Taking the employee's perspective : negotiating critical research in an organization in conflict

The growing interest in critical management research reveals a complexity of potentially problematic relationships between researchers, research participants, managers and research funding bodies. As critical social science is about identifying and challenging the assumptions underpinning perception and action, recognizing the influence of history and culture, and exploring alternatives that may disrupt established orders (Alvesson and Deetz 2000), relationships between researchers, participants and sponsors can become difficult (Behar 2003; Wray-Bliss 2003). This chapter examines the operation of these relationships within an organizational setting characterized by multiple agendas, hierarchical structures and considerable levels of mistrust.