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Moral judgements as organizational accomplishments : insights from a focused ethnography in the English healthcare sector
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Gkeredakis, Emmanouil, Swan, Jacky and Nicolini, Davide (2014) Moral judgements as organizational accomplishments : insights from a focused ethnography in the English healthcare sector. In: Cooren, François and Vaara, Eero and Langley, Ann and Tsoukas, Haridimos, (eds.) Language and Communication at Work : Discourse, Narrativity, and Organizing. Perspectives on Process Organization Studies, 4 . Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 293-324. ISBN 9780198703082
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Official URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198703082...
Abstract
In this chapter, we aim to deepen our understanding of judgments in organizations. Whilst previous studies have underscored the situated nature of individual judgments exercised by e.g. leaders or managers, our research focuses on how judgments emerge as organizational responses to recurrently emerging moral dilemmas. Accordingly, we study a setting—decision practices in the English healthcare sector—where moral puzzles (to fund or not to fund healthcare for apparently atypical patients) demand ongoing attention and systemic handling. We conducted (and present findings of) a focused ethnography of the ways expert decision-making panels in three health authorities confronted, engaged, and coped with morally perplexed situations. The moral perplexity there lay in that panels were called upon to prudently and demonstrably determine whether a particular patient deserved or not exceptional investment; and do so by taking into consideration the healthcare needs and rights of all patients under the same health system. By adopting a practice perspective (Schatzki, 2002), we develop an analytical account of the effortful accomplishments (sociomaterial activities or intertwined “projects” in practice theory terms), which enabled the recurrent collective exercise of judgments in accordance with publicly recognizable moral expectations—namely notions of fairness. Our main contribution lies in conceptualizing the work of rendering moral judgments as organized pursuits possible and meaningful and hence in complementing current “ecological understandings” of individual judgment-making in organizations.
| Item Type: | Book Item | ||||||
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| Subjects: | H Social Sciences > HD Industries. Land use. Labor | ||||||
| Divisions: | Faculty of Social Sciences > Warwick Business School > Innovation, Knowledge & Organisational Networks Research Unit Faculty of Social Sciences > Warwick Business School |
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| Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH): | Communication in organizations, Organizational behavior | ||||||
| Series Name: | Perspectives on Process Organization Studies | ||||||
| Publisher: | Oxford University Press | ||||||
| Place of Publication: | Oxford | ||||||
| ISBN: | 9780198703082 | ||||||
| Book Title: | Language and Communication at Work : Discourse, Narrativity, and Organizing | ||||||
| Editor: | Cooren, François and Vaara, Eero and Langley, Ann and Tsoukas, Haridimos | ||||||
| Official Date: | 8 May 2014 | ||||||
| Dates: |
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| Date of first compliant deposit: | 16 February 2016 | ||||||
| Volume: | 4 | ||||||
| Page Range: | pp. 293-324 | ||||||
| Status: | Peer Reviewed | ||||||
| Publication Status: | Published | ||||||
| Access rights to Published version: | Restricted or Subscription Access | ||||||
| Funder: | National Institute for Health Research (Great Britain) (NIHR) | ||||||
| Grant number: | SDO 08/1808/244 (NIHR) | ||||||
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