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The article discusses the importance of political strategy in organizations and its impact on various aspects of strategy and organization. It highlights that political activity within organizations can influence decision-making processes and goals, while political activity outside organizations can affect their influence and legitimacy. The article presents ten papers that contribute to the understanding of these topics, covering areas such as technology in managing internal politics, firms' response to activism, taking advantage of rivals' misfortunes, shareholder dynamics, corporate political activity, the relationship between CSR and firm value, lobbying and government contracts, and the appointment of directors with political connections. The article concludes by emphasizing the need for a multidisciplinary approach to studying politics in organizations and its implications for strategy and organization theory. [Extracted from the article]

The article provides updates on the editorial team of Strategic Organization, including the addition of new members and the completion of terms for previous editors. The winners of the 2024 SO!WHAT awards for scholarly contribution are also announced, recognizing outstanding articles and essays published in 2019. The article also includes journal statistics, such as submission and acceptance rates, and highlights the focus on special issues and essays to showcase the impact of the journal. The editorial team expresses gratitude to reviewers and board members for their support. [Extracted from the article]

Scholars increasingly turn to paradox theory to offer insight into our world's greatest challenges. Yet to contribute to radical strategy theorizing concerning those challenges and avoid premature convergence on a narrow set of ideas, paradox scholars need new insights. We turn to early 20th century scholar and activist Mary Parker Follett. We highlight the alignment between Follett's philosophy and contemporary paradox theory, showing that the two approaches are well-suited traveling companions. Drawing on these similarities, we then explore how Follett's novel insights emphasize "what is" rather than "what may be" and in doing so challenge and expand on paradox theory. Specifically, these ideas help paradox theory reimagining of organizations and strategizing by focusing on (1) how the micro constructs the macro; (2) possibilities for meaningful change; and (3) participatory interactions. By doing so, we argue that Follett pushes paradox scholars to contribute to more radical strategy theorizing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the 20 years of Strategic Organization, how well has knowledge drawn from the behavioral theory of the firm contributed to the field of strategy? We see progress both in the pages of SO! and elsewhere in the field of strategy, but this progress has been held back by divisions between strategy and organization theory in what theories should predict, what mechanisms are preferable predictors, and what outcomes are of interest. Despite these divisions, the last few years have seen particularly rapid progress, turning the behavioral theory of the firm into one of multiple organization theory sources of strategy knowledge. It is time to reassess and consider the best future direction, and we propose a framework organized around how strategy is shaped by the (1) organizational structure, (2) organizational decision makers, (3) organizational history, and (4) organizational environment. This subdivision captures the decision-making units in the theory (1–2), the importance of experience (3), and the role of context (4). We outline fruitful research topics based on this framework. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]