Browsing by Author "Arevuo, Mikko"

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    Adam Smith’s implicit theory of distributive justice
    (Athens Institute for Education and Research, 2024-05-01) Arevuo, Mikko
    Adam Smith wrote at a time when new commercial forces were reshaping national politics, pulling people from the countryside into growing towns, and altering the physical, social, and ideological landscapes. He broke with the mercantilist position, which assumed that all that mattered was the wealth of the ruling classes and the state. Smith argued that the best indicator of a country’s success was the prosperity of the workers, created through a commercial system based on natural liberty of self-ownership, equality, liberty, and justice. Although Smith didn’t explicitly develop a theory of distributive justice, he considered the interests of the three main social and economic classes in mid-18th century Britain: workers, owners of capital and landlords. Smith thought of equality as a combination of two ideas that were novel at the time: an account of liberty that was rooted in the nascent discipline of economics and a democratic social ideal of dignity for ordinary people. Grounded in Smith’s moral philosophy that places human equality as its core value, this paper unpacks his theory of economic growth and efficiency, where rents and wages increase as society develops economically while profit and interest rates fall, thus resulting in an overall fall in inequality.
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    Adam Smith’s moral foundations of self-interest and ethical social order
    (Wiley, 2023-09-11) Arevuo, Mikko
    This article draws on textual evidence from The Theory of Moral Sentiments and The Wealth of Nations to address mistaken interpretations of Adam Smith's fundamental concept of self-interest as greed that has been said to have had a corrosive influence on markets, commercial behaviour, and widening inequality. To the contrary, Smith's complex set of human motivations, including self-interest, his economic system that is based on free markets, and institutional frameworks governing productive property rights and the rule of law are argued to increase aggregate wealth, improve the position of those least well off, and maintain ethical social order.
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    Epistemic objects in collective decision-making: a practice perspective on the use of causal maps as situated material artifacts
    (Cranfield University, 2015-10) Arevuo, Mikko; Reinmoeller, Patrick
    Recent practice-based approaches to strategic decision-making research have emphasized the importance of gaining a deeper understanding how managers think, act, and interpret strategic decisions in practice. This focus on the micro aspects of strategic decision-making has emerged from the critique that much of the ‘traditional’ decision- making theory may not be actionable in practice. Research should therefore concentrate on what managers do when they engage in strategic activities. This practice-based perspective considers decision-making as a situated, context specific activity, and research into the enactment of decisions constitutes an important part of understanding decision-making. Such micro focus may reveal insights to the similarities and differences between organizations and teams in the ways in which their members approach decision-making tasks. Studies on decision-making as a situated activity provide valuable insight into managerial practice. However, few studies focus on the role of epistemic objects in decision-making. This thesis makes a contribution by investigating the role of epistemic objects as situated material artifacts in the collective decision-making context. Drawing on extensive review of the literature on epistemic objects, sociomateriality, causal maps, group decision-making, and managerial attribution biases, the thesis identifies an under-researched area in our understanding how epistemic objects interact with human activity in strategy making. As an inductive research undertaking, the thesis makes a theoretical contribution to knowledge by developing a conceptual framework how causal maps as epistemic objects are enacted, interpreted, and used as a sociomaterial decision-making ‘tool-in-use’ by actors. The research reveals how the enactment of causal maps as a ‘safety net’ in collective decision-making increases cognitive conflict in decision-making groups that results in the consideration of multiple decision outcomes and the development of innovative solutions to decision problems. The research also shows how the enactment of causal maps increases decision acceptance among the decision- makers by making their individual knowledge claims visible to other group members, and by motivating them to work collectively towards a shared goal. Furthermore, the research reveals how causal maps act as a ‘shock absorber’ by deflecting the decision- makers’ frustration and anger away from personal confrontation among group members thereby preventing the emergence of affective conflict. Finally, the research results indicate that the enactment of causal maps mitigates managerial biases such as groupthink and the escalation of commitment bias. In terms of managerial contribution the thesis offers a deeper insight to the affordances of causal maps, and how managers can use causal mapping as a practical decision-making ‘tool-in-use’ to improve the quality of decision-making processes by structuring conversations and debate, developing a shared understanding of decision problems, and achieving closure and decision acceptance of the decision outcomes. The thesis concludes by making recommendations for future research and the testing of the conceptual framework that may provide useful guidance for the future development of strategy practice and managerial ‘tools-in-use’ for effective strategy work.