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Organizational Memory Studies (OMS) is limited by its managerialist, presentist preoccupation with the utility of memory for knowledge management. The dominant model of memory in OMS is that of a storage bin. But this model has been rejected by psychologists because it overlooks the distinctly human subjective experience of remembering, i.e. episodic memory. OMS also fails to take account of the specific social and historical contexts of organizational memory. The methodological individualism that is prevalent in OMS makes it difficult to engage with the rapidly expanding sociological and historical literature in social memory studies, where a more social constructionist approach to ‘collective memory’ is generally favoured. However, for its part social memory studies derived from Maurice Halbwachs neglects organizations, focusing primarily on the nation as a mnemonic community. From a critical perspective organizations can be seen as appropriating society’s memory through corporate sites of memory such as historical visitor attractions and corporate museums. There is scope for a sociological and historical reorientation within OMS, drawing on social memory studies and focusing on corporate sites of memory, such as The Henry Ford museum complex, as well as the mnemonic role of founders and beginnings in organizations. Taking a social constructionist, collectivist approach to social remembering in organizations allows connections to be made between memory and other research programmes, such as organizational culture studies.

Organizations are increasingly being called to account for their history. In particular, German and non-German companies have been called to account for their relations with the Nazi regime between 1933 and 1945. Organizations are not only accountable for past activity, but also for previous, often misleading, historical accounts of their behaviour. Thus we are interested in how an organization deals with historical accounts of its past, and how this reflects its culture. Therefore we draw upon concepts from organizational culture studies, and specifically Martin's three perspectives of culture as integration, differentiation, and fragmentation. We take the illustrative case of Bertelsmann, the German publishing company. Revelations of its record under the Nazis, when it published anti-semitic literature, were brought to light by Hersch Fischler in 1998, when Bertelsmann was in the process of taking over Random House. These revelations jarred with the company's image of corporate social responsibility and undermined the company legend, which alleged that it had an impeccable record, and had even been closed down for opposing the Nazis. The Bertelsmann case highlights the dilemmas involved in organizations invoking their past. Debate over the Holocaust has highlighted the dilemmas of truth and relativism in representations of history. The Bertelsmann case highlights similar dilemmas for organizational culture perspectives.

Las empresas suelen anunciar públicamente su longevidad. Para ellas, el pasado tiene un significado claro. Sin embargo, las teorías de la organización que consideran la pervivencia y el papel representado por los fundadores, sobre todo las de tipo ecológico y cultural, no explican los significados colectivos que van unidos al pasado. Tampoco lo hace la literatura sobre la memoria de las organizaciones, que la concibe como una serie de compartimentos estancos. La Historia empresarial se preocupa más por la reconstrucción del pasado desde el momento presente que por los significados implícitos en el pasado. Con el fin de comprender las prácticas sociales (mnemónicas) por las que el pasado es recordado y por las que cobra sentido, nosotros recurrimos al cada vez más importante campo de la memoria social. Para examinar el modo en el que las interpretaciones oficiales están presentes en el pasado de las organizaciones, nos servimos de documentos públicamente disponibles, como memorias de las compañías, informes de prensa, artículos o historias hechas por encargo. Partiendo de los puntos de vista de la memoria social, nos centramos en analizar los centenarios y la creación de lugares de memoria, así como en el tradicional debate sobre la condición histórica de memorias que vertebran la identidad. En el texto, proporcionamos breves ejemplos sobre la celebración del centenario de la Ford, la denominación del centro de formación de directivos de la General Electric como John F. Welch Learning Center, así como de la desacreditadora leyenda de la Bertelsmann, concerniente a su comportamiento durante el dominio nazi en Alemania. Concluimos que el punto de vista de la memoria social puede constituir una base idónea para investigar el significado del pasado en las organizaciones.