating introjection that guides such studies in the office-industry scenario (Marcuse, 1973; Horkheimer, 1974). Thus, a dialogue was sought with the construction of an autonomous theory based on organizational studies of national scope.

The study attempted to show how critical management studies in Brazil have been advancing in the theoretical-empirical continuum in order to attain knowledge that develops local characteristics and that relates to national scientific production.

It is known that the process of developing a typically national theory takes place in a complex context that tends to access direct and indirect influences from a variety of historical, cultural, socioeconomic, and environmental contexts (Davel & Alcadipani, 2003).

The research referred to works considered pioneers in the formation of critical organizational studies in Brazil, such as Alberto Guerreiro Ramos and Maurício Tragtenberg, considered precursors of this onto-epistemological construction for long before the Anglo-Saxon critical management studies (CMS) movement of the mid- 1990s (Davel & Alcadipani, 2003).

These studies back up CMS in Brazil, and ensure a pioneering detached from the international milieu, more radical humanist and interpretative (Morgan, Frost & Pondy, 1983; Daft & Weick, 1984; Bertero, Caldas & Wood Jr, 1999; Paula, et al., 2010) and not drinking from the post-structuralist source that CMS advocated (Paula, 2001; Paula et al., 2010; Amorim & Brüning, 2015).

By going beyond the edges of knowledge, from a more critical and libertarian practice, it has its relevance for the development of science, which should aggregate and transcend its social, historical and cultural bases in the interests of research extension. Although it is perceived that such effort follows a trend much more towards a classical theoretical rescue, based on eclecticism and heterogeneity, there is a vision beyond the administration mainstream that culminates in national theory and theorization (Carrieri & Correia, 2020).

Brazilian organizational studies itself aggregate a phenomenological criticism proposed by Guerreiro Ramos and later it is perceived the materialization of an autonomous Brazilian critical theory by Tragtenberg (Faria, 2009), in its cultural multidimensionality, eclecticism and that not entering into the merits of a secondary cultural relativism perceives its bases in a broader cultural movement that groups the so-called “brasilidade”.

Theory and theorizing in organizational studies

The theory and theorizing dialogue in organizational studies considers theory and practice at the core of organizations, the interaction of their actors, and the context in which they coexist. The 1980s and 1990s brought the restlessness of researchers to a more critical lens on management. The lack of critical reach, in Brazil or worldwide, can be attributed to the so-called management industry that ideologically bequeaths an autonomous arena of knowledge rivalries (Fournier & Grey, 2000; Motta & Thiollent, 2016; Inocêncio & Favoreto, 2022).

In “Organizations and organizing: rational, natural, and open systems perspectives”, Scott and Davis (2016) make it clear that there was little mapping of organizations at the beginning of organizational studies (OS). Starting in the 1990s, an expanded identification of the quantity and profile that characterized existing organizational structures around the world was allowed.

The post 90's for OS brought utilitarian studies of the theory as a liberating practice for the individual and collective sense. This is the case of Gloria Jean Watkins, who signs her works under the pseudonym “bell hooks”, an American writer and propagator of black activism around the world. In “Teaching to Transgress: Education as a Practice of Freedom” she challenges the status quo for a theory touted as a “place of healing” (Hooks, 2013, p. 86).

In explaining about theory and theorizing, Hooks (2013, p. 87) clarifies that the former: “[...] is not inherently healing, liberating, or revolutionary. It only fulfills that function when we ask it to do so and direct our theorizing to that end”.

Theory brought a scientific and classical bias embedded in the method and weakened the possibility of the legitimized theory-practice synapse. On the other hand, modernist thinking focused on empiricism and rational theoretical ballast becomes impoverished (Pereira, 1982). The balance of theory and practice is only achieved through the “[...] ability to open oneself to the world, to accept and/or deny it in order to be able to transform it” (Pereira, 1982, p. 85).

The critique of theory and theorizing is evidenced in the social sciences, which has been discussed since the studies of Wright Mills in the late 1950s, the pioneer of the concept of the sociological imagination, and who questions such field in various contexts in postmodern analytics, in a poststructuralist view or in another contemporary perspective of organizational studies (Campos & Costa, 2007).

Moving into the discussion at the level of the academic-scientific system and its training fields, another relevant criticism of the construction of theory and practice comes from Cunliffe (2020) when he cites that the very molds of business schools contributed to a failure to train this researcher with characteristics of more critical, analytical, and reflective thinking.

Scott and Davis (2016) alert to the blindness of such schools in the 1970s, which restricted organizational studies to the purely business context (of for-profit entities), forgetting other aspects and potentialities of such analyses (Scott & Davis, 2016).

In addition, Cunliffe (2020) reinforces that such structures do not work on the formation of socially engaged leaders with an emancipatory bias and not replicating

what is already perpetuated in the administration mainstream. What comes through is a technicist and positive idea, cloned or derived from North American and European models. And despite using introductory mechanisms of morality in classroom environments through principles for responsible management education, the incorporation of reflexivity in the teaching and research of organizational studies remain precarious.

On the other hand, the search for reflexivity should drive the theories and the exercise of theorization aimed at praxis, which is considered a “... projected, reflected, conscious, transforming action of the natural, the human and the social” (Pereira, 1982, p. 77). This cultural action propagates itself through the conscious use of information marking an ideological rupture considering the social, historical, cultural and institutional contexts that organizations and society have been shaping in recent years (Pereira, 1982; Campos & Costa, 2007; Luz, 1996; Mills, 1959).

An interesting aspect raised is that the success of social research depends not only on its methodological route, but also on emphasizing aspects related to the nature of the being itself (ontology) and the ability to understand knowledge while questioning its foundations and structuring (epistemology) (Campos & Costa, 2007).

In contemporary times theoretical models that aim at aspects leading to originality and utility, reinforce the significance of managers and their agents as commanding figures, within a hierarchical structure, with predominant functionalist profiles. When exploring the evolution of decision-making models, one can observe their basis in the postulates of classical Economics, which have dominant applications in academic studies and organizational analysis (Burrell & Morgan, 1979).

The science that creates theory and engages in theorization should be regarded as a human action. It is important to notice that the researcher does not bring neutrality in his observations; he is an active social actor. The research process is directed as an intelligible choice and its criteria should be guided in why and for whom this knowledge is formed, generating value and promoting a posture of critical reflection (Morgan, 1983a; 1983b; Campos & Costa, 2007).

On this scale, the organizational studies have advanced from a robust theoretical understanding much more inward than simply seeing peripheral elements that surround the phenomenon in isolation without an analysis of the process in practice. The theoretical knowledge produced needs to be able to atomize its practice and vice versa (Pereira, 1982; Hooks, 2013). Thus, the “[...] lived experience of theorizing is fundamentally linked to processes of self-recovery, of collective liberation, there is no gap between theory and practice. [...] one enables the other” (Hooks, 2013, p. 85).

This experiential analysis of organizational studies advocates a discussion among its agents in decision-making from an administrative behavioral perspective, which is a factor that fosters theory and practice. However, it is noticeable a tendency to adopt models that aim at simplifying reality. Such models work the decisions through emotional bias, in a faster process that is supported by heuristics, considering the human factor, its needs, the urgency of the decision, and the scarcity of organizational resources (Simon, 1965).

This new approach to the production of dynamic knowledge traces its foundations in parallel to the Frankfurtian construction that postulated the original critical theory and was linked to the Marxist assumptions. Such derivations of knowledge have been previously discussed in the scientific works of authors like Adorno, Horkheimer and Marcuse (Faria, 2009; Melo, 2011). This imputed to modern science a mutable concept in the face of a historical and sociocultural context that tends to develop spontaneously or forcibly in the face of the “pressure of social interests in capitalist society” (Voirol, 2012, p. 84).

Such criticism was necessary for advancements in the theory and theorization of organizational studies, but it cannot leave in the background that the essentiality of its approach, even adopting a more critical and emancipatory stance, must be guided by the relevance of the practice of reflexivity and more qualified practices in the study of phenomena through the various lenses of analysis (Hooks, 2013; Cunliffe, 2020).

By adopting more responsive and ethical practices, linked to transformational leadership actions in an organizational context, it allows for greater fluidity of analysis and reinforces the studies arising from a legitimized and increasingly assertive theory and theorization (Campos & Costa, 2007; Cunliffe, 2020).

Organizational studies in the Brazilian context

The significant challenge in weaving organizational studies within the Brazilian context lies in achieving its own identity and legitimization. Such construction has considered political-ideological issues, historicity and culture, and an involvement of social psychology. While many authors and their studies emphasize greater criticality in their analyses, attempting to move away from the mainstream of administration, the practice, in general, does not completely disregard the global theoretical-empirical construction (Amorim & Brüning, 2015).

A landmark of this movement is the understanding of critical management studies in Brazil. Paes e Paula et al. (2010) present in detail an analogy to the critical management studies (CMS), which gained strength in the 1990s through discussions of Alvesson and Willmott (1992) and Alvesson and Deetz (1999). These studies aimed at a critiquing Anglo-Saxon positivism but did not reveal a necessary social emancipatory condition (Misoczky & Amantino-de-Andrade, 2005; Melo, 2011; Amorim & Brüning, 2015).

Paes de Paula et al. (2010) studies indicate that there is an autonomous foundational line predating the dissemination of European and North American originated studies, with the pioneering work of Guerreiro Ramos in the mid-1940s and early 1950s. The study cites “Administração e política à luz da sociologia” from 1944, in which Ramos praises sociological analysis and describes the singularities of social organization, aiming to differentiate between Politics and Administration. This directed his studies in a more assertive and non-conflicting manner between both areas of knowledge, while cautioning that there is no single rational and self-governing mold.

He is also a strong critic of the passivity and silence of the national society. Guerreiro Ramos brings to organizational studies the strengthening of movements in favor of blackness without objectifying it. This is evidenced in his book “Cartilha

brasileira do aprendiz de sociólogo: prefácio a uma sociologia nacional” from 1954, mentioned by Paes de Paula et al. (2010). As a black person in a predominantly white elite society and a pioneer in anti-racist activism in Brazil, he challenges colonialist ideas and criticizes functionalism in studies that approached the issue of black people through Westernized lenses. In his view, the replicating practices of colonial dominance become intertwined with social invisibility and cultural alienation in social and racial relations, silencing advances in the field of organizational studies.

Through his 1958 work “The sociological reduction (Introduction to the study of sociological reasoning)” he manages, in a libertarian and alternative way, to build his studies in an original perspective of a typically national Sociology, which breaks with elitism and the remnants of an irregular social and political evolution through a dominant colonialist bias.

This matrix of colonial dominance and the peripheral social and political identity in Brazil had already been described by the Brazilian writer and journalist Euclides da Cunha in his work entitled “À margem da história” in which he expressed the politics and social and ethnic issues rooted in Brazilian historiographical evolution as “[...] twisted without a precise characterization, in parceled movements strictly locals” (Cunha, 1922, p. 218).

Souza and Ornelas (2015) characterize Ramos' intellectual trajectory through the lens of a repositioning with an emphasis on the social emancipatory nature, granting prominence to a “[...] renewal of Brazilian sociological studies, raising them to an outstanding degree of autonomy in the context of international sociology” (Souza & Ornelas, 2015, p. 439).

In addition, Ramos aimed to break away from the internalization of mainstream administration molds, as well as to encourage a new strand of such studies that would establish their own autonomous sociopolitical and cultural foundations, with an emphasis on emancipatory and libertarian perspectives (Misoczky & Amantino- de-Andrade, 2005; Souza & Ornelas, 2015).

Such studies went beyond the regulatory bias that predominated around the 1970s (Burrell & Morgan, 1979; Clegg & Hardy, 1999). However, the dominance of studies in Brazil adopted lenses predominantly immersed in positivism and the transition away from such onto-epistemological obfuscation occurred through a critical and organized construction based on emancipatory reflections in Brazil (Misoczky & Amantino-de-Andrade, 2005).

Critical management studies in Brazil take shape from a humanist perspective, being the vision proposed by Ramos inserted in a critical phenomenological and foundational sociological perspective extracting any interaction with Marxist theory (Paes de Paula et al., 2010). In addition to Ramos, another noteworthy emancipatory critic of Brazilian CMS is Maurício Tragtenberg, being an important exponent of such construction, with a heterodox Marxist epistemological bias.

Tragtenberg spread his studies in a work that emphasizes and approaches the original critical theory itself, but does not couple to a replicant condition of the Frankfurt School thought (Paes de Paula et al., 2010). “[...[ the proximity to critical theory did

not make him a Frankfurtian intellectual, but a scholar of bureaucracy, power and domination [...], by way of Marxism-anarchism” (Faria, 2009, p. 510).

Therefore, the Brazilian CMS had a significant impact and relevance, led by the foundational stone of the critical studies proposed by Tragtenberg. This continued the search for originality, particularly through his work Bureaucracy and Ideology, a generational milestone, presenting a new vision beyond the reflection and practice of Weberian and Marxist classical precepts. This fact guided scholars towards alternative and legitimized paths in the theory and theorization of OS (Motta, 2001).

Maurício Tragtenberg presents a genuine critique of CMS and redefines this approach in Brazilian studies. This serves as a cautionary message to critical studies that may be ambiguous and inauthentic in fostering an organizational reality of micro emancipation and increment, without consistency in the transformation of the social body (Misoczky & Amantino-de-Andrade, 2005).

Besides this, Tragtenberg had ample relevance in the construction of such a nationalizing theory, being a great supporter of autonomy. This can also be observed in the work and critique of Fernando Claudio Prestes Motta, an author of great relevance in Brazilian CMS, and who describes the Tragtenbergian work in the condition of “[...] a great blow in the mainstream of organizational theory and the seed of critical theory in Brazil” (Motta, 2001, p. 64).

According to Faria (2009), Motta is also considered highly relevant in this construction due to his involvement with critical theory, bringing new dimensions to CMS in Brazil particularly in the field of “[...] critical psychosociology, in Foucault's poststructuralism and in studies on symbolism, imaginary and ideology” (Faria, 2009, p. 510-511).

These precursors of OS in Brazil took it upon themselves to weave new meanings into the studies while falling into objectivism and functionalism, as they are not very emancipatory. These pioneers broke away from utilitarian pragmatism and the dominant rationalist regulation (Burrell & Morgan, 1979). In this environment, an analytical approach more consistent with the societal aspects of localities emerges. Although these studies have been pioneering, the research still lacks theoretical and methodological consistency in achieving legitimacy between theory and practice, this is attributed to “[...] deficiencies in basic conceptual training in organizational theory in Brazil” (Caldas, 2005, p. 53).

It was then sought to trace an overview of organizational studies with an emphasis on research in Brazil. Such research aims to understand how the field of knowledge of organizational studies has been evolving towards a more critical, autonomous and libertarian theory.

Methodology

The study brings a qualitative approach of applied nature, with a descriptive and exploratory objective. As for the procedure, a systematic literature review was chosen to emphasize a collaborative and cumulative view of works on organizational studies in Brazil from 2018 to 2022.

As a research protocol, data collection was conducted using the multidisciplinary platforms Web of Science (WoS) and Scopus, ensuring the quality and reliability of the referenced data among the main sources available.

Beforehand, the key terms were defined and the expression “organizational stud*” was used, adopting the title classification in the databases. The Boolean operator OR was used to expand the search bases, including four more expressions closely related to the search, “Brazil* context” OR “stud* in Brazil” OR “critical organizational” OR “microemancipation”. The search yielded the results presented on Table 1.

Table 1 - Protocol for the refinement of the search

Source: Prepared by the authors (2023)

Some WoS filters were applied, refining the search by document types to include only articles and excluding materials categorized as early access and article impressions. The time frame was defined as the period from 2018 to 2022. Finally, the materials were categorized by the topics management and business as they are directly related to the research area in Administration. On the other hand, the Scopus base underwent the same previous filtering, focusing on articles under the themes of business, management and accounting.

A total of 111 articles were exported in .bib format and statistical computing using the R graphic language was performed with the RStudio open-source edition

v. 2022.07.2 build 576 to group the databases.

For the bibliometric analysis, the bibliometrix package was utilized enabling the import of data from the WOS and Scopus search platforms. It allowed for analyses involving three degrees, grouped by source, author, and document; as well as the exploration of three knowledge structures of relevance listing conceptual, intellect, and social aspects. Additionally, the biblioshiny application was used to provide a web interface visualization for the bibliometrix package which is intuitive, dynamic, and organized (Aria & Cuccurullo, 2017; Moral-Muñoz, Herrera-Viedma, Santisteban- Espejo, & Cobo, 2020).

The process included (a) preliminary analysis based on a systematic reading, culminating in the exclusion of articles that did not align with the theme and the

research objective; (b) the removal of duplicate studies in the databases. In the end, 21 materials remained, representing important contributions and guided the research.

Analysis and discussion

The study mapped research engagement from the academic output of authors, coauthors, and keywords. The analysis used the R language and the bibliometrix package at various scales. Seven categories were selected for the analysis: sources, authors, documents, clustering, conceptual, intellectual and social structures, to ensure greater robustness in the study. Initially, general information, content, authors' and documents' profiles in the studied period were listed (Table 2).

Table 2 - Main information of the analyzed journals

Note. The table brings a summary of the data collected from the articles researched on the theme of organizational studies in the Brazilian context. Data summarization was performed using the RStudio bibliometrix package. Source: Prepared by the authors (2023).

The authors who stood out in the scientific production on organizational studies during the researched period were Wanderley, Cunliffe and Gonzales-Miranda. It is

worth noting that Carrieri, Correia and Alcadipani also made significant contributions to the theme, building on studies from previous periods.

The research Estudios organizacionales en América Latina: Hacia una agenda de investigación aimed at a theoretical reflection on the course of organizational studies in the Latin American context. It expressed a broad concern in avoiding the importation of conceptual models developed in foreign research, mainly from the North American and Anglo-Saxon schools (Bertero, Caldas, & Wood Jr., 1999).

Another notable study is “Where do we come from, where are we going? Collective self-criticism and desirable horizons for Organizational Studies in Brazil” which reinforces the contributions of Ramos, Tragtenberg and Prestes Motta. It criticizes the molds of Administration as a field of knowledge and its theoretical-practical relationship, pointing out how it has been subjugated and stereotyped by the Brazilian social science corpus (Sá, Alcadipani, Azevedo, Rigo, & Saraiva, 2020).

In 2019, there was no significant change compared to 2018 in publications emphasizing a more critical view of the westernization of organizational studies in the Brazilian context. However, in 2020, there was an increase of 233.33% in scientific publications in the researched area compared to the previous year, representing 47.62% (10 articles) of the total materials analyzed. The following two years showed significant reductions of 60.00% (2021) and 75.00% (2022) in the annual scientific production in this thematic area in Brazil (Graph 1).

Graph 1 - Annual Scientific Production

Note. The graphic presents the annual scientific production of research dealing with organizational studies in the Brazilian context. The data were summarized from the bibliometrix package in RStudio and the MS Excel spreadsheet was used to process the information. Source: Prepared by the authors (2023).

In the three-field plot analysis (Figure 1) that parameterized countries (AU_CO), authors (AU), and keywords (DE), a significant presence of Latin American authors and research in this theme is observed, with Alcadipani, Wanderley, and Carrieri standing out. A transcontinental thematic crossing was identified regarding organizational studies in Brazil, involving proponents from Colombia, Argentina, and Chile, as well as Mexico and the United Kingdom.

Certain research has revealed other relevant topics that require further dialogue in the field. Ribeiro, Cunha, and Barbosa (2018) stand out for focusing their studies on the use of information technology in favor of organizational studies. They discuss challenges, digital gaps, and electronic participation, with particular emphasis on public entities in Brazil. Franco and Piceti (2018), on the other hand, work on the perspective of gender roles influencing the dynamics of family organizations under the co-entrepreneurship model in Brazil.

In addition, more critical theoretical approaches were found, addressing the autonomy of Brazilian and Latin American studies and exploring topics such as Amerindian perspectivism, controlled equivocation, and border thinking (Wanderley & Bauer, 2020), as well as an overview of autism and organizations (Pérez, Díaz, & Ruiz, 2018).

Other studies have been conducted on organizational issues. Despite the growing interest in researching topics such as technology, politics, finance, the environment, race, gender relations, and sexuality, among others, which intersect with organizational studies in Brazil, the dialogues often remain shaped by the lenses and stigmas of the global North. While these contributions emphasize relevance and progress, they are still guided and identified by the spectrum of dominance. Therefore, there is a need for more independent research and reflective perspectives when addressing intersubjectivity in the historical and social construction of organizational studies in Brazil.

Figure 1 - Three-Field Plot

Source: Prepared by the authors (2023).

Three clusters can be observed in the analysis, with a more prominent presence of green coloration concentrated in the works of Alvesson and Clegg.

The blue cluster shows a higher intensity of interconnected nodes, with emphasis on research by Clark, Rowlinson and Coraiola but in equivalence with other relevant research as is the case of Alcadipani and Wanderley. In the red cluster, Foucault's research stands out (Figure 2).

Figure 2 - Cocitation Network

Note. The figure shows the connections of the co-citation network in the face of research in organiza- tional theory in the Brazilian context. Source: Prepared by the authors (2023).

Throughout the studied period, research on OS viewed through different lenses of analysis, and considered within various historical-cultural contexts, socioeconomic factors, and environmental elements, has led to significant contributions in theory and theorizing. These contributions reinforce the strength of organizational practice and dynamic rethinking of such social structures.

Villar and Roglio (2019) present a resignification of the organizational concept and organizational processes (organizing) in an onto-epistemological perspective. They seek to establish theoretical conjectures between the actor-network theory advocated by Bruno Latour within the scientific spectrum of relational sociology and its impact on organizational studies. The authors propose an approach to understanding organizational reality that involves the participation of non-human elements in organizational processes. There is still a more emphatic observation of the experiential knowledge and the social experience of the components of the organization.

In the article “Contributions of the theoretical essay to organizational studies” Boava, Macedo and Sette (2020) initiate their discussion with a critique of the field of OS, likening its evolution to a regulatory Sociology, as previously suggested by Burrell and Morgan (1979). Once again, they highlight the functional bias in the construction of knowledge within the field of OS, which they attribute to a less complex causal relationship. The authors commend the development of theory and advocate for engaging with various lenses of analysis, which they consider crucial for comprehending organizational reality. Not focusing on a national perspective, but global in scope.

Montaño Hirose (2020) highlights the relevance of Latin American nations in the development of research in organizational studies. He points out that Brazil is among the top three countries that most focus on research involving institutional theory and new institutionalism, ranking just below Mexico and Colombia. Additionally, Brazil presents the highest prominence in studies related to institutional logics and plays a pivotal role in disseminating events within large international research networks, fostering discussions and progress in the field.

The critical management studies perspective and social reflection in organizations as a relevant element to understand OS and its implications is praised Durepos, Shaffner and Taylor (2019) and Cunliffe (2020). These authors advocate for a combination of reflexivity and a historical organization perspective.

Durepos, Shaffner, and Taylor (2019) works a historiographical perspective of OS and extol the subfield of critical organizational history by establishing elements that can assist in better representing organizational theories and practices with a more historically critical bias. This approach is corroborated in the studies of Matitz, Chaerki, and Chaerki (2020) who attempt to overcome the mainstream domination of the field and understand the research limitations in organizational studies. Finally, the study seeks to raise awareness among management practitioners beyond theorizing, focusing on issues involving its procedural and historical context.

The perspective of history, memory and the past in OS is explored by Costa and Vanderley (2021), who analyze its context in the 2000s, 2010s and 2020s along with its implications in Brazil. An important aspect highlighted by Costa and Wanderley (2021) is the pursuit of an original theory with dialogical and relevant usefulness in local and global environments.

Cunliffe (2020) emphasizes the presence of a reflexivity bias in the more fluid and libertarian organizational studies, extolling the role of reflexivity in the area of teaching and research within business schools and organizations practices. It serves as a catalyst for the plurality of knowledge and is not based on the passivity of its own construction.

In a unique approach, Ferretti and Moreira (2022) revisit the study of corporality and its contributions to OS. The authors propose a psychoanalytical approach to understand this relationship, which they find to be scarce in existing analytics. They introduce a new dimension for analyzing the organizational studies that is the erogenous body, and it attributes a relationship between mind and body in exercising the organization as a distinct structure and as a collectivity when considering its members.

Another interesting approach is presented in the studies of Righi, Müller, Silveira & Vieira (2019) which stablishes a connection between the assumptions of risk models and the dimensions of modern, postmodern and neo-modernist analytics of organizational studies. The latter is classified as the most appropriate solution, in the authors’ view, for handing information related to finance and risk.

Gonzales-Miranda (2019) and Szlechter (2020) bring their research focused on the Latin American context. In his self-critique on the OS Gonzales-Miranda (2019) acknowledges that there have been advances at different levels in organizational research in Latin America, which depends on the locality and context as they seek to catalyze studies in a greater adherence of researchers and the community.

The author calls attention to the incessant search for an autonomy of organizational studies, distancing itself from the positivist epistemological bias widely spread in the global context. This movement brought the search for the understanding of the resistances in the organization. Saavedra-Mayorga and Sanabria (2020) further explore this aspect and signal that despite the role of social transformation in organizations, the diversity of theoretical lenses reflects the diversity of the very study of the organizational phenomenon, and this was held with some disbelief by the dominant bias of Administration.

The text by Szlechter et al. (2020) follows this line and reinforces the critical and historical stance of Brazilian studies with an anti-management profile of organizational studies between the 1980s and 1990s, mainly reinforced by socio-environmental struggles nationally. The author mentions the vast community that systematizes Brazilian organizational studies, which is of great relevance for theoretical and methodological advances, as well as a practice-oriented focus.

Such practice is observed by Rocha-Pinto et al. (2019) which addresses the so-called practice turn, bringing an inflection point of the OS with an approach in the dynamics of the knowledge field itself. The authors suggest constructing theories by focusing on certain organizational phenomena, which are subjected to a primary lens of analysis capable of capturing aspects of theory and constructing it through the view of the practice of its agents.

In proposing a critical analysis of managerial discourse in the organizational context, Fernández Rodríguez (2020) defines the relevance of such discourse within an ideological and power perspective to generate certain engagement among the members of the organization for the legitimation of its practices. The text also draws a parallel with the new pro-technological discourses arising from the pandemic crisis.

In this line of thought and based on the theory of communicative action, Inocêncio and Favoreto (2022) bring a bibliometric study on the social contributions of the thought of Habermas on the international scene for organizational studies and finds a trend of such research since the 1980s and little variability in the themes that underlie such studies.

Carrieri and Correia (2020), in their text entitled “Organizational studies in Brazil: building access or replicating exclusion?” present a relevant reflection based on the teaching and research of OS inserted in the national reality. The text brings the idea that

the construction of the Administration field goes beyond the functionalist and structural idea and permeates plural practices as politicized beings and decision makers.

By emphasizing guidelines for a legitimate national research, Carrieri and Correia (2020) warn about the practice of what they call “epistemic racism” (Carrieri & Correia, 2020, p. 60) and work on the idea of theoretical construction and a process of theorization that emphasizes the whys, the hows and to whom the knowledge is being directed.

This bias is well contextualized by Wanderley and Bauer (2020) in the article “Tupi or not Tupi that is the question: Amerindian perspectivism and organizational studies”, which reflects the reflexive shift, a perspective of decolonization of the theories in the area seeking to enhance the equality between voices of researchers who perceive a heterogeneous and highly dynamic field.

Conclusions

The aim of this article was to conduct a systematic literature review on studies that critically examine the Westernization of organizational studies in the Brazilian context, focusing on the period between 2018 and 2022. The research aimed to analyze organizational studies in Brazil, characterizing it as an autonomous field of knowledge known for its originality. By emphasizing these constructions, it became evident that a significant process of global epistemic distancing was initially established through authors such as Alberto Guerreiro Ramos, Maurício Tragtenberg, and Fernando Cláudio Prestes Mota, advocating for an emancipatory theory and theorization.

While Ramos’ studies bring a critical phenomenological content and Tragtenberg’s perspective aligns with the original critique but from a cumulative approach with Marxist and anarchist leanings in its dialogue, Mota's analysis continued with a formation grounded in a critical ideology with a stronger historical foundation. These constructions follow a humanistic, radical, and interpretative perspective, which was crucial in opening up new ways for organizational research in Brazil based on tradition, critique, and autonomy.

Despite the efforts of Brazilian researchers in organizational studies and their critique of the dominant paradigm in this field of knowledge, there is a need for greater coordination among scholars to achieve a deeper theoretical and practical understanding. Although the field's interest is not to advocate for an isolated theory of knowledge, there is a growing need for new, original and legitimized constructions that challenge the mainstream of administration.

The objectives of Brazilian organizational studies, regarding the rationality of theory, the process of theorization, and the grasp of the logic of practice, aim to create broader dialogical alternatives, operating within a pluriverse of lenses for analyzing these discourses.

Additionally, it is essential to highlight the strengthening of academic and scientific networks in sharing studies, seeking to consolidate the concerns and singularities of local contexts in the face of global organizational realities. Furthermore, contemporary authors continue to denounce systems based on power dimensions that silence

struggles and generate resistance. These studies advocate for relevant and more peripheral research focused on the local reality, as is the case in Brazil and other Latin American countries.

As for the limitations of this study, it was not possible to fully address the subjectivity present in identifying themes, subthemes, and biases in the theoretical construction of organizational studies in the Brazilian context, given their complexity and the heterogeneous views of the authors. However, the discursive diversity of the studies contributed to a broad and applicable analysis, achieving the initial objective outlined in this study.

Other limiting factors include the sample size of the materials included in the review and the temporal scope considered. The criteria used for database selection may have excluded relevant materials published in non-indexed journals within the field. As contributions to analysis and methodology, this study sought to capture thematic insights for organizational studies researchers, enabling an autonomous and more critical construction through a research agenda for the topic.

The study can also assist researchers in engaging reflectively with widely disseminated themes in the field of study, as well as emerging topics. Therefore, it aims to encourage knowledge production and the articulation of ideas in peripheral contexts that demonstrate greater social impact and convergence with new socioinstitutional relations in Brazil.

Future research can be conducted on various topics such as technology, sustainability, finance, gender relations, race, and sexuality, among others, while observing how organizational studies interact within their local contexts in Brazil. Research should include sociodemographic, cultural, and geopolitical variations at the regional, state, or municipal levels to influence stronger theoretical constructions and theorizations based on their practice.

Such research should no longer be driven solely by functionalist and Westernized parameters, but should recover its phenomena through original lenses that form a humanistic and resistant framework against the hegemonic standardization of science and knowledge in administration.

The debate on theory and theorization of organizational studies in the Brazilian context has convergently facilitated the continuity of studies that have been traced for decades. To achieve this, Brazil needs to incorporate these discussions in academia, the scientific community, and society, thereby strengthening national research related to organizational studies.

In conclusion, although organizational studies in Brazil have engaged in a constructive dialogue regarding the Westernized critique of their predecessors, there remains a need for a thorough assessment of emerging themes and careful consideration of future research directions. The ultimate goal is to validate these studies, avoiding the mere replication of organizational practices, questioning inhibiting theories, and promoting a theoretical framework and theorization that prioritize epistemic independence.

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