[…] whenever we propose a solution to a problem, we ought to try as hard as we can to overthrow our solution, rather than defend it. Few of us, unfortunately, practice this precept; but other people, fortunately, will supply the criticism for us if we fail to supply it ourselves. (Popper, Karl R. 2005. The Logic of Scientific Discovery. London and New York: Taylor & Francis, p. xix).
Can counterpoints provide the much-needed criticism that Popper alluded to if they remain confined within familiar academic circles? To venture beyond the soothing beam of light cast by AOM's lampshade and its sister journals, readers may want to consider the following:
« More sophisticated but also deceptive is the stakeholder perspective of Foss et al. (2021), Foss and Klein (2018), and Klein et al. (2012). It is more sophisticated because, unlike the abovementioned scholarship, they purport to have a more elaborate understanding of property rights. Yet as tributaries to the free-market commitments of Austrian economics, they shy away from rethinking the firm to move past ahead of the shareholder-centric view. It is thus deceptive because they have concocted another libertarian narrative where bargaining power builds up in the nexus node of equity owners, who generously delegate trivial rights to non-equity stakeholders who lack countervailing powers save for, perhaps, exiting the firm in the kind of apparent free market that Austrian economists crave for:
In other words, limiting residual decisions and ultimate control rights to equity holders benefits not only the equity holders, but also the firm itself and hence the nonshareholder stakeholders as well. At the same time, firms can allocate the use of rights of various kinds of assets to improve the incentives of various stakeholders. (Foss and Klein, 2018, p. 29).
They justify this by "the skill with which ownership is exercised to create value" (Foss et al., 2021, p. 320), which they presume to be a competence best exerted by equity owners. However, this not only flies in the teeth of the diversity of organizations observed in the real world (Agafonow, 2020; Hansmann, 2000; Thompson and Valentinov, 2017; Williamson, 1984b), but it also precludes experimentation with new organizational designs to cope with the environmental challenges brought forward by climate change, as Patagonia testifies. »
An excerpt from: Agafonow, A., & Perez, M. (2024) "In Search of a Non-anthropocentric Middle-range Theory of the Firm: On How the Patagonia Purpose Trust Granted a Controlling Stake to Nature," Ecological Economics, Vol. 217, March, pp. 01-14. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecolecon.2023.108076
Available on Research Gate: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/376480984_In_search_of_a_non-anthropocentric_middle-range_theory_of_the_firm_On_how_the_Patagonia_Purpose_Trust_granted_a_controlling_stake_to_nature
MORE OUTSIDE THE AOM LAMPSHADE:
Agafonow, A., & Perez, M. (2024) "Overhauling multinationals for the Anthropocene: How a rogue subsidiary offers a blueprint for sustainable development," Ecological Economics, Vol. 222, August, pp. 01-14. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ecolecon.2024.108232
Available on Research Gate: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/380543943_Overhauling_multinationals_for_the_Anthropocene_How_a_rogue_subsidiary_offers_a_blueprint_for_sustainable_development
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Alejandro Agafonow
Full Professor
ESSCA School of Management
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Original Message:
Sent: 06-11-2024 06:18
From: Anita McGahan
Subject: Can the field of Strategy address climate change effectively and, if so, how?
Strategy scholars are "on fire" in a point-counterpoint debate on whether and how the field can address climate change: