I den här artikeln diskuterar jag investeringar och användning av investeringskalkyler utifrån några studier och ingångar som bryter mot ”rationella” föreställningar om hur investeringskalkylering och investeringsprocesser går till. Exempelvis belyser jag hur kalkyler utgör strategiska brickor i spel och hur de används för att få förutbestämda investeringar till stånd. Sammantaget etablerar detta en motbild till den, inom både utbildning och forskning, utbredda – rationella – synen på investeringskalkylering och användning av kalkyler. I ett senare steg kompletterar jag motbilden genom att introducera ett par paradoxer som synliggör investeringskalkylering utifrån premisser som bryter mot invanda föreställningar och antaganden. Tillsammans bildar paradoxerna ett perspektiv som öppnar för en annorlunda förståelse av investeringskalkyler än vad befintliga studier inom området gör. Mer konkret stimulerar paradoxerna till kritisk reflektion samtidigt som de öppnar för insikter om hur sociala omständigheter färgar användning av kalkyler och investeringsbeslut. 

Through the writings of Thomas Mann, this paper explores ideas about what entrepreneurship was, is, and is not. The starting point is the question of how the discourse on entrepreneurship has evolved over time. The methodology is inspired by a research program that emphasizes the relationship between social science and literature, and the empirical inquiry is guided by the works of the German author Thomas Mann, particularly, Buddenbrooks and The Magic Mountain. Through these works, the discourse on entrepreneurship is explored at two points in time: one in the 19th century and one in the present day. This exploration illustrates the contrast between the 19th-century perception of the entrepreneur as a capitalist and risk-taker, and the contemporary discourse where the entrepreneur is often seen as a creative and flexible innovator. The final section of the paper delves into the ever-expanding discourse on entrepreneurship and elaborates on what entrepreneurship is not, as well as whether the broad discourse – where even artists are considered entrepreneurs – risks obscuring the understanding of entrepreneurship.

In this chapter, I discuss and challenge a traditional assumption about management scholars, namely, that they, above all, are to be seen as development consultants who create knowledge to make organizations more efficient and well-functioning. I do this by approaching research and researchers through a perspective that places writing at the heart of scientific activity. This is a perspective that tends to be neglected, and sometimes even forgotten. That is strange—perhaps even problematic—since writing is an indispensable and central part of all scholarly work. The chapter begins by framing the management researcher, through a more conventional perspective, as a development consultant. Next, I suggest that writing can equally be framed as the central research activity, that the researcher can be seen as a writer—a Homo scribens. From this perspective, I look at three different parts of the research process that relate to methodology, empirical material, and theory. Following this, I reflect upon some political aspects of writing management. In the final section of the paper, I summarize the implications of seeing writing as the central research activity, and the researcher as a writer—a Homo scribens—hoping that this can contribute to more interesting research, well worth reading.

Johan Asplund is highly regarded in Swedish sociology, yet there are few studies dedicated to his work. Existing research focuses mainly on the ideas (content), overlooking the significance of his unique sociological approach and style (form). This text, however, emphasizes the distinctive style and form of his texts. Drawing on a broad range of his works and a detailed analysis of his notable book Om undran inför samhället a couple of key themes that highlight Asplund's distinctiveness and way of shaping ideas are proposed. They all emphasize, and build on, the relationship between science and art. In addition to contributing to the growing literature on Asplund, the themes encourage a deeper exploration of the importance of scholarly form and composition in academic discourse, showcasing their inherent creative potential.

Antalet vetenskapliga publikationer ökar kraftigt varje år, och man kan med rätta fråga sig vem som ska läsa alla texter.

"Tanken på att tid är pengar tar alltmer över vårt tänkande i vardagen"

The aim of this book is to inquire into the relationship between human beings and financial markets. In this inquiry the author wishes to emphasize two aspects. Firstly, the act of creation of scientific knowledge, and secondly, the ubiquitous relationship that seems to interweave our everyday lives with financial markets. These two aspects highlight the main conversations to which this book wants to contribute. These are interpretative and hermeneutic research within social science in general and business administration in particular, as well as the growing literature on financialization. The more precise problem discussed concerns the insecurity and uncertainty that seem to surround our relationship with financial markets, or, as put in the literature: “the uncertain subjects of financialization”. Inspired by the ethnographic tradition, the author observed a gathering of thousands of people under the topic of making money from money in a spectacular building. The experience of this event worked as a catalyst for an interpretation of not only the specific meeting but also of our relationship to financial markets more generally. With the help of an elaborated analogy, it is suggested that we live (within) a spirit of finance capitalism, a spirit that has an ever-increasing presence in our lives. The author argues that our relationship to financial markets – and the financialization of daily life – is an existential dilemma as much as a financial one. Differently put, we can read the widespread uncertainty surrounding financial markets as doubt about the existence that we – more or less, for better or worse – appear unable to escape in a capitalistic society where finance is omnipresent. The interpretation contributes to the literature on financialization in two distinct ways. First, it integrates several themes recognized in the literature – such as opportunity, power, education and community – under one umbrella. Second, it accomplishes this by drawing on the tradition of sociology of religion and thereby highlighting the existential aspect of finance as an essential part of the human condition in a capitalist society.

Previous research has shown that sociopolitical context is important for adoption of shareholder value-oriented practices in terms of owner and manager preferences (Fiss & Zajac, 2004). This turn of research and its focus on owners has further been elaborated on by for example Chizema & Shinosawa (2012) and Zattoni & Minichilli (2009) as well as by Saunders & Tuschke (2007) and Shipilov et al. (2010) when it comes to the importance of firm networks. The purpose of this paper is to continue to explore why firms adopt shareholder value practices and especially so in traditional stakeholder governance system. Drawing on institutional theory, we develop a model of firm adoption of shareholder value practices which emphasizes the two sociopolitical features of different ownership types and board networks.

The model is tested on all Swedish listed companies 1995 to 2010 in five-year intervals. Furthermore, we specifically choose to study the two separate practices of using a dual-share system or not and executive incentive plans, as they are both closely connected to an agency-theory perspective and shareholder value orientation, but are very different in how upsetting one may assume them to be to the incumbent corporate governance system.

Our findings show that a shareholder value orientation seems to have taken root in Swedish companies, but that different aspects of the concept are affected by different actors, making the traditional Swedish blockholders and board networks vital although in separate ways. When it comes to the practice of equity incentive-based executive compensation, this is closely related to firm relations in terms of both board interlocks and board centrality. Thus, social networks seem to drive this practice. When it comes to using a one-share-one-vote system (rather than as traditional in Sweden A- and B-shares), social networks seem to have no importance at all. Instead, what is closely related to the adoption of such a non-traditional system is whether there are strong blockholders or not and of which type this owner is, as family and sphere blockholding is negatively related to one-share-one-vote, whereas institutional and foreign blockholding is positively related to it. Thus, non-system-threatening practices are readily diffused through social networks, as tends to be the case with symbolic action, but system-threatening practices are met with resistance from incumbent powerful actors.

We suggest that rather than hypothesis-testing of different variables, the contribution of our paper lies in its teasing out of different patterns for different shareholder value orientation practices, as it may help explain the different results in previous studies in similar European contexts. For where Fiss & Zajac (2004) emphasize their findings on the importance of owners (and the non-importance of networks), Sanders & Tuschke (2007) as well as Zattoni & Minichilli (2009) in contrast emphasize the non-importance of owners and in the first case the importance of networks, which are unfortunately not included in the latter one. The explanation for these diverging results may then be found in the dependent variable, as who is invested (or not) in the practice may determine its adoption.