This volume explores the concept of communication as it applies to organizational theory, comparing and contrasting approaches to the notion that communication constitutes organization. Chapters also examine the ways that those processes produce patterns that endure over time and that constitute the organization as a whole. This collection bridges different disciplines and serves a vital role in developing dimensions, characteristics, and relationships among concepts that address how communication constitutes organization.

LINDA L. PUTNAM (Ph.D., University of Minnesota, 1977) is a Professor in the Department of Communication at the University of California-Santa Barbara. Her current research interests include discourse analysis in organizations, negotiation, and organizational conflict. She is the co-editor of eight books, including Organizational Communication, The SAGE Handbook of Organizational Discourse, and The New Handbook of Organizational Communication.

ANNE MAYDAN NICOTERA (Ph.D., Ohio University, 1990) is an Associate Professor in the Department of Communication at George Mason University. Her research is grounded in a constitutive perspective and focuses on culture and conflict, diversity, race and gender, and aggressive communication, with a particular interest in healthcare organizations. She has also published four books and numerous articles on these topics.

Chapter 1 Introduction: Communication Constitutes Organization Linda L. Putnam, Anne M. Nicotera, and Robert D. McPhee Chapter 2 The Communicative Constitution of Organizations: A Framework for Explanation Robert D. McPhee and Pamela Zaug Chapter 3 Agents Of Constitution In Communicad: Constitutive Processes of Communication In Organizations Robert D. McPhee and Joel Iverson Chapter 4 Constitutive complexity: Military entrepreneurs and the synthetic character of communication flows Larry D. Browning, Ronald Walter Greene, S. B. Sitkin, Kathleen M. Sutcliffe, and David Obstfeld Chapter 5 Dislocation and Stabilization: How to Scale Up from Interactions to Organization François Cooren and Gail T. Fairhurst Chapter 6 Organizing from the bottom up?: Reflections on the constitution of organization in communication James R. Taylor Chapter 7 Theory Building: Comparisons of CCO Orientations Linda L. Putnam and Robert D. McPhee