- Item type
- Book
- Language
- English
- Publication year
- 1996
- ISBN
- 978-0-7619-5227-5
- Note
Organization theory is presently dominated by theories of strategic choice and politics. Managers are seen as exercising a wide choice and maximizing their personal self-interest through complex power struggles. For Positivist Organization Theory challenges these views, arguing instead that managerial decisions are determined by the situation and serve the interests of the whole organization. Showing that organizations follow laws which generalize across organizations of many different kinds in many different national cultures, the book rejects the model of organizational configurations or types. Lex Donaldson offers a critical assessment of leading organization theorists such as Henry Mintzberg, John Child, Michael Hannan and Danny Miller - and also of the satirist Northcote Parkinson. This book is important and stimulating reading for academics and senior students in organization, management and administrative studies.
TABLE OF CONTENTS -- Chapter 1: Positivist Organization Theory
Chapter 2: For Determinism: Against Strategic Choice
Chapter 3: For Determinism: Subjective Factors in Strategic Choice
Chapter 4: For Functionalism: Against Politics and Parkinson's Law
Chapter 5: For Functionalism: The Validity of Blau's Theory
Chapter 6: For Cartesianism: Against Organization Types and Quantum Jumps
Chapter 7: For Generalization in Positivist Organization Theory
Chapter 8: For Generalization of Organizational Size
Chapter 9: Conclusions.
