Provided by Markus Reihlen, Leuphana University Lüneburg
Guiding questions: How do we understand decision-making processes in times of crisis, conflict and war? How do typical decision-making biases lead to war?
Lecture
Core readings
Bukkvoll, T. (2016). Why Putin went to war: Ideology, interests and decision-making in the Russian use of force in Crimea and Donbas. Contemporary Politics, 22(3), 267-282. PDF
Hodgkinson, G. P., & Starbuck, W. H. (2012). Organizational decision making: Mapping terrains on different planets. In: Hodgkinson, G. P., & Starbuck, W. H. (Eds.) The Oxford Handbook of Organizational Decision Making. Oxford University Press, 1-31. PDF
Contemporary news articles
Gessen, K. (2022). Was it inevitable? A short history of Russia’s war on Ukraine. The Guardian, March 11.
Gorris, L. (2022). “Putin lives in historic analogies and metaphors” – An interview with Ivan Krastev. Der Spiegel, March 17.
Post-lecture assignment
Write a short (about 500 words each) memo about the following two questions:
- In the lecture we introduced four models of organizational decision making. Based on the background readings and video material, give a brief account of how each model – the rational, the sensemaking, the organizational routine, and the politics model – would explain the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
- Assess these four accounts and try to synthesize them into your own explanation of how decision making in the Kremlin unfolded. In order to do so, try to take the dynamics of events into account.
Background readings
Allison, G. T. (1969). Conceptual models and the Cuban missile crisis. American Political Science Review, 63(3), 689-718. PDF
Hart, P. (1991). Irving L. Janis’ victims of groupthink. Political Psychology, 247-278. PDF
Langley, A., Mintzberg, H., Pitcher, P., Posada, E., & Saint-Macary, J. (1995). Opening up decision making: The view from the black stool. Organization Science, 6(3), 260-279. PDF
Kornberger, M., Leixnering, S., & Meyer, R. E. (2019). The logic of tact: How decisions happen in situations of crisis. Organization Studies, 40(2), 239-266. PDF
Background videos
The psychology of an isolated Russia (by Stephen Kotkin, Princeton University & The New Yorker)
Decision-making in Russia (by Ekaterina Mikhailovna Schulmann, Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration/Moscow School for the Social and Economic Sciences & Nikolai Petrov, Chatham House/Higher School of Economics in Moscow)
Organizational decision-making in crisis (by Elke Schüßler, Johannes Kepler University)
Crisis management (by Markus Reihlen, Leuphana University of Lüneburg)
Organizing in Times of Crisis 