A cultural political economy Of business strategy in a developing country context: The case of the Sri Lankan tea industry

This paper contributes to the development of a critical understanding of business strategy of the Sri Lankan tea industry within broader socio-cultural politico-economy perspective. The broader insight coming from this thesis will enhance the understanding of the stakeholders of the industry particularly the plantation managers, policy makers, and funding and training agencies to develop more realistic and context sensitive business strategies and management practices for the development of industry.The Sri Lankan tea plantation sector rests on the fact that in its historical context and the present set of issues. It is a rich and peculiar case study capable of shedding some light on the ongoing debates in methodology, theory, and their practice in the arena of strategic management. The Western/Northern business strategy is conventionally developed and practiced within organizational process. Strategy ideology and managerialist perspective promise to bring success through improving competitiveness of such organizations or industries. Therefore, it is significant to assess the validity of applicability of this perspective for the tea industry in Sri Lanka. Therefore, the main puzzle of this thesis is to critically examine the applicability of the Western/Northern business strategy ideology and approaches to the Sri Lankan tea industry, particularly tea plantation companies. This thesis therefore provides a critical analysis of the Western/Northern business strategy ideology and mainstream perspectives, which are dominant in decision-making process in Sri Lanka. The overall purpose of the study is to understand the origin of the mainstream strategy ideology and managerialist perspective developed in the West. This thesis therefore examines inherited problems with lack of critical reflexivity of the Western/Northern strategy perspective which limit its applicability in understanding the Sri Lankan tea industry context where broader and direct socio-cultural and political interactions and power relations are important component of the business strategy decision-making process.