American society today is shaped not nearly as much by vast open
spaces as it is by vast, bureaucratic organizations. Over half the
working population toils away at enterprises with 500 or more
employees--up from zero percent in 1800. Is this institutional
immensity the logical outcome of technological forces in an
all-efficient market, as some have argued? In this book, the first
organizational history of nineteenth-century America, Yale sociologist
Charles Perrow says no. He shows that there was nothing inevitable
about the surge in corporate size and power by century's end. Critics
railed against the nationalizing of the economy, against corporations'
monopoly powers, political subversion, environmental destruction, and
"wage slavery." How did a nation committed to individual freedom,
family firms, public goods, and decentralized power become transformed
in one century? Bountiful resources, a mass market, and the industrial
revolution gave entrepreneurs broad scope. In Europe, the state and
the church kept private organizations small and required consideration
of the public good. In America, the courts and business-steeped
legislators removed regulatory constraints over the century,
centralizing industry and privatizing the railroads. Despite
resistance, the corporate form became the model for the next century.
Bureaucratic structure spread to government and the nonprofits.
Writing in the tradition of Max Weber, Perrow concludes that the
driving force of our history is not technology, politics, or culture,
but large, bureaucratic organizations. Perrow, the author of
award-winning books on organizations, employs his witty, trenchant,
and graceful style here to maximum effect. Colorful vignettes abound:
today's headlines echo past battles for unchecked organizational
freedom; socially responsible alternatives that were tried are
explored along with the historical contingencies that sent us down one
road rather than another. No other book takes the role of
organizations in America's development as seriously. The resultant
insights presage a new historical genre.
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Produktdetaljer
ISBN
9781400825080
Publisert
2013
Utgiver
Vendor
Princeton University Press
Språk
Product language
Engelsk
Format
Product format
Digital bok
Forfatter