A quest for Cinergy: The war metaphor and the construction of identity

Abstract

As organizations struggle to present a consistent identity to multiple and overlapping publics, metaphor provides one unifying possibility. This essay examines the case of an unlikely winner in a corporate dispute over control of Indiana's PSI Resources, arguing that PSI's consistent portrayal of its “enemy” as a savage, using the war metaphor's victimage ritual, contributed to a successful defense. In addition to demonstrating how metaphor pervaded one organization's discourse to present a consistent identity to stakeholders, the essay offers questions and conclusions about the efficacy and ethics of the war metaphor as a weapon of corporate persuasion, with a focus on the consequences of its polarizing nature.