The Outer Limits: Monsters, Actor Networks and the Writing of Displacement

TLDR

The article situates science fiction and actor network theory as lenses for writing displacement, arguing that organizations are portrayed as incomplete, transient entities perpetually threatened by intrusion and the Other, which defines disorganization and disorder. The study examines intrusion and its associated organizational dramas of proof to explore how the Other, the alien and out of place, is realized in representation. The authors analyze intrusion and organizational dramas of proof as a method to investigate the representation of the Other. The article illustrates displacement with two examples.

Abstract

This article focuses on science fiction and actor network theory as ways of writing displacement which are relevant to organization studies. Recent work within organizational theory and related (sub)disciplines has suggested that the articulation of organization as a privileged site of presence is made possible by that which is Othered and excluded (or rather deferred) as representing disorganization and disorder. Organizations in this view constitute `incomplete and transient' accomplishments always under threat from various forms of intrusion and displacement. By way of illustration, two examples of displacement! intrusion and their associated organizational `dramas of proof' are examined as a way of exploring how the Other, the alien and out of place, is realized in representation.