Conceptual Notes

whose education was interrupted years before. This challenge would necessarily begin with a sizable element of "brainwashing," getting rid of deeply ingrained but now anachronistic ways of thinking. Given the comprehensiveness and difficulty of this re-education operation, a first more specific conclusion takes off from a saying in our language "you can't get there from here". In principle, our hypothetical "Rip Van Winkle" could surely be "retreaded". But who among us, given this choice, would not prefer to take on instead a brand-new MBA who had spent the last 20 years daily and deeply immersed in the world in which he will now have to function? A second, more concrete conclusion looks at implications more broadly. Fulmer and Wren

refer to Ecclesiastes 1:9 where it is observed that there is nothing new under the sun. Perhaps, at the level of fundamentals, civilization is and always has been confronting the same problems, forever hoping that "this time" there is at hand a real key to their solution. Here, of course, is Sisyphus, rolling his stone again and again up the hill, ali of the time knowing that it will immediately tumble down again. But if that is the relevant image here, we nevertheless have no choice but to solve age-old problems as best we can with the attitudes, understandings, and skills now at our disposal undismayed by the prospect of having again and again to endeavor to solve the same problems by putting to work to the best of our ability what we have learned in the meantime.

REFERENCES
Fulmer, Robert M., The New Management (New York: The Macmillan Company, 1974). Fulmer, Robert M., and Daniel A. Wren. "Is There Anything 'New' in Management?" journal of Management, Vol.2, No. 2 (1977), 71-75. 3. Hildage, H. T., T. G. Marple, and F. L. Meyenberg. The New Management (London: McDonald and Evans, 1938)

Dreams of Humanization and the Realities of Power

WALTER R. NORD Washington University

For several decades American organizational psychologists have dreamed of and sought to create humanized organizations. While it is not
Walter R. Nord (Ph.D. Washington University) is r'rofessor of Organizational Psychology at the Graduate School of Business Administration at Washington University, St. Louis, Missouri. Received 7/17/77; Accepted 9/28/77; Revised 11/16/77.

clear exactly what a humanized organization is, various writers seem to agree that in humanized organizations members are: (a) treated as ends rather than as means; (b) engaged in meaningful, challenging work; (c) encouraged to develop
1 This manuscript is an extension of a paper presented at the 1976 meetings of the American Psychological Association in Washington, D C .

Academy of Management Review - July 1978

their uniquely human abilities fully; (d) treated justly and with a dignity which places them well above the non-human aspects of organization; and (e) able to exercise substantial control in organizational decisions particularly those decisions which affect them directly. As writers have dreamed of organizations which would be characterized by at least some of these features, often they have appeared to assume that such organizations would be easy to develop. Optimists have come to see them as inevitable, whereas many of the pessimists see hunnanized organization as requiring only the enlightenment of managers. Recently these dreams seemed sound because organizations appeared to need these very characteristics if they were to be effective and to survive. A number of things pointed towards the necessity for more humanized organizations. Bennis (4) noted some of these including: (a) the exponential growth of science; (b) turbulent environments; (c) a younger, more mobile, better educated work force; (d) a growth in the confluence between persons of knowledge and persons of power; (e) a change in managerial philosophy towards the emphasis on a new concept of humanity based on complex and shifting needs; (f) a new concept of power based on collaboration and reason; and (g) new organizational values based on humanistic-democratic ideals. As Bennis and Nord (16,17) have observed, humanized organizations have been slow to develop. Why have organizations been so resistant to humanization? There is no simple answer, but some valuable insights can be gained by exploring the role that power and political processes play in the dynamics of organizations. The working definition of power used here is derived from the work of Adams (2) and Bachrach and Baratz (3). Power is the ability to influence flows of the available energy and resources towards certain goals as opposed to other goals. Power is assumed to be exercised only when these goals are at least partially in conflict with each other. Given this conceptualization, humanizing organizations can be accomplished by

altering the flow of resources and energy so that at least some of the five aspects of humanization listed above are given increased emphasis. The quest for humanized organizations can be broken in two parts. First, consider the design of systems in which the achievement of humanized goals and organizational success on traditional criteria of effectiveness are mutually supportive. Secondly, consider those cases where the two sets of outcomes are in conflict. It is this second set of cases where consideration of power provides insights into why organizations have remained so resistent to power sharing, to just and dignified treatment of individuals, and to the provision of challenging and growth producing work. Examination of four postulates about power and organizations will help to focus on some of these constraints. PI: Organizations are composed of coalitions which compete with one another for resources, energy, and influence.

Organizations are a mixture of common goals, individual goals, and sub-group goals. Conflict among competing parties for resources and energies is seldom completely resolved, and the conflicting parties are often arrayed in a number of coalitions. As Zaieznik (23) argued, competition to become a dominant coalition (or part of one) is an intense and an important feature of life in organizations. Moreover, competing coalitions are often engaged in what approach zero-sum games. If one coalition exercises dominant control over resources and the allocation process, other coalitions cannot. Sometimes these struggles are reflected in what appear to be the palace revolts which result in the ouster of top-level corporate officials, but, as Zaieznik showed, the struggles are often more subtle and less spectacular. While more information about the magnitude and frequency of these conflicts is needed, the climates created by such struggles are not likely to be conducive to the achievement of humanized ends of justice, dignity, and etc. The focus on organizations as coalitions

Conceptual Notes

highlights some other constraints upon humanization. In particular, we discover why turbulent environments have not had the straight forward effects of humanizing organizations which have often been assumed. Following the strategic contingencies theory of organizational power developed by Hickson et al. (10) and Hinnings et al. (11), it is clear that changes in the environment affect the balance of power among the various coalitions within the organization, because skills and/or resources which were highly valued become less important. Other skills and resources which were once unimportant become highly valued. Participants whose power is threatened are apt to respond defensively and/or aggressively; those who have gained power are apt to seek to consolidate their position. Consequently, the response of the total organization is not the rational adaptation of a harmonious system, but is the resultant vector of conflicting interests, distorted information, and struggle. Contrary to the beliefs of some organizational behaviorists, because rapidly changing environments introduce power struggles within organizations, turbulent environments may be in conflict with humanizing organizations. The more turbulent the environment, the more pervasive and strong the resulting internal strife may be. There is little reason to expect that the warring parties will treat each other in humanized ways, and the scars, particularly when the resources and rights of one or more parties have been reduced or eliminated, are apt to be slow to heal. P2: Various coalitions will seek to protect their interests and positions of influence by moderating environmental pressures and their effects.

creased discretion may occur, such increases will not be pervasive because members of the dominant coalition are often effective in routinizing the organization's core technology and protecting it from fluctuations in the environment. While there may be an increase in size of the dominant coalition, if the core technology is adequately buffered, the change in the environment may affect very few people. For example, consider an automobile firm facing changes in materials, governmental regulations, and consumer preferences. The effects of these changes are frequently absorbed by engineering and other technical adjustments. There is at best a small chance that operatives on the assembly line will experience significantly more variety in their work or exercise more discretion. Members of dominant coalitions, operating under the norms of rationality, are motivated to limit the discretion of lower level participants in order to avoid disruptions in the operation of core technologies. Thus, while turbulent environments may force the dominant coalition to dilute its power slightly, there is no assurance that this dilution will humanize the work of all or even most people. P3: The unequal distribution of power Itself has non-humanizing effects.

i , ! ; !

It is typically assumed that rapidly changing environments humanize organizations because they induce deroutinization and consequently create the need for a large number of organizational participants to exercise greater discretion and to use a wide variety of their skills and talents. Thompson's (22) analysis suggests that, while in-

The unequal distribution of power itself stimulates outcomes which are contrary to many of the characteristics of humanized organizations. Some of these outcomes stem from the influence of power inequalities on the powerfulothers are due to the influence of power inequalities on the less powerful. The Powerful Thompson (22) noted that the dominant coalition frequently attempts to design structures which reduce the discretion of lower level participants. Often, the discretion of lower level participants is limited by explicit decisions made by those in authority. As political scientists such as Bachrach and Baratz (3) suggested, one of the most significant advantages the powerful have is the power of non-decision the ability to suppress and/or thwart challenges

Academy of Management Review - July 1978

by preventing an issue from being considered subject to a decision. Movement towards humanized organizations frequently will require that issues handled by non-decision in the past are negotiated in the future. As the history of trade unionism documents, such a process is often bitter, and the humanized outcomes are by no means inevitable. In addition to the effect of reducing the ability of individuals to control their own outcomes, various processes used to increase predictability often result in perceived injustice, threats to individual esteem and dignity, and other dehumanizing consequences. O'Day's (18) description of intimidation rituals and Swingle's (21) discussion of mechanisms of bureaucratic strangulation provide some interesting examples. A number of studies (12, 13) have shown how possession of power itself leads to non-humanized treatment of lower level participants by the powerful. Kipnis concluded: . . . the control of power triggers a chain of events, which, in theory, at least, goes like this: (a) with the control of power goes increased temptations (sic) to influence others' behavior, (b) as actual influence attempts increase, there arises the belief that the behavior of others is not self-controlled, that it is caused by the powerholder, (c) hence, a devaluation of their performance. In addition, with increased influence attempts, forces are generated with the more powerful to (d) increase psychological distance from the less powerful and view them as objects of manipulation (12, p. 40). Similarly, Zimbardo's (1) discussion of his mock prison and Rosenhan's (20) observations of how hospital personnel related to mental patients provide convincing evidence that the possession of power itself leads the powerful to treat the less powerful in a non-humanized fashion. Overall, it appears that the possession of the power has important dehumanizing effects. Not only are many individuals deprived of the ability ^o control their own outcomes but, in McGreg^i^'s terms, there seems to be a tendency for powerful people to adopt Theory X assumptions b their subordinates.

Effects on the Less Powerful The unequal distribution of power has complementary, nonhumanizing effects on the less powerful. Examples are: Harrington's (9) description of "twisted spirit" of the American poor and the "culture of poverty"; Lefcourt's (14) work on the psychology of powerlessness; Gouldner's (8) observation of feelings of dependence that result in servile attitudes toward superiors; and Nemeth's (15) report that inequalities in power inhibit cooperative behavior; these studies reveal the dehumanizing consequences of "powerlessness". Similarly, Culbert's (5) work reveals how relatively powerless individuals become trapped by shared assumptions which make them vulnerable to excess influence and induce them to accept the status quo. Thus, it seems reasonable to hypothesize that humanized relationships will be more probable when there is relative equality in power among individuals than when gross discrepancies exist. P4: The exercise of power within organizations is one very crucial aspect of the exercise of power within the larger social system.

One of the most productive outcomes of assessing the relationship between power and humanized organizations may well be that such discussions direct us to the work of political scientists. Their ideas point to some important omissions in thinking about power and control of work organizations. Dahl (6) provides a basis for exploring some of these considerations. He observed that in America we have made a strange ideological distinction about the exercise of power. Power exercised in political organizations ought to be public and democratic, but power within economic organizations need not be democratic and ought to be left in the hands of the owners or managers of the firm. In his words: . . . the prevailing ideology prescribes "private" enterprise, that is, firms managed by officials who are legally, if not de facto responsible to private shareholders... It is widely taken for granted that the only appropriate form for managing economic enterprise is a pri-

Conceptual Notes , vately owned firm . . . Ordinarily technical arguments in favor of an alternative must be of enormous weight to overcome the purely ideological bias in favor of the private firm (6, p 117-118).

Dahl was more concerned with macro level analysis (e.g. the fact that the given magnitude of many decisions made by General Motors, they cannot reasonably be considered private matters) than he was with democracy in the workplace. Pateman (19) extended Dahl's ideas into the work place. She suggested that since organizations are so important in the lives of people, a fully democratic society is possible only if democratic voting is extended to organizations. She maintained that unless such an extension is made, voting and representation are doomed to be largely formal matters. Pateman wrote:
The aim of organizational democracy is democracy. It is not primarily increased productivity, efficiency, or better industrial relations (even though these things may even result from organizational democracy); rather it is to further justice, equality, freedom, the rights of citizens, and the protection of interests of citizens, all familiar democratic aims (19, p ISIS). It is only a radical, participatory approach to organizational democracy that is likely to foster the expertise, skills, and confidence, both in the daily work process and in the exercise of democratic citizenship within the enterprise, that are vital if members of the organization as a whole are to be equipped to meet the challenge of control that will come from the technostructure (19, p. 21).

ganization in a democratic society. Inquiry into this question has potentially radical implications. When we start to discuss power in this way, we are beginning to ask as Ellerman (7) did, "Who is the firm?" We may come to inquire about the rights by which certain individuals or groups now exercise control and come to consider alternative bases of power as means of humanized organizations and to a more fully democratic society. We may discover that equal access to power (political democracy) is a necessary (but certainly not sufficient) condition for humanized social organization.

Conclusion
The feelings which underlie this article can be summarized by a comparison of the two Golden Rules. First, many of us who seek to humanize organizations dream of organizations where the powerful people either out of self interest or out of moral commitment, follow the first (or the normative) Golden Rule "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you". By contrast, the second or the descriptive golden rule, which I first saw on the wall in a men's room at Washington University, states, "Them that has the gold makes the rules". The distribution of power and resources in existing organizations supports humanized relationships only to a limited degree. Humanization of such systems is by no means inevitable, but instead may require considerable struggle. Analysis and facilitation of the process will be aided by greater emphasis on the role of power and the realization that organizations are political systems embedded in larger political systems.

This argument leads to a direct consideration of the right to exercise power within an or-

REEERENCES
"A Pirandellian Prison," New Vork Times Magazine, April8(1973), pp. 38-40,49. Adams, R. N. Energy and Structure: A Theory of Social Power (Austin, Texas: University of Texas Press, 1975). Bachrach, P., and M. S. Baratz. Power and Poverty: Theory and Practice (New York: Oxford University Press, 1970). Bennis, W. G. "A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Future," American Psychologist, Vol. 25 (1970), 595608. 5. Culbert, S. A. The Organization Trap (New York: Basic Books, 1974). 6. Dahl, R. A. After the Revolutions' Authority in a GoodSociety (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1970). 4.

Academy of Management Review - July 1978

7. Ellerman, D. "The 'Ownership of Firm' Is a Myth," Administration and Society, Vol. 7 (1975), 27-42. 8. Gouldner, A. W. The Coming Crisis of Western Sociology (New York: Basic Books, 1970). 9. Harrington, M. The Other America (Baltimore: Penguin Books, 1962). 10. Hickson, D. J., C. R. Hining?,, C. A. Lee, R. E. Schneck, and |. M. Pennings. "A Strategic Contingencies' Theory of Intraorganizational Power," Adm(nis(ra(/ve Science Quar(er/y. Vol. 19 (1971), 216-229. 11 Hinings, C. R., D. ). Hickson, ). M. Pennings, and R. E. Schneck. "Structural Conditions of Intraorganizational Power," Administrative Science Quarterly, Vol. 19 (1974), 22-44. 12. Kipnis, D. "Does Power Corrupt?" journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Vol. 24 (1972), 33-41. 13. Kipnis, D., P.). Castell, M. Gergen, and D. Mauch. "Metamorphic Effects of Power," journal of Applied Psychology,\o\.(>^ (1976), 127-135. 14. Lefcourt, H. M. "The Function of the Illusions of Control and Freedom," American Psychologists, Vol. 28 (1973), 417-425. 15. 16.

679
Nemeth, C. "Bargaining and Reciprocity," Psychological Bulletin, Vol. 74 (1970), 297-308. Nord, W. R. "The Failure of Current Applied Behavioral Science: A Marxian Perspective,"/ourna/oMpp/ied 8ehaviora/Science, Vol. 10 (1974), 557-578. Nord, W. R. "Economic and Socio-Cultural Barriers to Humanizing Organizations," in H. Meltzer and F. R. Wickert (Eds.), Humanizing Organizational Behavior (Springfield, Illinois: Charles C. Thomas, 1976), 175-193. O'Day, R. "Intimidation Rituals: Reactions to Reform," journal of Applied Behavioral Science, Vol. 10 (1974), 373386. Pateman, C. "A Contribution to the Political Theory of Organizational Democracy," Administration and Society, Vol. 7 (1975), 5-26. Rosenhan, D. L. "On Being Sane in Insane Places," Science, Vol. 179 (1973), 250-258. Swingle, P. G. The Management of Power (Hillsdale, N.J.: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 1976). Thompson, J. D. Organizations in Action (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1967). Zaieznik, A. "Power and Politics in Organizational Life," Harvard Business Review, Vol. 48 (1970), 47-60.

17.

18.

19.

20. 21. 22. 23.

The Illusion of Contingency Theory as a General Theory

JUSTIN G. LONGENECKER University of Washington CHARLES D.PRINGLE University of Kentucky

The quest of early writers for a general theory of management continues. The "universals" postulated by classical theorists of the 1920s and
lustin C. Longenecker (D.B.A. University of Washington) is Professor of Management, Baylor University, Waco, Texas. Charles D. Pringle (D.B.A. University of Kentucky) is Assistant Professor of Management, The Pennsylvania State Univer'^"y, The Capitol Campus, Middletown, Pennsylvania. Received 10/12/77; Accepted 1/23/76.

1930s proved to be less than universal in their application when subjected to close examination in the laboratory of organization life. The formal garden of management "principles" became trampled to the extent that it resembled a "jungle" (11). V . As Festinger (5) observed, cognitive dissonance is uncomfortable. Management professors and related scholars, with the rest of humanity, strive to make sense of their respective areas of