What We Talk About When We Talk About Inequality: An Introduction to the Journal of Management Studies Special Issue

Date01 May 2018
AuthorJames P. Walsh,Roy Suddaby,Garry D. Bruton
Published date01 May 2018
DOIhttp://doi.org/10.1111/joms.12333
What We Talk About When We Talk About Inequality:
An Introduction to the Journal of Management Studies
Special Issue
Roy Suddaby, Garry D. Bruton and James P. Walsh
University of Victoria; Newcastle University; Texas Christian University; University of Michigan
ABSTRACT This introduction to the Journal of Management Studies Special Issue on
Inequality argues that the way we frame conversations about inequality reveals important
information about how poverty and inequality have become institutionalized in modern
society. We observe a distinct recent shift in the collective conversation about vulnerable
populations in western society away from poverty and toward inequality. We question why
this shift has occurred and who benefits from it. Drawing from the provocative papers that
populate the Special Issue we describe how forms of talk can help create inequality, maintain
it and holds the potential to change it. We encourage new research that adopts a holistic
reintegration of poverty and inequality by attending to the ‘dirty realism’ of the violence of
poverty and the dire consequences of internalized inequality.
Keywords: inequality, poverty, rhetoric, social issues in management
INTRODUCTION
The empirical fact of inequality is beset by ongoing debates and unresolved questions.
What is inequality? How do we measure it? Most critically, is inequality getting worse?
Some say yes. An Oxfam report presented at the World Economic Forum last year rein-
forces the observation that we used to motivate this special issue – the wealth of the
world’s 62 richest individuals equals that of half the world’s poorest individuals – some
three and a half billion people (Oxfam, 2016b). When we announced this special issue,
quoting Oxfam’s 2014 data, we remarked that 85 individuals controlled such wealth.
The number was 388 in 2010. As Figure 1a demonstrates, the concentration of global
wealth is increasing.
Address for reprints: Roy Suddaby, Peter B. Gustavson, School of Business, University of Victoria, Victoria,
British Columbia V8P 4V4, Canada (rsuddaby@uvic.ca).
V
C2018 John Wiley & Sons Ltd and Society for the Advancement of Management Studies
Journal of Management Studies 55:3 May 2018
doi: 10.1111/joms.12333

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