Parallel Universes and Disciplinary Space: the Bifurcation of Managerialism and Social Science in Marketing Studies

JOURNAL OF

MARKETING

MANAGEMENT

Parallel universes and disciplinary space:

the bifurcation of managerialism and social science

in marketing studies

Chris Hackley, Royal Holloway University of London, UK*

Abstract The field of marketing studies embraces a striking contradiction. On

the one hand, it originated in a spirit of critique and dissent which has since

been manifest in a rich, diverse and fiercely contested outpouring of marketing

scholarship and research. On the other, it is a highly packaged brand with a

remarkably uniform identity as a set of universal managerial problem-solving

techniques. This paper explores this deep contradiction, positing the notion of

parallel universes of disciplinary space, the one characterised by a critical social

scientific orientation, the other by a naïve managerial orientation. While such

a dialectical figure may lead to some blurring of important distinctions, this

paper suggests that an investigation of the historical, political and ideological

undercurrents of this bifurcation can contribute significantly to a re-orientation

of the disciplinary space of marketing studies.

Keywords Critical theory; Marketing history; Neo-liberalism; Marketing

ideology.

INTRODUCTION

After more than 100 years as a university teaching subject, originally in North

America and Germany (Jones and Monieson 1990; Bartels 1951) and some 70 years

later in Europe, Asia and Africa, marketing studies remains an enigma. It has attained

a degree of global success and influence which have been much commented upon

(Willmott 1999; Fırat and Dholakia 2006). Marketing has boomed with the rise

*Correspondence details and a biography for the author are located at the end of the article.

JOURNAL OF MARKETING MANAGEMENT, 2009, Vol. 25, No. 7-8, pp. 643-659

ISSN0267-257X print /ISSN1472-1376 online © Westburn Publishers Ltd.

doi:10.1362/026725709X471541

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Journal of Marketing Management, Volume 25

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