- Department of Management
72 Fifth Avenue, Room 602
The New School
New York City 10011
Nidhi Srinivas
The New School University, Management and Urban Policy, Faculty Member
- Critical Theory, NGO management, Critical Management Studies, Neoliberalism, Disaster Management, Postcolonial Theory, and 19 moreSubaltern Studies, Latin American literature, Latin American History, Critical Geopolitics, Critical Development Studies, Critical Theory in China, Urbanism, Social Innovation, Philosophy of Management, Knowledge Transfer, Global (North/South) Environmental Politics, Norbert Elias, Nonprofit Management, Management History, Philanthrocapitalism, Philosophy, Management, Organization Studies, and Film Analysisedit
- Nidhi Srinivas is Associate Professor of Management. He joined the New School in 2001, after serving as a Lecturer of... moreNidhi Srinivas is Associate Professor of Management. He joined the New School in 2001, after serving as a Lecturer of Management at the University of Essex, in the United Kingdom.
Srinivas' thesis was on the strategy formation of NGOs, and was written under the supervision of Henry Mintzberg and Jan Jorgensen in McGill University in the Faculty of Management. He defended his thesis in 2001. Much of Srinivas' conceptual orientation regarding management is shaped by his years at McGill University, which remain an enduring influence, notably in terms of Mintzberg's processual understanding of management decisions, a commitment to historical sensitivity, an understanding of societal responsibilities of work organizations and a profound respect and empathy for the work of managing.
In the first stage of research past his thesis defense Srinivas focused on two questions: what were the processes through which management knowledge was transferred historically to postcolonial settings such as of India? what were the processes through which management knowledge was being transferred from corporate settings to settings of non-governmental organizations? In researching these questions Srinivas shifted from an initial commitment to Eliasian historical sociology to an interest in critical theory, notably in terms of the sociology of Pierre Bourdieu, the philosophy of Michel Foucault, and an assessment of the consistent concerns with instrumental rationality of the Frankfurt School. This shift towards critical theory, the second stage, was shaped profoundly by the conceptual priorities within the New School's Graduate Faculty, which houses its departments of the humanities and social sciences. An interest in politics and conceptualizing the links between organizations and political action, a commitment to assessing early and later Marx programs of class struggle and trajectories of capitalism, bridging phenomenological and deconstructive views of ethics, all emerged during this stage. This shift led to a third and contemporary stage of research where the original questions return, but in a rephrased form: what are the processes through which subject formation occurs in managers, and what are postcolonial traces and ramifications? what are the forms of accommodation that occur between development policies, managerial practices within organizations, and the spheres of civil society? This current stage has led to research that focuses on critical geneologies of social innovation, civil resistance to urban mega-events, identity work in postcolonial Indian organizations, and the continued work on his book project "Against NGOs".
Typically management research is bounded by the expectations of "business schools". Even critical management theorists tend to refract and play against dominant views of business organizations and their practices. Srinivas' interest is in larger and wider social processes, such as in terms of non-business organizations (non-profits, community boards, NGOs) and unconventional managers (women who are lent micro-credit loans, villagers harvesting water, small scale vendors, political activists); his interest is especially in terms of larger questions that are hard to bound and tether under the term "management" though they do certainly overlap, such as politics, ethics, technocracy, democracy, constitutionalism, subjectivities, and professions. For these reasons his research fits well in the growing overlap of management with international affairs, and with design.
Consistent across these themes of research remains a commitment to the subaltern, not in an historical and static sense, as much as in a contemporary and shifting sense. In short less in terms of simplifying the subaltern as a distinct group, and more in terms of complicating the term, as part of a larger acknowledgement, of the ways in which contemporary capitalist forces fracture identities and require therefore a sensibility to the multiple and inchoate forms of knowledge and politics within which our globe functions. Across the research Srinivas remains committed to tracking the ways class and professional power grow naturalized, and the ways to unearth such power and challenge it. Therefore an important aspect of his research is to consider vernacular forms of managing, that are elided or endangered by professional discourses of management and the manager.edit
Research Interests: Conscience and Routledge
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ABSTRACT This collaboratively multiauthored essay presents diverse tales of organizing and communicative practices in our global context. Authors from India, Nepal, Aotearoa New Zealand, Australia, Brazil, the United States, and Nigeria... more
ABSTRACT This collaboratively multiauthored essay presents diverse tales of organizing and communicative practices in our global context. Authors from India, Nepal, Aotearoa New Zealand, Australia, Brazil, the United States, and Nigeria present individual contributions that coalesce around three clear thematic concerns regarding issues of organizing and communicating: (1) silence and voice, (2) the limits and consequences of linguistic and theoretical translations, and (3) the communal considerations of research politics and participation. The essay concludes with communal reflections on how it is that in attempting to engage with diversity we begin to see remarkable similarities not only in expressing a desire to be heard but also in making a commitment to let others be heard, not only in breaking boundaries and building alliances but also in moving towards a collective, inclusive, and participative conceptualization of the myriad shapes of organizing and communicating that exist in the contemporary global context.
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... New Delhi: Oxford University Press. Chakraborty, SK 1995. Ethics in management: Vedantic perspectives. ... Research review: Organization behaviour research in India: A critique of the last decade, Organization Studies, 4(3):... more
... New Delhi: Oxford University Press. Chakraborty, SK 1995. Ethics in management: Vedantic perspectives. ... Research review: Organization behaviour research in India: A critique of the last decade, Organization Studies, 4(3): 357-374. Garg, Pulin K. & Parikh, Indira J. 1993. ...
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... Nidhi Srinivas The New School, New York, USA ... A young scholar from Uganda completes his doctorate in organization studies at a well-known US university following a Ugandan bachelor's degree and an MBA from a UK business... more
... Nidhi Srinivas The New School, New York, USA ... A young scholar from Uganda completes his doctorate in organization studies at a well-known US university following a Ugandan bachelor's degree and an MBA from a UK business school. ...
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PurposeThis study aims to offer a postcolonial approach that goes past current management history controversies.Design/methodology/approachDiscussion of current management history controversies with examples.FindingsPost-colonial... more
PurposeThis study aims to offer a postcolonial approach that goes past current management history controversies.Design/methodology/approachDiscussion of current management history controversies with examples.FindingsPost-colonial approaches to management history enable engagement with questions of power and knowledge in the management discipline.Research limitations/implicationsFurther historical research is needed that considers the interplay of disciplinary knowledge and the historical events under question, especially in post-colonial settings.Practical implicationsIt is essential to engage with historical texts and interpretations to better understand the contextual limitations to management as a discipline: a better understanding of disciplinary pasts enables us to better understand the present.Social implicationsBy considering management’s pasts, this paper can acknowledge more closely how the discipline continues to retain colonialist assumptions that need to be challenged and changed.Originality/valueExamples of management history from formerly colonized regions.
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NGOs and Organizational Change: Discourse, Reporting, and Learning, by Alnoor Ebrahim. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2003. 181 pp. $45 (cloth). DOI: 10.1177/0899764005275209 ... However well intentioned in seeking social... more
NGOs and Organizational Change: Discourse, Reporting, and Learning, by Alnoor Ebrahim. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2003. 181 pp. $45 (cloth). DOI: 10.1177/0899764005275209 ... However well intentioned in seeking social change, nongovernmental organization ...
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This chapter reviews the concept of social innovation (SI) towards two sets of ecological questions: How can local management actions strengthen ecosystem response to crises? Through what organizational arrangements are ecosystem... more
This chapter reviews the concept of social innovation (SI) towards two sets of ecological questions: How can local management actions strengthen ecosystem response to crises? Through what organizational arrangements are ecosystem responses coordinated? The first part of this chapter reviews the concept of social innovation; the second part presents cases from southwest Rajasthan and west Yunnan on social innovation, based on fieldwork conducted in January and August 2011. The cases describe SIs that vary in scale and technology: beehives; improved wood burning stoves; pump sets; working groups to raise funds and share technology; working groups to clean shared water sources; community forest wardens; village councils for water sharing and commons access; and seed banks, land regeneration, child care, and night schools. However these cases can be read as not only demonstrating social innovation but also, in terms of critiques of the policies of neoliberal governments, and in terms of narrative ruptures, puzzles that reveal the push and pull of agential interests in the realm of ecology. The final part of the chapter argues for a focus on the politics of social innovation. As a term SI signifies the possibilities for shifting power structures through networked engagement. Networks including of NGOs must work with state governments to mobilize local people with their own interests. This requires a variety of groups, such as village councils, state-mandated bodies, registered NGOs, and networks, to negotiate and mobilize around ecological response.
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Philip Dick's science fiction (SF) offers a stimulating critique of modernity. One of his important themes was the gradual replacement of the empathy of humans with the cold logic of machines. Using Arendt (1964), Bauman (1991) and... more
Philip Dick's science fiction (SF) offers a stimulating critique of modernity. One of his important themes was the gradual replacement of the empathy of humans with the cold logic of machines. Using Arendt (1964), Bauman (1991) and Tester (1997), I argue that managers are prone to moral indifference. This tendency was termed androidization by Dick, the transformation of human beings into machines. Through two novels and a film adaptation, I discuss how his characters combat this tendency, exercising moral agency. I point to the importance of identifying avenues for managers to resist their androidization.
Research Interests: Critical Theory, American Literature, American History, Political Ecology, Critical Management Studies, and 15 morePhilip K Dick, Indigeneity, Modernity, Modernism, Empathy, Organization, Postindustrialism, Philosophy and Religious Studies, Obsolescence, Gothic, Industrialism, Managerialism, Detroit, Moral Agency, and Management Ethics
Through a review of two bodies of critical literature, within management studies and development studies respectively, the implications of a critical perspective for our understanding of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) is presented.
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Research Interests: Technocracy and Situated
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This paper studies the use of critical theory in Making sense of management: A critical introduction (Alvesson & Willmott, 2012) (henceforth abbreviated as MSM). The book’s arguments (in first and ...
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In this paper I review the concept of social innovation (SI) towards two set of questions to do with ecology and critical management: how can local management actions strengthen ecosystem response to crises? Through what organizational... more
In this paper I review the concept of social innovation (SI) towards two set of questions to do with ecology and critical management: how can local management actions strengthen ecosystem response to crises? Through what organizational arrangements are ecosystem responses coordinated? The first part of this paper reviews the concept of social innovation; the second part presents cases from southwest Rajasthan and west Yunnan on social innovation, based on field work conducted in January and August 2011. I argue that these cases can be read as not only demonstrating social innovation but in terms of critiques of the managerial agency available in neoliberal governments, and in terms of narrative ruptures, puzzles that reveal the push and pull of agential interests. I then step back from these interpretations and argue for a focus on the politics of social innovation. As a term SI signifies the possibilities for shifting power structures through networked engagement. Networks including of NGOs must work wit...
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This chapter is about tricks, tricksters and trickery. We argue that design for the public interest involves tricks. The designer is properly called a trickster. To discuss design in this manner is not intended to imply that designers are... more
This chapter is about tricks, tricksters and trickery. We argue that design for the public interest involves tricks. The designer is properly called a trickster. To discuss design in this manner is not intended to imply that designers are somehow amoral or deceitful. Rather it is to signal the manner in which design interacts with organizational and political processes, bewildering intentions.
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This paper develops a critical historiography of management, by presenting the philosophies of two important thinkers of history, Enrique Dussel and Walter Benjamin, and their implications for an u...
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Resumo Esta edição especial, generosamente aceita e publicada pelo Cadernos EBAPE.BR, surge das lutas diárias pela preservação da vida no Brasil e em outras partes do Sul Global e contra a radicalização da invisibilidade das opressões... more
Resumo Esta edição especial, generosamente aceita e publicada pelo Cadernos EBAPE.BR, surge das lutas diárias pela preservação da vida no Brasil e em outras partes do Sul Global e contra a radicalização da invisibilidade das opressões coloniais e raciais em um momento de dupla pandemia, a da COVID-19 e da supremacia branca. Essa coleção de artigos que temos o prazer de compartilhar com você, incorpora nossa resposta decolonizadora e desracializadora a uma normalização da necropolítica, de decidir quem pode viver e quem deve morrer. Essa normalização pode ser vista, por exemplo, na falsa ideia de impunidade de agentes da aplicação da lei, como o policial de Mineápolis que matou George Floyd nos EUA. É importante destacar que o assassinato de George Floyd teria sido apenas mais uma estatística se não fosse a coragem e determinação da adolescente negra de 17 anos que filmou aquela ocorrência ordinária com seu celular. Inspirados pela coragem negra, reunimos oito artigos provocativos e ...
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This collaboratively multiauthored essay presents diverse tales of organizing and communicative practices in our global context. Authors from India, Nepal, Aotearoa New Zealand, Australia, Brazil, the United States, and Nigeria present... more
This collaboratively multiauthored essay presents diverse tales of organizing and communicative practices in our global context. Authors from India, Nepal, Aotearoa New Zealand, Australia, Brazil, the United States, and Nigeria present individual contributions that coalesce around three clear thematic concerns regarding issues of organizing and communicating: (1) silence and voice, (2) the limits and consequences of linguistic and theoretical translations, and (3) the communal considerations of research politics and participation. The essay concludes with communal reflections on how it is that in attempting to engage with diversity we begin to see remarkable similarities not only in expressing a desire to be heard but also in making a commitment to let others be heard, not only in breaking boundaries and building alliances but also in moving towards a collective, inclusive, and participative conceptualization of the myriad shapes of organizing and communicating that exist in the contemporary global context.
Research Interests: Management, Sociology, Communication, Intercultural Communication, Diversity, and 14 moreInternational organizations, Politics, Communication Management, Silence, Emotions, Vision, Business and Management, Online Community, Organizing, Communication and media Studies, Conceptualization, International Organizations, Aotearoa, and Communicating
This special issue, generously accepted and published by Cadernos EBAPE.BR, emerges from the daily life-preserving struggles in Brazil and other parts of the Global South against the radical invisibility of colonial and racial oppressions... more
This special issue, generously accepted and published by Cadernos EBAPE.BR, emerges from the daily life-preserving struggles in Brazil and other parts of the Global South against the radical invisibility of colonial and racial oppressions at a time of the double pandemic of COVID-19 and white supremacy. This collection of articles that we have the pleasure to share with you embodies our decolonizing and deracializing response to normalization of necropolitics, of deciding who may live and who must die. This normalization can be seen in the false idea of impunity of law enforcement officials, such as the Minneapolis police officer who killed George Floyd in the USA. It is important to highlight that George Floyd’s death would have been yet another mere statistic if not for the courage and determination of the 17-year-old Black teenager who filmed it with her cell phone. Inspired by the attitude of this Black girl, we brought together eight provocative and insightful articles which wi...
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In this paper I review the concept of social innovation (SI) towards two set of questions to do with ecology and critical management: how can local management actions strengthen ecosystem response to crises? Through what organizational... more
In this paper I review the concept of social innovation (SI) towards two set of questions to do with ecology and critical management: how can local management actions strengthen ecosystem response to crises? Through what organizational arrangements are ecosystem responses coordinated? The first part of this paper reviews the concept of social innovation; the second part presents cases from southwest Rajasthan and west Yunnan on social innovation, based on field work conducted in January and August 2011. I argue that these cases can be read as not only demonstrating social innovation but in terms of critiques of the managerial agency available in neoliberal governments, and in terms of narrative ruptures, puzzles that reveal the push and pull of agential interests. I then step back from these interpretations and argue for a focus on the politics of social innovation. As a term SI signifies the possibilities for shifting power structures through networked engagement. Networks including of NGOs must work wit...
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... 1, Nidhi 2006. Juxtaposing helpers and doers: A framework of Non-Governmental Organizations in development Mintzberg, Srinivas. 1, 2002. ... 1, Syama 2001. Traditional industry in the new market economy: The cotton handlooms of... more
... 1, Nidhi 2006. Juxtaposing helpers and doers: A framework of Non-Governmental Organizations in development Mintzberg, Srinivas. 1, 2002. ... 1, Syama 2001. Traditional industry in the new market economy: The cotton handlooms of Andhra Pradesh Mukund, Sundari. 1, 2004 ...
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What would development look like if its practitioners and scholars were 'against NGOs,' challenging common sense about them? This book presents a critical perspective on NGOs, describing how they emerged as key agents of... more
What would development look like if its practitioners and scholars were 'against NGOs,' challenging common sense about them? This book presents a critical perspective on NGOs, describing how they emerged as key agents of development over time. Through an interpretative history based on Gramscian concepts it shows how civil society organizations were gradually enlisted in development as non-state technocratic actors. The book argues that management studies and development studies emerged as commonsensical explanations for capitalist crises. Each offered complementary solutions to balance the needs of capital and society, in particular historical circumstances. These solutions also situated civil society as agents of development and vectors of management. Against NGOs fills a gap within the literature of management and development studies through its original discussion of their historical interconnections and shared themes. The book raises provocative questions on what forms ...
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Deepening, broadening and re-asserting a postcolonial interrogative space in organization studies
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The fact is that ideas about 'management' and ideas about 'anarchism' emerged at the same time, in the context of the rise of industrial capitalism. So perhaps we need to understand the two as somehow... more
The fact is that ideas about 'management' and ideas about 'anarchism' emerged at the same time, in the context of the rise of industrial capitalism. So perhaps we need to understand the two as somehow related. This chapter will suggest that we can write a different history of management, one in which choices about who controls and benefts from industrial production are actively discussed.
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This chapter is about tricks, tricksters and trickery. We argue that design for the public interest involves tricks. The designer is properly called a trickster. To discuss design in this manner is not intended to imply that designers are... more
This chapter is about tricks, tricksters and trickery. We argue that design for the public interest involves tricks. The designer is properly called a trickster. To discuss design in this manner is not intended to imply that designers are somehow amoral or deceitful. Rather it is to signal the manner in which design interacts with organizational and political processes, bewildering intentions.
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The project of identifying voices from the South, and transforming the discipline of organization studies through such engagement, raises important questions of how to assess and categorize disciplinary knowledge adequately for such a... more
The project of identifying voices from the South, and transforming the discipline of organization studies through such engagement, raises important questions of how to assess and categorize disciplinary knowledge adequately for such a purpose. This article discusses two quests for authenticity in the context of Indian management studies, based in claims of epistemic relevance and performative efficacy. In both instances there appears a conscious effort to hear voices of the south. But is it sufficient to adequately re-order management knowledge to the demands of a locale, to make it more authentic?
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How did historically marginalized groups learn to become professional managers? This paper studies the identity work of a manager in a colonial work setting, focusing specifically on the aspirational quality of professional identity, and... more
How did historically marginalized groups learn to become professional managers? This paper studies the identity work of a manager in a colonial work setting, focusing specifically on the aspirational quality of professional identity, and on the forms of subordination enmeshed in organizational work, through a close reading of an autobiography. Beyond Punjab describes the career of Prakash Tandon in the multinational Lever Brothers India. He eventually became its first Indian Chief Executive and a respected public figure. Studies of such colonial work settings can seem indebted to existing research within postcolonial studies in management. But I argue that the dominant attention of postcolonial studies in management has not been on identity work and practices, but the historical enduring force of representations. Therefore this paper offers a complementary engagement, developing Bourdieu’s concept of the habitus for a fuller understanding of how managerial identity was constituted i...
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Purpose This study aims to offer a postcolonial approach that goes past current management history controversies. Design/methodology/approach Discussion of current management history controversies with examples. Findings Post-colonial... more
Purpose This study aims to offer a postcolonial approach that goes past current management history controversies. Design/methodology/approach Discussion of current management history controversies with examples. Findings Post-colonial approaches to management history enable engagement with questions of power and knowledge in the management discipline. Research limitations/implications Further historical research is needed that considers the interplay of disciplinary knowledge and the historical events under question, especially in post-colonial settings. Practical implications It is essential to engage with historical texts and interpretations to better understand the contextual limitations to management as a discipline: a better understanding of disciplinary pasts enables us to better understand the present. Social implications By considering management’s pasts, this paper can acknowledge more closely how the discipline continues to retain colonialist assumptions that need to be ch...
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This article aims to examine a crucial issue in Industrial Relations by taking stock of developments in Organization Studies. It seeks to provide insights into the role of employers’ collective action, which responds to a call for... more
This article aims to examine a crucial issue in Industrial Relations by taking stock of developments in Organization Studies. It seeks to provide insights into the role of employers’ collective action, which responds to a call for renewing attention to its role and socio-economic implications in Industrial Relations. In particular, the article sheds light on how employers’ meta-organising, involving multiple organisations, recover social credibility, known as legitimacy. The case study in Japanese frozen food provides insights into tactics and consequences concerning meta-organising involving key stakeholders by an employers’ association for recovering legitimacy of frozen food category.