https://www.neondagene.no/call-for-papers-2023/
Organizing in changing landscapes: Threats, challenges, and novel opportunities?
Throughout the year, the water flows in Norwegian rivers and streams at a predictable and familiar pace, in paths that are well established and where, at a close but safe distance, we have our schools, businesses, and homes. The burble of the river is a dear sound in everyday life, and life goes on at its regular pace. But some years, when spring and mild weather arrive, snow and ice loosen and accumulate in piles, building higher and stronger into a dam that resists the powerful pressure.
An ice pile formed by individually harmless lumps of ice, a form that grows and grows, waiting to burst. Suddenly, on a beautiful sunny day, the structure begins to melt, and the ice breaks into the creek at a furious pace. Ice and huge masses of water sweep away what stands near the river. Buildings, soil, roads and young trees are never seen again, and it is only when the ice comes out into a gentler and wider landscape that it calms down.
In 2023, it feels like we are watching the construction of such an ice-build-up. Many disturbing and isolated events both near and far seem to gather into a chaotic mixture, which threatens to break what we have built together. There is war in Europe, political fronts are steeper than in a long time, and our planet is in peril, but the solutions create new tangles. Digitalization demands new ways of handling tasks and leading human beings and organizations. The rapid rise of artificial intelligence penetrates and disrupts the «regular flow» of everyday life, and challenges our traditional ways of working, learning, leading and organizing. Do the challenges appear manageable, or do we have to seek new directions for organizing and the field of organization science?
Our society and our communities are under pressure. Organizations are often hoped to offer solutions: providing arenas for coordination, negotiation and compromise, achieving sustainable development goals, and generally overcoming the “grand challenges” of our time. At the same time, organizations also seem to create problems: as arenas of inequality and exclusion, conflicts that cannot be solved with today’s organizing, and as forces of nature destruction. At NEON23, we hope to come together to discuss how we as researchers, teachers, students, and professionals are able to respond to these challenges and successfully navigate these complex times.
We strongly believe in the need for interdisciplinarity and pluralism of organizational research as an advantage. The NEON conference – having for many years served as a meeting place across disciplines and between researchers and practitioners – is an excellent arena for professional discussions about what constitutes positive visions for the future and how to organize present and future organizations with an eye to a better future. In order to develop NEON’s potential of filling such a role further, we invite you to submit proposals for papers and we encourage all participants to embrace broad interdisciplinary issues also for this year’s conference.
We therefore invite you to submit paper proposals focusing on what organizing and management on various levels (macro, meso and micro) which in turn may help us gain further understanding of the increasing uncertainty and conflicting times facing the world today.
This call is in English to also attract paper presenters outside Norway. Our language policy is still to organize the session programme in both English and any of the Scandinavian languages. We welcome presentations under the proposed track-themes of NEON 2023. You may also submit a paper proposal on themes that are not in the list.
Abstract Submission
We are now welcoming paper proposals for oral presentations. An abstract of maximum 500 words should be submitted to the conference organizer using the online abstract formula (one table or one figure may be added in addition to the abstract. You will then be asked to upload the image either in jpeg or png format with good resolution). Deadline is August 31st. By September 20th you will receive feedback on your abstract. Authors that receive a “rework” feedback, will be asked to resubmit a revised abstract by September 27th. There is a limit of two papers submissions per author/presenter. The length of a paper presentation may vary from one session to another, but the standard length is 15 minutes + time for questions/opponents. Welcome!
Published: 07/23/2023