The study of organizational culture through practices: a proposal in the light of Bourdieu’s legacy

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to analyze the study of organizational culture through its management practices, based on Bourdieu’s theoretical framework. In order to achieve this, it has a secondary objective, which is to analyze the state of the art of organizational studies that employ this theoretical framework. Initially, a categorization of the prevailing trends in the study of culture is presented, followed by a discussion over the concept, which highlights its approach as directly related to practices. The focus of this study is the management practice, understood as a cultural manifestation of the organization, through which normative, symbolic, semantic and organizational values are broached. The adopted cutting was restricted to Bourdieu’s Theory of Practical Action. Brazilian and foreign academic literature that employed this theoretical framework was reviewed through the survey and analysis of articles published in scientific journals from January 2003 to December 2013. The analysis of the state of the art of organizational studies, comprising 74 selected articles, of which 24 are Brazilian and 50 are foreign, all making use of the central concepts of the Theory of Practical Action, revealed a deficiency of the associate employment of habitus, field and capital constructs in studies concerning practices as manifestations of organizational culture. Finally, a research agenda that employs the Bourdieusian theoretical legacy in cultural studies in organizations is proposed, which is justified in view of the gap in cultural approaches to the theoretical basis in question.