The enemy within: The legitimating role of local managerial elites in the global managerial colonization of the Global South

Abstract

This paper contributes to the drive to decolonize management and organization knowledge by unpacking the role played by indigenous managerial elites in the global managerial colonization of the Global South. We focus on the narratives managerial elites construct to legitimate managerialism to a dissenting population. We conducted an ethnographic study of efforts by members of the city council of Yaoundé, in Cameroon to implement and legitimate a global managerial intervention. Our findings show that to successfully legitimate the imposition of managerialism to a dissenting populace, managerial elites construct hybrid narratives. These hybrid narratives are not ignorant of the local context and are particularly potent because of the manner in which they factor in some local concerns, making the managerialist intervention more palatable to locals and yet continuing to impose a foreign way of life.