Mairi Maclean

Research interests

I have previously held positions at the universities of Newcastle, Exeter, UWE, Royal Holloway, Aston and Paris-Sorbonne, where I have served as Associate Dean for Research (Newcastle), Director of Research (Exeter), Subject Group Head (Exeter), Research Degrees Director (UWE), Deputy Dean and MBA Director (RHUL).

My research interests lie primarily in the area of international business elites and elite power from a Bourdieusian perspective. I am the lead researcher of a four-person team, including Professors Charles Harvey (Newcastle), Gerhard Kling (SOAS), and Robert Chia (Glasgow). The research has required the production of a large-scale elites database and the conduct of numerous interviews with elites. A research monograph was published by Palgrave Macmillan in 2006, entitled Business Elites and Corporate Governance in France and the UK. This was followed by a series of journal articles on elite power, social networks, storytelling, reflexivity, and capital theory, published in Organization Studies (2014; 2010), Organizational Research Methods (2017), Human Relations (2012), Management Learning (2012), the Sociological Review (2008), Business History (2008; 2007), Research in the Sociology of Organizations (2015) and Theory, Culture and Society (2017).

I am also interested in entrepreneurship and philanthropy, particularly from the perspective of elite power and rising inequalities. A paper on the philanthropic journey was published in Human Relations (2015), and a paper on the tax aspects of charitable giving and elite philanthropic networks in Organization Studies (2016). I am a member of the Centre for Research on Entrepreneurship, Wealth and Philanthropy (REWP) at Newcastle University, led by Charles Harvey.

My research on aspects of international management has embraced France, Germany, Serbia, Central and Eastern Europe, India, Japan, the US and the UK. One research project concerns the adjustment of marginalized, first generation migrant workers from West African countries to today’s multi-ethnic workplaces (with Dr David Sarpong, Brunel). A paper on this topic was recently published in Work, Employment and Society (2017).

A further research project with Stewart Clegg (UTS) and Charles Harvey concerns historical organisation studies, examining how history is ‘carried into’ the present within organizations, what strategic difficulties the on-going force of history creates, and what results can be achieved by better understanding the dynamics of strategic change. Papers on this topic have appeared in the Academy of Management Review (2016) and Business History Review (2017), with further papers published in Human Relations (2015) and Organization (2014). My research has been funded by the ESRC, the Leverhulme Trust, Reed Charity, the Anglo-German Foundation and the British Academy. I am currently engaged on an ESRC-funded project, awarded £394K over two years (2016-2018), examining the ‘Rowntree Business Lectures and the Interwar British Management Movement’ with Alan Booth, Gareth Shaw and Morgen Witzel (Exeter). 

Willing to supervise PhD

I am interested in supervising doctoral students in the areas of international business elites and elite power, entrepreneurial philanthropy, storytelling, and historical organisation studies. I have supervised seven doctoral students to successful completion.

Education / Academic qualification

Business and Management, Master of Business Administration, University of Bath

French, German, History, Master of Arts, University of St Andrews

PhD, University of St Andrews