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Chinese Management Research at a Crossroads: Some Philosophical Considerations

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 February 2015

Eric W. K. Tsang
Eric W. K. Tsang*
Affiliation:
University of Texas at Dallas, USA
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Abstract

In this commentary, I discuss some philosophical issues related to contextualizing Chinese management research. First, it should be noted that contextualization can be interpreted in different ways by different philosophical perspectives. Second, the Duhem-Quine thesis implies that replications, in the form of empirical generalization, are an appropriate means of testing Western theories in a Chinese context. Third, owing to the difficulty of conclusively falsifying management theories, attempts to create theories that explain unique Chinese management phenomena may lead to theory proliferation and the perpetuation of weak, or even false, theories. Finally, I propose the study of empirical regularities as an alternative to the theory application and theory creation approaches.

Keywords

contextualizationDuhem-Quine thesisempirical regularityreplicationtheory proliferation情境化重复检验迪昂-奎因 (Duhem-Quine) 论题理论的过度增生经验规律
Type
Commentaries
Information
Management and Organization Review , Volume 5 , Issue 1 , March 2009 , pp. 131 - 143
Copyright
Copyright © International Association for Chinese Management Research 2009

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