Sociology of Organisations

Course goals

• To acquire knowledge about the development and relevance of sociological theories and research on organisations, their structures and functioning, and changes therein.
• To be able to discriminate between various theoretical insights (similarities and differences) concerning organisations.
• To learn to apply the theoretical insights to modern-day cases, such as newspaper articles and the company-specific portfolio students write.

Content

This course is focused on the problem (P), theory (T) and policy (P) parts of the so-called PTRP (PTOB in Dutch) cycle in the Sociology bachelor's curriculum.

In many ways, sociology is about understanding behaviour in context. Organisations are a major aspect of that context. During most parts of our lives, we are embedded in organisations and we are constantly affected by them: the university we attend, the company we work for, the government agency that gives us permits, or the factory that makes our phones. Without knowledge about and insight in modern organisations, we cannot understand many social problems. This course uses sociological theories to understand organisations, and at some points also includes ideas from economics, management science, and psychology.

By the end of this course, students will have been exposed to a wide range of core concepts in the sociology of organisations, based on classical authors and recent studies.  Each week is organised around a specific topic (e.g., structure, culture, responsibility, flexibility), which will be studied in the lectures, workshops, and portfolios.