Interorganizational relations from the perspective of strategy as social practice

Abstract

This theoretical essay aims to reflect on interorganizational relations (IORs) from the idea of strategy as social practice (SSP), contributing to the debate on considering rationalities other than the instrumental in studies on interorganizational strategies. Therefore, critical theoretical assumptions of organizational strategy and organizational studies are reviewed. It is assumed that the IORs occur in everyday life through interactions between different agents, considering the analysis of micro-processes as inherent and complementary to analysis at the meso and macro level. The justification is that the instrumental rationality inherent to the dominant social science in the West, traditionally used to explain IORs, is not enough to contemplate the debate in the field of interorganizational strategies to consider the social context and the decolonial thought, which requires a look beyond economic utilitarianism.

Keywords:
Interorganizational relations; Strategy as social practice; Rationalities; Microprocesses