From Monastic Rule to Corporate Culture
Year: 2025
Type: article
Abstract: This working paper investigates the often-overlooked monastic and ecclesiastical foundations of modern organizational discipline and management techniques. Drawing on a Foucauldian genealogical framework, it traces how medieval monastic structures—embodied by the Rule of Saint Benedict—shaped later ecclesiastical bureaucracies, then informed early modern states and mercantile ventures, and finally migrated into industrial and contemporary corporate management. By exploring key texts such as the Regula Benedicti and the Jesuit Constitutions alongside managerial theories (e.g., Taylor, Weber), the study reveals significant continuities in performance oversight, hierarchical supervision, and self-optimization. These longstanding practices, once rooted in spiritual regimes, persist in secular workplaces under new rationales, including productivity, profit, and team cohesion. Ultimately, the article reflects on how modern organizational life retains the structural residue of pastoral power, inviting ethical inquiries about whether “care” in the workplace disguises lingering patterns of control, and suggesting possibilities for more genuinely participatory forms of discipline and community.
Author: Montano Durán, Carlos Eduardo
Institution: Universidad Autónoma de Ciudad Juárez
Language: English
Topic: Foucault, Power, and Ethics
Subfield: Sociology and Political Science
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W7084666516
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