From Strategy of Religions to Religion of Strategy: Comments on Miller's “Competitive Strategies of Religious Organizations”

Abstract

In a recent article, Miller (2002) employed strategic management tools (SMT) to explain the competition amongst religious organizations as well as their evolution. Intrigued by the novelty of the approach, were sought to analyze the use of the SMT in this situation. Based on our analysis, we challenge the appropriateness of the transposition, and argue that beyond the novelty and the peculiarity of the topic, the pre-requisites for defining religious organizations as being firm-like and competition amongst them as being market-like have not been satisfied. Consequently, we advocate that SMT are limited in describing religious organizations' strategies. Finally, we demonstrate that Miller's essay is metaphorical and we identify how the metaphorical use of strategic management thought can be misleading.