Global Encounters Challenge Western Rationality Assumptions

Abstract

Over the last 20 years, an interdisciplinary debate in science and technology studies (STS), political economy, sociology of knowledge and economic geography has started to consider the economic assumptions underlying Western management rationality. Such academic contributions emphasise conceptual problems created by economic assumptions about rationality. At the same time, the highly normative power of economic assumptions challenges society. The case presented here concerns investors from China, India and Russia who acquire well-established companies in the Global North, particularly in Germany. Based on the methodology of structural hermeneutics, the results show how German managers defend their own professional ethics and thereby mobilise different underlying normative economic assumptions about rationality.

Key Words:

• economic assumptions
• rationality
• western professional ethics
• global encounters

Acknowledgements

We thank Ulrich Oevermann who was inspiring in our discussions of interview extracts.

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes on contributors

Martina Fuchs is Professor for Economic and Social Geography at the University of Cologne, Faculty of Management, Economics and Social Sciences, Germany. Her main research field is the global–local relationship in the economy. This research includes issues of knowledge, patterns of interpretation and labour geography.

Martin Schalljo is geographer and research assistant at the University of Cologne, Faculty of Management, Economics and Social Sciences, Germany.

Notes

1 Translations of the German interviews were done by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the German Scientific Foundation [FU 424/15-1].