Organizational complexity in big science: strategies and practices.
Studies on ‘Big Science’ have shifted our perspective from the complexity of scientific objects and their representations to the complexity of sociotechnical arrangements. However, how scientists in large-scale research attend to this complexity to facilitate and afford knowledge production has rare...
| Publicado en: | Synthese Vol. 200; no. 3; pp. 1 - 26 |
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| Autores principales: | , |
| Formato: | Artículo |
| Publicado: |
Springer Nature
Jun2022
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| Acceso en línea: | Ver este registro en EBSCOhost |
| fields | @attributes: recordID: 1 pdfLink: plink: https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=hlh&AN=156757972&site=ehost-live header: @attributes: shortDbName: hlh uiTerm: 156757972 longDbName: Humanities International Complete uiTag: AN controlInfo: bkinfo: jinfo: jid: 00397857 4LI jtl: Synthese issn: 00397857 maglogo: N pubinfo: dt: Jun2022 vid: 200 iid: 3 pid: 237 pub: Springer Nature artinfo: ui: 156757972 10.1007/s11229-022-03649-3 ppf: 1 ppct: 25 formats: fmt: – @attributes: type: T – @attributes: type: P size: 889KB tig: atl: Organizational complexity in big science: strategies and practices. aug: au: Merz, Martina Sorgner, Helene affil: University of Klagenfurt, Sterneckstrasse 15, 9020, Klagenfurt, Austria sug: keyword: Big Science Bureaucracy Large Hadron Collider Organizational complexity Segmentation Standardization ab: Studies on ‘Big Science’ have shifted our perspective from the complexity of scientific objects and their representations to the complexity of sociotechnical arrangements. However, how scientists in large-scale research attend to this complexity to facilitate and afford knowledge production has rarely been considered to date. In this article, we locate organizational complexity on the level of organizing practices that follow multiple and divergent logics. We identify three strategies of managing organizational complexity, drawing on existing literature on large-scale research as well as own empirical research. The three strategies are: segmenting research infrastructure, introducing elements of bureaucratic governance, and implementing standards and standardization. We illustrate these strategies with examples from our empirical case study on experimental particle physics research at CERN’s Large Hadron Collider. While the strategies we identified help to cope with the complexity of some organizational tasks by dividing, ordering, or mediating between divergent organizational logics, we find that organizational complexity overall is not reduced but rather displaced. We argue that dealing with complexity is a dynamic and ongoing process, which inevitably generates novel organizational complexity. pubtype: Academic Journal doctype: Article src: R language: English refInfo: copyright: @attributes: flag: Y custom: Synthese is a copyright of Springer, 2022. All Rights Reserved. item: Synthese holder: Springer Nature dt: @attributes: year: 2022 holdings: @attributes: islocal: N |
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