Critical approaches to organizations focus on how organizational change and development is experienced by diverse groups of women and men who work within organizations, as well as how organizational change is influenced by broader historical, social, political, and economic forces. Through this course, students will have the opportunity to develop theoretical and analytical skills to critically assess organizational change, its socio-economic contexts, and its dimensions of sense making, language, power, inequality, and resistance in a variety of organizational settings (offices, factories, service sector firms, NGOs, non-profits, cooperatives, community groups, government units, schools, family businesses, etc.). We will explore the methods frequently used to ''restructure'' organizations (such as downsizing, outsourcing, contingent just-in-time policies); develop critiques of recent trends which emphasize ''empowerment'', ''organizational learning", and ''reengineering'' and reflect on alternative organizational models with a vision of social change. Throughout the course, we will endeavour to situate the critical perspectives, theories, and methods of organizational change we will be studying to actual cases (including your own experience with organizations) via a variety of learning formats.