Ethics of Engagement in Research Practices: Response-ability in Organization and Management

This book elaborates on the concept of response-ability. Although the notion is becoming popular in organization and management studies to talk about the ethical dimension of academic practices and research work, it has been formulated outside this discipline with Joan Tronto, Donna Haraway, Vinciane Despret, and Karen Barad as key authors. This book honors the foundational contribution of these scholars and their legacy.

This book adopts a feminist posthumanist definition of response-ability as an iterative and emergent process that unfolds within embodied relations and through academic practices. A response-able academic practice intertwines personal reflexivity and critical analysis of the politics underlying our ways of knowing and doing in academia. Furthermore, a response-able approach requires us, as researchers, to pay attention to the consequences of our research practices through which multiple encounters are made possible (or impossible).

By offering empirical examples and theoretical elaborations, this book invites students, researchers, and practitioners to find ways of embodying response-ability when generating knowledge.

With the exception of Chapter 1, no part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers.

Chapter 1 of this book is freely available as a downloadable Open Access PDF at http://www.taylorfrancis.com under a Creative Commons Attribution (CC‑BY) 4.0 license.

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Michela Cozza is an Associate Professor at the Department of Organization and Management at Mälardalen University, Sweden. Her research interests focus on the relationships between social and material aspects of organizational practices. She takes a practice-based approach and leverages a science and technology studies perspective to understand issues related to technology's role in embodied practices of care and technological interventions. She is a member of several research networks, scientific associations, and editorial boards.

Anna Carreri is an Assistant Professor (tenure track) of Sociology of Work and Organization at the Department of Human Sciences of the University of Verona, Italy. She is a scientific coordinator and co-founder of the Research Centre RE-WOrk: REsearching for REmaking Work and Organizing at the same university. She is affiliated with the School of Social Sciences at Hasselt University, Belgium. Her research is mainly conducted through qualitative methods, from an intersectional and critical perspective. Her current research is focused on gender inequalities in academic careers and the quality of working life in relation to ‘new’ forms of work and organizing enabled by technology.

Barbara Poggio is the Vice-Rector for Equality and Diversity at the University of Trento, Italy. She is a Full Professor of Sociology of Work and Organization at the Department of Sociology and Social Research at the same university. She carried out several international studies and research in the field of gender studies (gender cultures and practices in organizations, gender and entrepreneurship, gender and science), workforce diversity, work precariousness, and work-life balance. She is a member of several national and international editorial boards.