Focusing on addressing Charles Morrissey final question: what "observations -
and recommendations- to our institutions" should we make?
Currently what are the principles behind management education being thought?
In a different context Robert Bacal wrote, "... pretending that they are
neutral is a dangerous error". He was talking about how "... tools,
technology are hardly neutral in their effects" that they have associated
"positive and negative outcomes, some foreseen, many NOT foreseen". If we
consider that management education is both a tools set of ideas and an
enabling technology then we must ponder what perspective we implicitly are
promoting.
Ed Brenegar gives us a clear example, the Amish seek "their commitment to
maintain community over against an individualism that is sustained through
technological innovation". To pretend that we are neutral is a dangerous
error. We require to address the changes produced by our progress and
technological developments. Ideally we must find a sustainable way of doing
whatever we want in the first place, most likely we are going to have to find
fixes and clean up the mess to the unforeseen negative outcomes resulting
from our past progress or live with the resulting products. Contamination of
our air in cities is just one example.
In a previous e-mail I questioned whether a directed vision or the result of
exploiting current desires drives our development, including management
education. "Can we freely act to create the environment we want or are we
bound to react to the environment we have?" This should bring us back on
Charles Morrissey final question: what "observations - and recommendations-
to our institutions" should we make?
Saludos
Esteban
pd Don, I too don?t fear progress. What concerns me is the lack of it in some
areas. Technologies now provide the means to create and automate mistakes
with incredible efficiency and speed.