This study reviews the organizational aesthetics approach in organizational studies. Emerging from organizational culture studies in the 1990s, the organizational aesthetics and organizational symbolism studies took shape. Empirical aesthetics studies, in particular, have been influenced by a methodological focus on artifacts, one of the components of organizational culture. There has been considerable discussion within organizational aesthetics about the ‘pathos,’ or a recognition of feeling, emotions, mood, sense and dispositions of resources in organization life. The goals of this review include a presentation of the history of theories of organizational aesthetics by Japanese researchers, to show usefulness in organizational research, and to examine qualitative analysis methods applied to Japanese organizations.
