مقاله انگلیسی رایگان در مورد طراحی با فریب تا یک سیاست شی گرا

مقاله سال ۲۰۱۶

Stakeholders are important in project management research at least in the general sense that many different types of people, who all cherish their objectives, take part in the development of an infrastructure object (Cleland and King, 1968; Calvert, 1995; Cleland, 1998; McElroy and Mills, 2000; Winch, 2004). This invites the problem of coordination of interests towards common goals (Chinyio and Olomolaiye, 2010; Achterkamp and Vos, 2008; Littau et al., 2010; Mok et al., 2015). Stakeholder analysis and the management of stakeholder relationships are particularly relevant in the management of megaprojects (Mok et al., 2015), and Winch’s (forthcoming) review of megaproject stakeholders expands the range of potential stakeholders from only those ‘interested in the project’ to also those ‘affected by’ the project.

Gathering insights from these studies, it is possible to develop a critique of the notion of ‘interests’, which is fundamental to stakeholder theory (Freeman, 1984; Freeman and Gilbert, 1987; see also Freeman et al., 2004, 2007), and illuminate the weaknesses of this notion for effective stakeholder management. In doing this, it is useful to contrast the dominant model in megaproject stakeholder management literature, which has focused on structural interests only. This model has led to two conclusions. One is that taking account of many interests is a difficult and often failing aspiration (Bruzelius et al., 2002). People seem to be self-centred and when they stand in each other’s way conflict ensues even if attempts are made to try to include people and their participation. The answer to this problem typically suggests using more stakeholder management to acquire more knowledge about the relevant interests at stake (Sykes, 1990; Stannard, 1990; Flyvbjerg, 2007). Another type of conclusion is that because there are many interests, it is impossible to align them all and only the strong interests prevail. Here, stakeholder management turns into deception (Flyvbjerg, 2005; Flyvbjerg et al., 2002, 2003, 2009) where one group, typically project management, deceives the rest. While stakeholder theory generally suggests that stakeholder management means aligning interests, when deception happens some interests are able to dominate other interests. In this case, stakeholder management produces an altogether different storyline, namely, that the enrolment of others into the project requires that project management fool them about the fulfilment of their interests. The notion of interests is relevant to the notion of ‘design by deception’; deception happens because project management’s interests in undertaking the megaproject are considered more important than others’ interests. Deception separates interests, rather than aligning them. Lying seems expedient to catch stakeholders’ approval, giving them the illusion that the megaproject will meet their interests, but it embraces a certain definition of stakeholder that has an orientation towards those who control the project (Frooman, 1999), rather than those affected by the project (Winch, forthcoming).

Yet, interests are clearly relevant in project stakeholder management (Cleland, 1985, 1986, 1989; Wright, 1997; McElroy and Mills, 2000; Miller and Lessard, 2000; Boddy and Paton, 2004; Bourne and Walker, 2006; Javed et al., 2006; Littau et al., 2010) focusing on dyadic relationships between project managers and individual stakeholders (Aaltonen and Sivonen, 2009). Stakeholder theory posits that interests derive from a group’s position in a system (Olander and Landin, 2008). In this theory, interest is shorthand for a generalised identity pertaining to a group’s position in a social system. It is a structural concept; for example, managers are interested in money, architects are interested in quality, clients are interested in effects and so on. The problem is that by focusing on interests, research pays more attention to what people should be considering relevant than what they actually consider relevant. This is partly due to the problem that interest, as such, is not material. Interest is abstract, and this poses empirical problems because it is unpredictable what happens when people advance claims, problems and concerns that are difficult to associate with their interests.