The Production of Knowledge: The Challenge of Social Science Research

by William H. Starbuck

Overview

Bill Starbuck has been one of the leading management researchers in the United States over several decades. In this book he reflects on a number of challenges associated with management and social science research—the search for a "behavioral science", the limits of rationality, the lack of reliability in many research findings, the social shaping of research agendas, cultures and judgements. It is an engaging, autobiographical account in which he discusses some of his own research and various methodological debates.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780199288533
Publisher:	Oxford University Press
Publication date:	06/29/2006
Pages:	208
Product dimensions:	8.78(w) x 5.61(h) x 0.65(d)

About the Author

William H. Starbuck is ITT Professor of Creative Management at the Stern School of Business, New York University. Author of numerous articles on a wide-ranging set of issues relating to organizational behavior and strategy, he is also a former editor of Administrative Science Quarterly and co-editor of The Handbook of Organizational Design (with Paul Nystrom, OUP, 1981).

Table of Contents

1. Creating Better Social Science2. A Journey into Disillusionment: Discovering Problems3. Pretences of Research4. A Journey into Hope: Discovering Partial Solutions5. The Production of Knowledge

Editorial Reviews

"In this remarkable book, one of the most original minds in all of social science shows how to make the science better. Bill Starbuck demonstrates that true scholars are defined by their inputs, not just their outputs. Inputs captured in his autobiography are converted into lessons that reshape the tools we use to understand social complexity. This book is a profound illustration of living the craft of scholarship, with equally profound guidelines to improve the craft!"— Karl E. Weick, Rensis Likert Distinguished University Professor of Organizational Behavior and Psychology, University of Michigan

"In a fascinating account of his 40 years of investigation and learning, Bill Starbuck presents an original, razor-sharp and often devastating critique of our vast body of organizational research. He also plots the route to a better way to create useful, cumulative knowledge of organizations, This book is a must-read for anyone who wishes to study organizations and it will become a classic in our literature."—Danny Miller, Rogers-J.-A.-Bombardier Chair of Entrepreneurship Hautes Études Commerciales, Montréal

From the Publisher