The philosophy of management

philosophy as a challenge to business, management as a challenge to philosophy

Peter Koslowski

pp. 3-18

in: Peter Koslowski (ed), Elements of a philosophy of management and organization, Berlin, Springer, 2010

Abstract

A new field of exploration between different fields of expertise must be a synthesis of the contribution of the two fields since it should be more than just the account of the borderline of the two fields in question. As a synthesis, this field will draw from the resources of knowledge of the two theses of the synthesized fields and will be fruitful to both of them. The same holds true for the philosophy of management. The philosophy of management as a field to be developed must draw insights from both bodies of knowledge and it must be useful to both of them. If two fields ought to be open to a synthesis they must not stand in strict anti-thesis to each other but must have something in common. They must be sub-contrary opposites, not contradictory opposites. Hegelians often disregard in their endeavor to mediate everything that only sub-contrary and not contradictory contradictionscan be 'sublated" or reconciled in a synthesis. That philosophy and management theory can be synthesized requires that philosophy and management have something in common. There must be something philosophical in management and something managerial in philosophy.

Cited authors

Hegel Georg Wilhelm Friedrich