The main objective of this article is to present ambivalences and contradictions of the concept of success in the context of management, with the diffusion of managerial ideas right after World War II. In this context, we can observe, connect to other phenomena, the prerogative of the market view, the blurring of ideological differences, the lack of a separation between public and private life. We argue that the contemporary notion of success is included in this context. From the constructionist perspective, which proposes that social life is a result of a collective construction organized by discursive practices, this paper reviews and classifies national and international academic articles about success to show that it is a notion that was disseminated and incorporated as a conduct model in contemporary society, along with values disseminated by management. The notion of success has been object of study of a great number of publications, especially the ones described as pop management (WOOD JR.; PAULA, 2002), but also criticized in academic texts (PAHL, 1997; TANURE; CARVALHO NETO; ANDRADE, 2007; CHUSMIR; PARKER, 2011). This model of success, propagated, within other ways, by the media, and seen as a possibility of social mobility, ignores gender matters and imposes high personal costs for it to be reached. The critical perspective used in this essay pretends to denaturalize social structures described as inevitable, show that discussions about success are full of controversies, propose that success is a social institution built and assimilated in different frontiers and, by doing this, allow a configuration of new meanings to the term.
Meanings of success; Managerialism; Constructionism; Institution: Discursive practices