Thompson Work Organisations A Critical Introduction (3rd ed)

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extensively from biology – transferring a Darwinian survival of the fittest to organisational life, with survival paths within each sector of competing firms. There is even a species analogue for organisations; blueprints which consist of rules and procedures inferred from formal structures, patterns of activity and normative orders, for transforming inputs into outputs (Hannan and Freeman, 1977: 934–5). One ‘law’ is that of requisite variety; organisations need to be as complex as their environment. If they are less complex they are not likely to be adaptable enough. But over-complexity would probably mean that too much slack is being carried: ‘populations of organisational forms will be selected for or against depending on the amount of excess capacity they maintain and how they allocate it’ (Hannan and Freeman, 1977: 949). Furthermore the environment is an ecological system populated by sufficient organisations to allow for selection. The full process involves three stages: first are planned or unplanned variations, from which appropriate structures or behaviours are drawn; second, natural selection eliminates undesirable variations; and third is a retention mechanism that ensures the reproduction of those variations that have been positively selected.

The borrowings do not stop at biology, but draw from neo-classical or free-market economics. Perfect market competition tends to underlie the ‘rationality’ of natural selection: ‘Organisational rationality and environmental rationality may coincide in the instance of firms in competitive markets. In this case, the optimal behaviour of each firm is to maximise profit, and the rule used by the environment (market in this case) is to select out profit maximisers’ (Hannan and Freeman, 1977: 940). These ‘natural laws’ are shaped by the kind of competitive struggle over limited resources identified by the resource dependency school. Competition also produces a crucial process for population ecology theory, that of isomorphism. When equilibrium conditions obtain, the structural features of organisations – for example the appropriate degree of specialism or generalism – will correspond to the relevant features of the resource environment. Those organisations that fail will be selected against, though organisations can also purposefully adapt. Of course equilibrium models can be too simplistic. To help deal with this the concept of niche width is used. A niche consists of the combinations of resource levels at which the population of organisations can survive and reproduce themselves. It is difficult for new organisations to enter already-filled niches where they cannot compete with existing social and economic resources. In fact there is a curvilinear effect whereby competition increases as densities get higher, with mortality rates eventually rising as founding rates fall (Hannan and Carroll, 1992; Hannan et al., 1995).

Despite the use of some sophisticated historical models to handle data, population ecology analysis frequently remains at a highly abstract level. Hannan and Freeman admit to a frustration with the level of empirical information (1977: 959), a problem that arises partly from the choice not to focus on particular organisations, but on populations over long periods (Clegg and Dunkerley, 1977: 376). But the problems also derive from the theory as well as the method. As Perrow (1979) argues, ecological perspectives are attractive to some theorists because behaviour and events can be interpreted as natural. Evolution through natural selection gives the impression that patterns of activity that serve society are maintained, while those that are dysfunctional fortuitously disappear. Though contingency theories generally allow more scope for individual actors to learn rationally from processes of adaptation, the remarkable thing is not the distinctiveness of population ecology but how much it has in common with adaptation approaches. Hannan and Freeman (1977: 929) admit that processes involving selection can usually be recast at a higher level of analysis as adaptation

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processes. We are still in the world of ‘best fits’, with organisations responding to environments.

Critiques and alternatives

It would be foolish not to recognise that mainstream research on organisation–envi- ronment relations has generated some useful knowledge of structural differentiation within and between organisations. The best of it, drawing on perspectives such as resource dependency, has introduced issues of bargaining and power partially on to the agenda. The appeal to ‘practitioners’, particularly of contingency theory, can be located in the more realistic clarification and yet expansion of managerial role and of organisational success. Indeed at one level the general argument is correct. Clearly organisations do face environmental constraints and often need to adapt to new markets or technologies to survive. For some people, the ‘if–then’ formula became difficult if not impossible to criticise precisely because it was based on a ‘horses for courses’ argument. Wood notes: ‘Thus ironically an approach which began by dismissing previous work as “panaceas” became itself the new panacea, the “situational approach to management”’ (1979: 336).

Contingency theory and wider adaptation and selection perspectives have, however, rightly been criticised for their environmental determinism. Environments are not only given determinate power, as in all systems theory, but they are literally reified through the language of environments acting on passive organisations. Somehow managerial actions to change work rules, create dual internal labour markets or hire temporary workers instead of full-timers can be elevated to a principle of natural selection which rewards flexible organisational forms (Aldrich and Stabler, 1987). Perrow notes that such reification makes it difficult to for workers to say ‘I was fired by the environment’, adding that:

the new model of organisation–environment relations tends to be a mystifying one, removing much of the power, conflict, disruption, and social class variables from the analysis of social processes. It neglects the fact that our world is in large part made by particular men and women with particular interests, and instead searches for ecological laws which transcend the hubbub that sociology should attend to. (Perrow, 1979: 243)

As Pfeffer (1997: 163) observes, even organisational mortality may not reflect poor performance, but instead, a choice by successful businesses to sell while the going is good. This neglect of choice is at the heart of the general critique that can be made of the approaches discussed so far. The starting point of such critiques has often been John Child’s (1972) influential concept of strategic choice. Strategic choice can operate with reference to the context of the enterprise, performance standards or organisational design. Most emphasis is, however, given to restoring the significance of the internal environment and particularly the degree of discretion available to power holders and decision-makers within the dominant coalitions identified earlier. Contingency and other mainstream perspectives neglect the role of policy formulation and intervention, or see it only in terms of adaptation to the environment. One of the crucial factors this ignores is the existence of multiple contingencies that affect the capacity to achieve internally consistent responses and any potential correlation between structure and

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performance. There is sufficient ‘slack’ in most organisation’s position and resources to allow different strategies to be considered and pursued, without incurring performance penalties or diseconomies.

The conceptual schema used by John Child allows for important breaks with determinism compatible with a radical analysis. He explicitly distances himself (1972: 6) from technological determinism by stressing the role of decisions relating to control of work. The empirical evidence in this area has been provided in studies from a labour process perspective, including path-breaking contributions from Noble (1979) and Wilkinson (1983a). This research allows us to focus on the neglected issue of choice of technology itself, in this case the development of numerical control in engineering that allowed management to replace the direct input of craft workers by tapes and later computers that were externally programmed. Both case studies show that alternative technologies for automating machine tools existed which allowed manual data input that retained operator skills. This was passed over in part because management preferred a system that enabled them to transfer skill from shop floor to programming office and shift authority and control. A more recent example that illustrates the same point is the development of teamwork in manufacturing environments. Used primarily to facilitate labour flexibility and continuous improvement (see Chapters 12, 13 and 20), as a form of social organisation teams have often been introduced without altering the assembly or continuous process technology. In addition, the degree of self-gover- nance given to or taken by teams means that different ways of working can coexist side by side across different lines, as research from the whisky bottling halls demonstrates (Findlay et al., 2000).

At a wider level, Child’s analysis moves beyond the dominance of technical criteria in organisational practices, ‘recognising the operation of an essentially political process in which constraints and opportunities are functions of the power exercised by decision-makers in the light of ideological values’ (1972: 22). Systems theory utilises an organicist perspective that assumes equilibrium and interdependence. For example, like their human relations predecessors, the Tavistock writers adopt a unitary and socially harmonious view of the enterprise, taking for granted that the primary task is shared by all. It is also consistent with that tradition in taking technical and formal structures for granted, the difference lying in the language of management choice rather than worker adjustment. As Rose notes, once the above constraints have been accepted, even that choice is within strictly determined managerial limits, and ‘the socio-technical systems concept may be seen as a device for helping production engineers to discover better “best ways”’ (M. Rose, 1975: 216). For Trist and his associates, workers’ choices are seen as non-existent in the face of a determinate environment. Resistance to management plans run up against ‘uncontrollable forces in the external environment’ (quoted in Rose 1975: 216).

In this light, Child’s early work is valuable, but how far does it take us? Certainly too far for Donaldson, who criticises his work for accommodating to the ‘critical camp’ by emphasising the politics of organisational action. Strategic choice theory is thus counter-productive because ‘Study of effective structure requires concern for functional imperatives or systems needs’ (1985: 147). Ambiguity is the enemy of design knowledge. For example, if contingencies are variables that specify appropriate structure for high performance, talk of multiple contingencies that can affect a variable makes it impossible to unambiguously specify the right structure for high performance (1985: 144).

Yet there is a good deal of ambiguity as to whether Child’s work has sought to

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modify or supplement contingency and systems theory, or significantly depart from it. Wood notes: ‘Put simply, he is arguing theoretically for the inclusion of managerial ideology as an intervening variable between the environment and organisational design’ (1979: 350). At this stage, Child tended to consider strategic choice only as a variable and within management terms. Options that involve contesting existing power relations are made largely redundant. As Whittington (1988: 532–3) argues, property rights and structures of class, gender and ethnicity endow a limited circle of actors with command over resources to make strategic choices. Furthermore we need to break from the idea that environments produce situational imperatives, or from the population ecology equivalent that environments can only select out a specifically appropriate form. Child’s later work (Child and Smith, 1987) from a ‘firm-in-sector’ perspective recognises that changes are primarily triggered by markets, but choices still remain and new strategies require an intellectual or cognitive reframing among management.

Conceptions of strategic choice have been deepened, modified and qualified within further research. Purcell (1991) has usefully distinguished between choices at different levels of decision making. Firstand second-order decisions about purpose and form respectively are ‘upstream’, while ‘downstream’ decisions are third-order and refer mainly to functional activities, including employment relations. The latter are likely to be constrained by the former, as is shown in subsequent research. Kessler, Purcell and Shapiro (2000) examine the expanded discretion in the sphere of personnel practices available to public sector organisations in the UK. While some new third-order variations were found, discretion continues to be constrained by powerful external pressures from state policies and first-order, upstream decisions on mission, purpose and structure.

Research influenced by labour process theory has also extended our understanding, primarily by situating choice within the constraints and characteristics of the capital–labour relationship. We will examine this perspective in more detail in Chapter 8 and in Part III. Early contributions on managerial control strategy (Friedman, 1977; Burawoy, 1979; R. Edwards, 1979) established an analytical framework. Child in his later work (1984: 231) refers in detail to Friedman’s ideas of strategies of direct control and responsible autonomy. Direct control corresponds broadly to the scientific management tradition of close supervision, minimal responsibility and treating workers as machines. In contrast, responsible autonomy is mindful of the negative effects of worker resistance and the potentially positive gains from worker cooperation and involvement. Hence the stress on enlarged responsibilities and status, lighter controls, greater security and sometimes enriched jobs. These are not abstract choices. Responsible autonomy is more applicable to well-organised workers with controls over external or internal labour markets, who therefore need to be treated as central or core. Workers who are poorly organised, less skilled, and working for companies in highly competitive product markets are more likely to be directly controlled and treated as peripheral. This distinction, however, is too crude and does not fit all sectors.

For Child, Friedman’s analysis appears to confirm the relevance of managerial choices within market environments. But this neglects the wider nature of radical explanations. No matter how strategies are described, and Friedman is only one variant, they are shaped not just by markets, but by the capital–labour relation itself. Management is caught in the contradiction of needing to exert control and authority over labour to secure profitability in competitive conditions, while requiring workers to be motivated

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and co-operative. These contradictions are also conditioned by the general dynamics of capitalist production, either in a particular sector or in the economy as a whole. The development of monopoly capitalism has enabled large firms with power over markets and access to ‘scientific’ planning and management to experiment without being under undue pressure for short-term profits.

Enacted environments?

Many corporate ‘strategies’ put adaptation to the environment in reverse. Take the example of the choices open to management over the nature and sources of labour. Labour markets are clearly part of the organisational environment and decisions about who to recruit are important ones. Employers may not always have much discretion, but the basic criteria of controlled costs, stability and minimisation of risk has been well documented (R. Jenkins, 1982). Hence employers may look for workers with characteristics such as family men with commitments, as at Ford (Beynon, 1975), or draw on informal Protestant family networks in Northern Ireland telecommunications plants (Maguire, 1986). In the former case the company hopes that mortgage and other responsibilities will mean financial dependence and unwillingness to strike, while in the latter employment of people from the same family can increase a sense of social obligation and act as a social control over behaviour such as absenteeism. But a more significant choice is over the location of a workplace. Radical labour market theorists (Garnsey, Rubery, Wilkinson et al., 1985) rightly regard the firm as a social organisation acting collectively. In locating a plant to utilise a specific form of labour, it is segmenting the market, though such effects can also occur when employees seek to build ‘shelters’ round their own jobs (Freedman, 1984).

There is plenty of evidence to show that large companies have often made their location decisions with specific cheap or controllable labour sources or stable industrial relations in mind (Whitaker, 1986). When GM finally chose Spring Hill, a small town outside Nashville, Tennessee, for its Saturn plant, it was the end of a process that began with a public specification of decision criteria. The subsequent beauty contest had 38 out of 50 states offering a total of 1000 sites that would be created to the requirements (Meyer, 1986: 78). Tennessee has laws outlawing union closed shops. Locating new plants in small towns has been an increasing policy of GM, with the effect that the company becomes the environment.

Recruitment and location policies are examples of the power of organisations to enact environments. Perrow makes a related criticism of population ecology theory. He argues that to begin with the question, ‘why are there so many kinds of organisation?’ is to ignore reality. When we are dealing with the big corporations such as the auto giants, it is simply not the case that there is evidence of significant differences. Furthermore, the large firms very seldom die and they dominate the environment of the host of small organisations around them, as we see in the example of the Japanese ‘just-in-time’ system (See Chapter 11). Perrow (1979: 243) concludes, ‘If there is little variation, and little negative selection, then, what is the value of the theory?’

This capacity to set limits to environments was a sub-theme of Child, who drew on Galbraith’s (1967) analysis of the ‘new industrial state’ to argue that any significant countervailing powers to big business had broken down (1969: 54). This stands in sharp contrast to the complacency of conventional open systems theory (Thompson and McEwan, 1973: 158), which only conceives of organisations dominating their envi-

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ronment in extreme circumstances, which in turn will generate the countervailing powers dismissed by Galbraith.

Child also sees his own insights as indebted to the work of the business historian Chandler (1962, 1977) on strategy, previously discussed in Chapter 3. Chandler showed how a new multidivisional structure was created as a strategic response to shortand long-term market trends, and technological innovations. The refashioned structures allowed for an improved internal division of labour and resource allocation based mainly on the separation of longer-term strategic planning from operational decisions and practices. A decentralist strategy established market-type conditions within firms. There are parallels between these strategies and more contemporary attempts to extend markets within firms by creating quasi-independent profit centres which have to compete with one another and treat everyone else as customers. In addition, Williamson’s related transaction-cost analysis also shows that the thrust of emergent giant corporations was to intervene in and shape economic environments in circumstances where the growth of managerial power in large corporations coincided with the declining influence of the market.

However there are limitations to how far these frameworks substantially rework conceptions of organisation–environment relations. For Chandler, though the focus is on strategy and the ‘visible hand’ of management, the extent to which it can incorporate real choice is open to question. The emphasis on the superiority of the multidivisional firm as a form of adaptation to new market and technological imperatives strongly resembles contingency theories. Nor does Williamson’s ‘transaction costs’ theory allow for much diversity. The problem arises from treating the growth of firms through internalisation of the costs of transactions in an unproblematic way. As Granovetter observes, there is an implicit functionalism in the argument that ‘whatever organisational form is most efficient will be the one observed’ (1985: 503). It is true that firms do seek to internalise costs and for some of the reasons mentioned – environmental uncertainty and bounded rationality. But efficiency may not be the driving force or outcome. For example, if we take research on mergers and acquisitions (see Thompson, Wallace and Flecker, 1992), it would be foolish to believe that every organisation taken out of the market is less efficient or that the newly created combination is more so. Firms take over others often because their control over resources gives them the capacity to dominate their environment, including other firms. This may literally be ‘the environment’ in the recent case of biotechnology companies. For example, in recent years Monsanto has acquired Holden’s Foundation Seeds for $1.2 billion, gaining them a 35 per cent share of the corn acreage in the US. It also holds a 40 per cent share in a second major seed company, DeKalb, and has recently acquired Asgrow, a leading soybean company, plus Agracteus and Calgene, two high-profile agricultural biotech firms (Rifkin, 1999). Such vertical integration allows a high degree of control over the production and consumption of scientific knowledge.

This inability to analyse the power resources available to the various parties in transactions is something we will return to in the next chapter. More realistic analyses do have that orientation. Teulings notes that ‘large corporations do not comply with the laws of every market, but rather the other way round’ (1986: 146). An organisation with a monopoly or semi-monopoly position can, for instance, create a product market through its own sales policies; or displace parts of its costs on to the environment, as with unchecked industrial pollution. The 2000 US court judgement against Microsoft

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confirmed exactly the former point. Equally, it would be wrong to believe that each member of a ‘population’ contributes equally to competition within an ecological niche (Baum, 1995). To return to the example of mergers; such processes increasingly create environments to which other organisations and sections of the community have to adapt. For example there has been a tremendous concentration of media resources through mergers and takeovers such as those initiated in many countries by Rupert Murdoch or Bill Gates. As Schiller comments with respect to the Internet, ‘Smaller companies that specialised in what were initially niche markets at the frontier of the liberalisation process worked the new territory. When they succeeded, major traditional suppliers either snapped them up or rushed to develop similar applications of their own’ (1999: 28). A pertinent instance is the recent merger of the world’s biggest online service provider, AOL, and one of the biggest media conglomerates, Time Warner. As with other media vertical integrations, such a deal links a content provider with a new form of outlet. AOL’s more than 23 million subscribers are a captive market for Time Warner’s products. The outcomes not only create a new business conglomerate, but give enhanced power to shape cultural and political environments, and the ideological climate of a whole society.

A major theme to come out of this discussion is the need to take large firms seriously as economic actors in their own right (Whitley, 1987). Though there are a variety of competing options or rationalities within organisations, the subsequent actions frequently constitute market environments more than they are constituted by them. The most obvious case of the capacity to control and change environments is that of the transnational company (TNC). The scale of their activities usually leads to considerable impact on national economies (Dicken, 1992). The issue is less whether the TNCs are willing to adapt to the environment in the form of national conditions, than how they contribute to changes in those societal institutions.

Increasingly TNCs can call on resources and structures that are superior to many nation states. Such power is further enhanced by changing corporate forms, with a gradual shift from structures based on centre–periphery relations, to global firms which have ‘foreign-based units with group-wide functions in management, manufacturing, marketing and/or research and development’ (Forsgren, 1990: 9). One of the crucial powers is mobility of capital across national and international boundaries, enabling an evasion of laws on taxes and profits in a particular country. Markets can be shaped and their ebbs and flows ridden by cross-subsidisation and transfer pricing of goods, services, technology and loans between related activities in a TNC’s global structure. To return to the example of the Murdoch media empire, cross-subsidisation allowed the price of The Times to be drastically cut to drive competitors out of the market, to the extent that News International was taking a loss of 80p on each copy sold of the Saturday paper. Domination of a product market can reduce dependence on external sources of finance. Clairmonte and Cavanagh (1981) illustrate the process with reference to textile transnationals, adding the point that those in oligopolistic positions can act as price makers, thus subordinating markets through cartels and other mechanisms. This led many countries, such as Sri Lanka and Malaysia, to create a ‘friendly’ environment in the form of Export Processing Zones in order to attract foreign capital. They offered virtual freedom of operations, cheap labour, bans on unions, and maximum repatriation of profits (Mitter, 1986).

Such dependency has gathered momentum in more recent times. In 1998 representatives of the world’s 29 richest nations gathered in Paris to put the finishing touches

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to an accord devised by the OECD (Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development) to create a level playing field for international investors.

It amounts to a new set of investment rules that would grant corporations the right to buy,sell and move their operations wherever they wish around the world, without government regulation ...it will acknowledge for the first time that corporate capital now has more authority and freedom to act than mere national and local governments. (D. Rowan, ‘Meet the New World Government’, Guardian, 13 February 1998)

Details of this Multilateral Agreement on Investment are still being debated as some governments try to hang on to their rights to regulate their own environments, but the example highlights the increasingly global context of relations between capital, labour and the state.

Conclusion

In conclusion, we have argued in this chapter for a richer, more complex and more reciprocal view of organisation–environment relations than represented in mainstream literatures. Such writings focus too much on the narrower frame of technology and product markets, at the expense both of political economy (capital markets) and cultural context. Organisations are constantly making and being made by the economic, social and political institutions around them. How many choices, at what level, and who is making them, are empirical questions influenced by factors such as different sectoral contexts and power resources. These questions can be re-addressed and further illuminated in the global arena. It is to this that we turn in the next chapter.

6Capital, Labour and the State in a Globalising Era

Given that much popular business writing treats managers as free agents able to act in ways only constrained by their own imaginations, it is useful to be reminded of external boundaries and constraints (Morishima, 1995). However, we have argued that even when taking account of the outside world, much orthodox theory does so in an economically and technologically deterministic way. That is, it tends towards single-track notions of efficiency that can only be embodied in specific design configurations between environmental variables (product markets, technologies) and organisational structures. The environment either rules or has rules for successful adaptation and selection. Strategic choice and notions of enacted environments bend the stick back in the other direction, but we need to take the discussion further. This chapter examines theoretical frameworks that challenge narrow and limited conceptions of organisation– environment relations, in a context where capital, labour and the state are being forced to readjust their relations in an increasingly global context.

Comparative analysis: beyond the American model

It is important for organisational analysis to be comparative, to have the tools to explain patterns of difference and similarity, convergence and divergence. We have already, in previous chapters, pointed to a number of sources of variation in the way in which management theories and organisational forms developed across and within various units – sectors, countries, companies – shaped by the requirements of cultural and other forms of adaptation and pressures from key actors. However, this framework still tends to assume models that arise and are adapted to at given stages along a single line of development. Chandler’s account of the rise of the ‘modern’ integrated business enterprise can be used to illustrate the general argument. He does give a historically-informed explanation of the emergence of the phenomenon. In general terms the US was a seedbed for managerial capitalism primarily because of the size and the nature of the domestic market (Chandler, 1977: 498–500). It was not only faster growing than other nations, but also more open and less class-divided. This encouraged the techniques and technologies of mass production and distribution.

In contrast, domestic markets in Western Europe were smaller and had slower growth. This limited the same kind of developments and kept greater reliance on middlemen to handle goods. Even where integrated enterprises did appear, they often remained small enough to be dominated by owner-managers. This kind of reasoning allows Chandler to evaluate other national experiences against this standard. British entrepreneurs are said to have failed to invest in manufacturing, marketing and management in key capital-intensive industries. As a consequence this ‘personal capitalism’, dependent on atomistic economic organisation such as the single-plant family firms in industries such as cotton and steel, was a pale version of its US counterpart:

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‘neglecting investment in administrative capabilities and research, dogged by shorttermism, preoccupied with family and personal management, prejudiced against salaried managers, determined to ensure a steady income stream rather than to maximise growth and profits in the long run’ (Supple, 1991: 511).

This account of stunted organisational capabilities makes an attractive link to institutionalist explanations for Britain’s declining economic performance. Such a framework point to factors that shaped industrial development: entrenched employee job controls; the separation of the banking system from finance of industry; and educational provision that failed to provide adequately trained managerial and technical staff. As a result, managerial structures and expertise were underdeveloped and ‘the British only adapted patchwork improvements to their existing organisational and productive structure’ (Elbaum and Lazonick, 1986: 7). Echoes of such explanations can be found more recently in critics of short-termism and institutional failure in Britain’s political economy, such as Will Hutton’s (1992) influential work. But the remit is much broader than Chandler’s ‘internal history’ of business enterprise. In emphasising the role of educational, state, legal and other institutions, such writers can demonstrate variations in industrial development.

It can also be argued that given the similarities between Britain and America’s financial and industrial systems, Chandler’s model of management and enterprise is even less likely to apply to other European countries. Modern American, or perhaps AngloSaxon, conceptions of management are built on assumptions of the superiority of a general science of co-ordination and control, a profession of management above particular specialisms and functions (Fores, Glover and Lawrence, 1992). In comparison, the Franco-German tradition draws on quite different sources. For example, Rueschemeyer (1986) notes the significance of public administration as a bureaucratic model for private enterprise in Germany, while the French state has developed vocationallyoriented higher education to produce generations of technocrats for the private and public sector. Germany and a number of other countries also have a tradition of engineering-based technical competence as the base for industrial progress. On the HRM terrain, there are different approaches to HRM in the US and Europe, shaped by different intellectual influences and by the fact that in the latter many aspects of the employment contract are decided outside corporate boundaries.

If the form and content of organisational structures and practices are socially constructed, Supple’s comments on Chandler have more general application: ‘What his assumptions make it difficult to do, however, is to generalise his results to a rounded and substantial exploration of the interrelationships and evolution of economic systems generally’ (1991: 510). Our view is that socially constructed organisational diversities are the proper object of analysis for organisational theory. This is not a minor point. Measuring organisations and change against a single, linear standard rears its misleading head again later, this time with Japanese management replacing the American model. But this is leaping ahead of the story. One of the most influential challenges to the standard Anglo-Saxon textbook view of management and organisation has come from Hofstede and other cultural relativists.

The rise of cultural explanations

Contingency theory, discussed in the previous chapter, was one critical response to the idea of universal principles of management. Hofstede’s promotion of the cultural