Health and disease in organizations

This article introduces some concepts from complexity theory and examines organizations as living systems which experience both health and disease. Orthodox management practice is considered in this context, and the authors introduce their own approach called Conditioned Emergence as a form of alternative therapy for organizations. Parallels are identified between management research and research in a number of other disciplines and the paper concludes that complexity theory may offer a new scientific paradigm in which orthodox and alternative approaches may be reconciled.