From Global Management to Global Appreciation

Abstract

This article begins by deconstructing the rhetoric of sustainable development and global management, revealing such schemes as furthering industrial imperatives. Further analysis shows that a global management perspective is guided by an epistemology of abstraction, hidden power relations, objectivism, and a technological bias. Environmental degradation and societal turbulence are consequences of a restrictive focal setting on space, time, and knowledge. To counter the limitations associated with modernist objectivist knowing, a new vision of reality is needed. This article argues that transformation to a sustainable society requires a global appreciation for the space and time in which we live. Such appreciation amounts to the emergence of a transformative epistemology that can open up restrictive focal settings. This aperspectival view is offered as a means to enhance environmental sensitivity and access to wisdom and creativity.