Paradox and Chaos Theory: Understanding Stability and Change in Organizations

Most current research exploring issues of stability and change has traditionally used linear models, assuming changes happening in organizational life to be linear and trying to predict the organization’s actions and outcomes (see Thietart & Forgues, 1995). However, organizations are nonlinear systems; decision taken regarding one element affects other elements. Organizational strategy does not unfold in a linear fashion as top management envisions; it is modified and remodified by the interactions between different organizational actors, structures and elements. Similarly, organizations’ and actors’ decisions and actions taken today might trigger another action tomorrow or interactions between actors would influence the actions of others later. This is also observed in strategy development processes where systematic, coordinated and planned approaches are often combined with hesitation, impulsive and intuitive responses. Thus, long-term stability of organization depends on several micro shifts in the short-term strategic change. In this paper, we aim to understand this question — how organizations manage the stability-change paradox — using the lens of chaos theory originated out of the need to understand nonlinear dynamic systems. We use a case study of an organization that has managed the paradox of stability-change to understand how stability motivates change and how change reinforces stability, which is a central tenet of paradox theory. Moreover, we argue that change evolves in a nonlinear fashion combined with unplanned emergent change resulting from the interactions between different elements of the organization.