post-organisation: Rethinking a ceremonial fraternal society

Abstract

<p>This portfolio examines how organisations can function without the creation of a fixed entity or organisational body. The term post-organisation is used to demarcate this type of organisation from other modalities which rely on a more traditional or institutional concept of an "organisation" constituted and formalised as an existential body. An exemplar of this organisational type was established as a ceremonial fraternal society with design features reflecting three modern trends in new organisations: networks, knowledge and projects. The new fraternity is an innovation in the domain of social organisations and a departure from the central and bureaucratic structures of traditional fraternal organisations.</p><p> The research explores as a point of difference the phenomenon of the fraternal Warrant, a document or artefact used by both Freemasonry and the innovation. Participants in both fraternities provided their views about the purpose of the document, their practical experience of it and their reaction to its use in the post-organisation context of the innovation. A generic model of the Warrant was derived addressing whether the purpose of the fraternal Warrant was necessarily bound to the presence of an organisational entity. The model demonstrates both personal and collective dimensions of the Warrant as an experienced artefact of a fraternity. These learnings may have immediate utility in existing traditional ceremonial fraternal societies.</p><p> The successful evolution of the new fraternity and the wider fraternal reaction to it through the lens of the Warrant, informs an abstract extension of post-organisation as a contribution to organisational theory. The portfolio articulates positioning this knowledge within broader trends of social change trends but separate to other contemporary approaches for describing the properties of post-organisation.</p>