The Time and Space of Materiality in Organizations and the Natural Environment

Abstract

In this article, we argue that prior organizations research has contributed to the erosion of the natural environment by failing to discriminate physical materiality from sociomateriality. The time–space attributes of physical materiality are more immutable than sociomateriality, so the compression of time and space in and by organizations is disrupting the cycles of the natural environment. We illustrate this point through the example of carbon markets. The development of futures and other financial derivatives contributes to the compression of time, whereas the movement of capital worldwide contributes to the compression of space. This time–space compression disembodies financial instruments from their physical target, namely, carbon, leading to the distortion of the instrument’s “real” value and hampering carbon emissions reductions. We call for organizational theories that more fully account for physical materiality.

Managing Nature–Business as Usual: Resource Extraction Companies and Their Representations of Natural Landscapes

“…Confirming one of the conclusions of Bansal and Knox-Hayes ( [42] p. 77), if the MNC now commits itself to becoming a sustainable MNC, it is likely to utilize its existing management processes in its attempts to manage for sustainability. In order to be able to manage them, the natural spaces-just like the MNC's productive installations-need to be represented in a set of key numbers that can be recorded in a spreadsheet so that comparisons can be made between actual and expected year-to-date, variations analyzed, and new instructions issued to the local manager.…”

Controlled Flooding in the Grand Canyon

“…Too often organizational research conceives of the natural environment as simply another issue or contextual factor, if it is conceived at all, rather than acknowledging the unique attributes expressed therein (Bansal & Knox-Hayes, 2013). It is one thing to focus on what nature means to humans and how such meaning shapes social activity.…”

“…Simple materiality, as in a desk, primarily serves as an artifact or prop for the enactment of social activity, but a 300-mile long river corridor exhibits the expression of innumerable biophysical-material properties and processes both autonomous to and predicated on organizational decision making. Such physicality, moreover, often functions on variant temporal and spatial scales than the temporal ordering of cognitive and purposive activity within organizations (Bansal & Knox-Hayes, 2013).…”

Quantum Sustainable Organizing Theory

“…System structure is extremely heterarchical, established by an egalitarian interplay of interconnected parts. (Gladwin, Kennelly, & Krause, 1995, p. 886) An example of the QSOT view of the natural environment is evident among indigenous peoples who have strong emotional and spiritual connection to the land and to place (Bansal & Knox-Hayes, 2013;cf. Liu & Robertson, 2011).…”

“…Within a QSOT "matter matters" perspective, there is little support for the idea that sociomaterial economic systems (e.g., markets, share values, profit margins) somehow "exist" as independent realities (Bansal & Knox-Hayes, 2013). This is not to suggest that QSOT does not have room for organizational boundaries per se.…”