Starting the Literature Review Today

Here's a draft of the introduction to the Lit. Review


The central concern of this study is “What does organizational leadership mean in a chaotic, nihilistic, and apocalyptic era?” I posit that applying Paul Ricoeur’s theory of interpretation to John’s Apocalypse offers a relevant response to this concern. This chapter provides a foundation from the scholarly literature supporting the appropriateness of the data source and the method of analysis in addressing this question.

Beginning this foundation, I answer from the literature two questions:
(1) Does the state of the 21st century world support the research question’s underlying assumption of a broadly chaotic, nihilistic, and apocalyptic contemporary reality?
(2) If there is support of this assumption, what evidence of chaos, nihilism, and apocalypticism exist in contemporary organizations?
In the course of answering these questions, I define chaos, nihilism, and apocalypticism.

Continuing the foundation, I turn to an examination of the current philosophical and theoretical models generally applied by leaders within their 21st century organizational realities. I explore the apparent inadequacy of positivistic epistemology to respond to the contemporary organizational context. Within the literature, Chaos Theory and theories of spirituality rooted in postmodern epistemology emerge as alternatives to theories grounded in positivistic epistemology. Consequently, a thorough discussion of these two theoretical orientations follows. As a part of this discussion, I define organizations and organizational leadership.

Furthering the foundation, I show from the literature how Paul Ricoeur’s hermeneutic phenomenology philosophy offers a step forward in constructing theories and best practices in organizational leadership within contemporary reality. Here I discuss the current application of Ricoeur’s hermeneutic phenomenology to organizational leadership studies.

Concluding the foundation, I demonstrate from the literature the potential of John’s Apocalypse to speak meaningfully to contemporary reality in general and in specific to the realities of 21st century organizations. Finally, from the literature, I offer an explanation of the appropriateness of Ricoeur’s hermeneutic phenomenological philosophy, and the theory of interpretation derived from it, in explaining and understanding John’s Apocalypse.