Critical marketing theory: the blueprint?

Abstract

There has been considerable recent discussion about the relevance of critical theory to management discourse and its implications for the education of managers. Within this debate, marketing, and by implication, marketing academics, have been extensively criticised by those outside the discipline for failing to embrace more critical theoretical approaches in their work. Unfavourable parallels have been made with management accounting which has a similar academic/practitioner profile but where critical theory was embraced over two decades ago. The objectives of this paper are threefold: to attempt to account for the lack of critical theory in the discipline; to provide a critical evaluation of the usefulness of critical theory in marketing discourse; and to assess some of the practical implications associated with the implementation of critical theoretical approaches in teaching, research and publishing.