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Abstract

In our capacity of researchers and teachers, we know that we are supposed to “pursue the source” we make references to texts. In this article we carry out such a pursuit of a source. The source we take as our point of departure is a particular theory in a course book in organization theory. The pursuit is implemented through four direct stages as far back as it is possible to detect the original source for the theory. The first purpose of this article is to show how authors refer to theories of other scholars and how the theories thereby can undergo changes. A second purpose is to effect criticism of the primary source (Kübler-Ross 1992) and the way in which it is used in the secondary sources. The conclusion is that management theorists misrepresent this model with the assistance of the empirically false concept ‘resistance to change’.