Organization Theory

The book Organization Theory has been written to introduce the discipline of organization theory to the reader, to convey different perspectives, topics and theories in this field, and to create an infrastructure that can evaluate them. In the book, from the 19th century, when modernism, which emerged with the positivist approach in social sciences, shed light on the theory of organization, how the theory of organization developed until the 21st century, when the postmodernist approach was dominant in organization theory, which approaches were dominated by the theory of organization at different times, between approaches. It is aimed to systematically convey to the reader how conflicts are reflected in organizational theory and what difficulties they create in understanding organizations. While explaining how the theory of organization emerged and developed from a historical perspective, the book also aims to illuminate how social change overlaps with developments in other fields of science and its philosophical development as well as chronologically.
For effective learning of organizational theory, the diversity and complex nature of the field must first be acknowledged. Rather than trying to reduce the theory of organization to a single point of view, it is necessary to examine and enrich it within the framework of different perspectives of many paradigms. In this book, the complexity of organizational theory and its relevance to management practices as well as to social life are revealed by critical and distinctive assessments of different approaches, beyond the coherent and complementary explanations brought by the isomorphic approaches in many books to this field. It is aimed to break stereotypes in organizational theory, to prevent analysis based on a single paradigm, to prepare a suitable ground for reflexive thinking that is open to discussion and criticism, and to encourage a supra-paradigmatic understanding. Ultimately, the reader is expected to be able to understand the organization from different perspectives, think critically, move organizational theory beyond existing thought patterns, and develop enriching theoretical dialogues.