Contributions of Africa to management and organization science

Abstract

Given the increasing globalization of management and organization science (MOS), it has been suggested that scholarly communities examine the contributions of their contexts to the discipline. Accordingly, the contributions from Africa to MOS across the pre-modern, modern, and post-modern eras are examined using generative theory. Evidence from historical, philosophical, anthropological, and sociological sources demonstrates that significant contributions to MOS have originated from Africa. Even so, those contributions have not been acknowledged, especially in the post-modern era, due to the “writing out” of Africa. Several implications for research and pedagogy concerning MOS and Africa are considered given the current trend of decolonization.