Taylorism Revisited: Culture, Management Theory and Paradigm-Shift

Abstract

In this article, the authors look at the role of culture, management theory and paradigm-shift vis-à-vis their implications for general management. There is an in-depth focus on the influence of the European Enlightenment on eighteenth and nineteenth century industrialism and the emergence of a possibly dominant paradigm in management theory in the twentieth century, namely ‘Scientific Management’ or ‘Taylorism’, as it became known. The authors also examine, in turn, how it shaped the next development in the narrative – ‘Human Relations’ – and its successors ‘Organisational Behaviour’ and ‘Human Resource Management’.