chapter THIRTY
Appreciative Inquiry
The theoretical foundation of Appreciative Inquiry (AI) is based on powerful assumptions about human change that are positive and life generating by nature. AI introduced a major shift in the practice of organization development by offering a mode of inquiry that was both generative and philosophical and that would not constrain imagination (Cooperrider & Srivastva, 1987). Developed by David Cooperrider and his adviser Suresh Srivastva, along with other graduate students at Case Western Reserve University in the 1980s, AI offered a generative model of organizational action research and change that challenged the traditional problem-based action research model. It is ...