Abstract
We propose to understand the global financial crisis of 2008 as an historical event marked by public decisions, economic evaluations and ratings, and business practices driven by a sense of subjugation to powerful others, uncritical conformity to serendipitous rules, and a levelling down of all meaningful differences. The crisis has also revealed two important things: that the free-market economy has inherent problems highlighting the limits of (financial) business, and, consequently, that the business organisation is not as strong as is usually assumed. We reconstruct some of the most dramatic events of that time by using the narratives of two former Lehman Brothers insiders. We then provide an interpretation of that world by using Heidegger’s notions of being and care. Our investigation uncovers persistent inauthentic relationships nourished by the public structure of the financial market, which, drawing on Heidegger, we call the they. In the financial market the what of the world becomes more important than authentic being and self. But a hitch-free switch to authenticity becomes possible through anxiety and the call of conscience.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Hershey H Friedman & Linda Weiser Friedman ‘The Global Financial Crisis of 2008: What Went Wrong?’ in: Robert W Kolb (ed) Lessons From the Financial Crisis — Causes, Consequences and our Economic Future pp 31–36 Hoboken, NJ, John Wiley & Sons 2010.
Andrew Ross Sorkin Too Big to Fail — The Inside Story of How Wall Street and Washington Fought to Save the Financial System — And Themselves New York, Penguin 2009.
James K Galbraith ‘The Roots of the Crisis and How to Bring it to a Close’ in: Robert W Kolb (ed) Lessons From the Financial Crisis — Causes, Consequences and Our Economic Future pp 37–42 Hoboken, NJ, John Wiley & Sons 2010.
Joseph A Schumpeter Capitalism, Socialism, and Democracy London, Allen & Unwind 1943; Joseph A Schumpeter ‘The Instability of Capitalism’ in: Joseph A Schumpeter Essays on Entrepreneurs, Innovations, Business Cycles, and the Evolution of Capitalism Edited by R.V. Clemence. 7th edition pp 47–72 New Brunswick and London, Transaction Publishers 2004.
Joseph A Schumpeter ‘Capitalism in the postwar world’ in: Joseph A Schumpeter Essays on Entrepreneurs, Innovations, Business Cycles, and the Evolution of Capitalism Edited by R.V. Clemence 7th edition pp 175–188 New Brunswick and London, Transaction Publishers 2004.
Galbraith, op cit 2010 p 38.
ibid p 37.
Lawrence G McDonald Colossal Failure of Common Sense. The Inside Story of the Collapse of Lehman Brothers. With Patrick Robinson New York: Three Rivers Press 2009; Joseph Tibman The Murder of LEHMAN BROTHERS. An Insider’s Look at the Global Meltdown New York, Brick Tower Press 2009.
Marin Heidegger Being and Time New York, Harper and Row 1962.
Eric W Ford, Jack Duncan, Arthur G Bedeian, Peter M Ginter, Matthew D Rousculp & Alice M Adams ‘Mitigating risks, visible hands, inevitable disasters, and soft variables: Management research that matters to managers’ Academy of Management Executive 19 no 4 (2005) pp 24–38, p 26.
McDonald op cit 2009 p 7.
ibid p 4.
Tibman op cit 2009 p 55.
Moody’s, Standard and Poor’s, and Fitch are the only rating agencies recognised by the free market economy. They have no competitors and their ratings are usually considered by governments and business as incontestable. Despite this, some market observers are starting to question their objectivity and reliability, especially after the global financial crisis of 2008 and the persisting banking problems within the European Union.
Tibman op cit 2009p 65.
ibid p 63.
McDonald op cit 2009 p 37.
ibid p 38.
ibid p 74.
ibid p 68.
ibid p 70.
Tibman op cit 2009, p 42.
McDonald op cit 2009 p 73.
ibid p 74.
ibid p 76.
Tibman op cit 2009 p58.
ibid p 68.
ibid p 54.
ibid p 56.
Schumpeter op cit 2004 pp 175-188.
McDonald op cit 2009 p 107.
ibid.
McDonald op cit 2009 p 110.
ibid p 71.
ibid p 108.
ibid p 114.
W B Donham ‘The Social Significance of Business’ Harvard Business Review 4 no 4 (1927) pp 406–419.
Howard Rothman Bowen Social Responsibility of the Businessman New York, Harper and Row 1953.
Raymond C Baumhard ‘How Ethical Are Businessmen?’ Harvard Business Review 39 no 4 (1961) pp 156–176.
Andrew Crane, David Knights & Ken Starkey ‘The Conditions of our Freedom: Foucault, Organization, and Ethics’ Business Ethics Quarterly 18 no 3 (2008) pp 299–320; Campbell Jones ‘As if Business Ethics Were Possible, Within Such Limits’ Organization 10 no 2 (2003) pp 223–248; Linda Klebe Treviño ‘Ethical Decision Making in Organizations: A Person-situation Interactionist Model’ Academy of Management Review 11 no 3 (1986) pp 601–617; Ben Wempe ‘In defense of a Self-disciplined, Domain-specific Social Contract Theory of Business Ethics’ Business Ethics Quarterly 15 no 1 (2005) pp 113–135.
John Dobson ‘Alasdair Macintyre’s Aristotelian Business Ethics: A Critique’ Journal of Business Ethics 86 (2008) pp 43–50; Alasdair MacIntyre After virtue Notre Dame, University of Notre Dame Press 1984; Roudan Shao, Karl Aquino & Dan Freeman ‘Beyond Moral Reasoning: A Review of Moral Identity Research and its Implications for Business Ethics’ Business Ethics Quarterly 18 no 4 (2008) pp 513–540; Jason Stansbury ‘Reasoned Moral Agreement: Applying Discourse Ethics Within Organizations’ Business Ethics Quarterly 19 no 1 (2009) pp 33–56.
David De Cremer, David Mayer & Marshall Schminke ‘On Understanding Ethical Behavior and Decision Making: A Behavioral Ethics Approach’ Business Ethics Quarterly 20 no 1 (2010) pp 1–6; Jason Stansbury ‘Reasoned Moral Agreement: Applying Discourse Ethics Within Organizations’ Business Ethics Quarterly 19 no 1 (2009) pp 33–56; Linda Klebe Treviño, Gary R Weaver & Scott J Reynolds ‘Behavioral Ethics in Organizations: A Review’ Journal of Management 32 no 6 (2006) pp 951–990; Gary R Weaver ‘Virtue in Organizations: Moral Identity as a Foundation for Moral Agency’ Organization Studies 27 no 3 (2006) pp 41–368; Gary G Weaver & Linda Klebe Treviño ‘Normative and Empirical Business Ethics: Separation, Marriage of Convenience, or Marriage of Necessity?’ Business Ethics Quarterly 4 no 2 (1994) pp 129–144.
De Cremer et al. op cit 2010; Treviño op cit 1986; Linda Klebe Treviño & Gary R Weaver ‘Business ETHICS/BUSINESS Ethics: One Field or Two?’ Business Ethics Quarterly 4 no 2 (1994) pp 113–128; Gary R Weaver & Linda Klebe Treviño ‘Compliance and Values Oriented Ethics Programs: Influences on Employees’ Attitudes and Behaviour’ Business Ethics Quarterly 9 no 2 (1999) pp 315–335.
Kenneth Bass, Tim Barnett & Gene Brown ‘Individual Difference Variables, Ethical Judgements, and Ethical Behavioural Intentions’ Business Ethics Quarterly 9 no 2 (1999) pp 183–205.
Stewart Clegg & Mark Haugaard The SAGE Handbook of Power. London, SAGE 2009; David Courpasson & Françoise Dany ‘Cultures of Resistance in the Workplace’ in: Stewart Clegg & Mark Haugaard (eds) The SAGE Handbook of Power pp 332–347 London, SAGE (2009); Crane et al., op cit, 2008; Peter Fleming & Andre Spicer Contesting the Corporation: Struggle, Power, and Resistance in Organizations Cambridge, Cambridge University Press 2007; Susan Halford & Pauline Leonard ‘Place, Space and Time: Contextualizing Workplace Subjectivities’ Organization Studies 27 no 5 (2005) pp 657–676; David Knights ‘Subjectivity, Power and the Labour Process’ in: David Knights D & Hugh Willmott (eds) Labour Process Theory pp 297–335 London, Macmillan 1990; David Knights & Glenn Morgan ‘Corporate Strategy, Organizations, and Subjectivity: A Critique’ Organization Studies 12 no 2 (1991) pp 251–273; Tim Newton ‘From Freemason to the Employee: Organization, History and Subjectivity’ Organization Studies 25 no 8 (2004) pp 1363–1387; Carl Rhodes ‘Reading and Writing Organizational Lives’ Organization 7 no 1 (2000) pp 7–29.
In translating Dasein with human agency we align ourselves with one of Heidegger’s contemporary interpreters: Michael Wheeler Reconstructing the Cognitive World Cambridge, Mass and London, The MIT Press 2005, p 122. Another equally prominent interpreter also uses the notion of ‘way of being’ or ‘way of acting’: Herbert L Dreyfus Being-in-the-world. A commentary on Heidegger’s Being and Time, Division I Cambridge, Mass, MIT Press (1993 4th edition), p 14 and 16.
Heidegger, op cit 1962 p 23.
See on the this John Dewey Human Nature and Conduct. An Introduction to Social Psychology London, Allen & Unwin 1922, p 178.
Dreyfus op cit 1993 p 70.
Heidegger op cit 1962 p 227.
ibid p 84.
ibid p 163.
Dreyfus, op cit 1993 p 67. Others have proposed the term ‘practical coping’: Robert Chia & Robin Holt ‘Strategy as Practical Coping: A Heideggerian Perspective’ Organization Studies 27 no 5 (2009) p 635–655.
Heidegger op cit 1962 p 153.
ibid p 154.
The following citations refer to pp 163–167.
Heidegger op cit 1962 pp 68–69.
ibid p 235.
ibid pp 318–319; emphasis in original text.
ibid pp 165–166.
ibid pp 166–167.
McDonald op cit 2009, p 339, italics in original.
Tibman op cit 2009, p 39.
Heidegger op cit 1962 p 236.
Op cit 1981 p 254.
Tibman op cit 2009 p 51.
Tibman op cit 2009 p 45.
Tibman op cit 2009 p 225.
Dewey op cit 1922 p 177–178.
Knights, op cit 1990.
Knights and Morgan op cit 1991.
ibid p 267.
Alf Rehn & Saara Taalas ‘On Wittgenstein and Management at Rest: Prolegomena to a Philosophy of Problems’ Philosophy of Management 7 no 2 (2008), pp 47–54, p 48.
Dreyfus op cit p 238.
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Betta, M., Jones, R. & Latham, J. Being and Care in Organisation and Management — A Heideggerian Interpretation of the Global Financial Crisis of 2008. Philos. of Manag. 13, 5–20 (2014). https://doi.org/10.5840/pom20141312
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.5840/pom20141312