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.(4) The institutional structure at any point in time is the contextwithin which actions are set and shapes the consequences of any behavior,which in turn reflexively perpetuate that institution and create change.(5).The large corporation did not dissolve the dynamics of property; it so-cialized property, socialized not within the institutional structure of pub-licly accountable government, but within the institutional structure of cor-porate capitalism; thus it did not render class irrelevant so much as itchanged the particular social relationships within which intraclass and in-terclass relations were framed.These five propositions help us assess thesocial significance of socializing capital in the large corporation.1.Institutions are constructed by extensive and complex interaction ofmany parties with a variety of motivations and resources, not just thosewith positions of formal managerial authority.Investors, bankers, workers,lawyers, and political figures played critical roles in the rise of the largecorporation, acting out of logics of action very different from the logic ofefficiency.Efficiency theory focuses almost entirely on the actions and deci-sions of managers, who are treated as synonymous with the corporation.For example, Chandler (1990) defines modern industrial enterprise as acollection of operating units, each with its own specific facilities and per-sonnel, whose combined resources and activities are coordinated, moni-tored, and allocated by a hierarchy of middle and top managers.It is theexistence of this hierarchy that makes the activities and operations of thewhole enterprise more than the sum of its operating units (15).This isbasically a technocratic definition, in the sense that running the organiza-tion is equated with governing the technology.3 The organization is merelya collection of operating units. Facilities and personnel are logicallyequivalent, reducing labor to another asocial factor of production alongwith capital and raw materials.All other actors, such as government, in-vestors, and consumers, are treated as exogenous.What managers do ismaximize the productivity of these various factors; their interests are seenas ultimately compatible with those of workers, investors, consumers, andthe public.Chandler describes the rational manager as a new subspecies of eco-nomic man, the salaried manager.With their coming, the world received anew type of capitalism one in which the decisions about current opera-tions, employment, output, and the allocation of resources for future opera-tions were made by salaried managers who were not owners of the enter-prise.Once modern transportation and communication systems were inplace, the new institution and the new type of economic man provided acentral dynamic for continuing economic growth and transformation (1990, 2).In efficiency theory, on the one hand, managers are seen as at-tempting to maximize productivity, and efficiency and success are validated C O N C L U S I O N 267by survival.Productive and efficient firms survived while inept and wastefulfirms failed.The perspective thus assumes a smooth congruence betweenthe internal operation of the firm and the environmental dynamics.A rela-tional perspective, on the other hand, assumes that outcomes are deter-mined by the interaction of many actors with many motivations, in contrastto efficiency theory s singular, asocial technological determinism.Manag-ers, owners, workers, consumers, politicians, judges, and others have inter-acted together, some motivated by financial gain, some by personal stabil-ity, some by quality considerations, some by a sense of justice, and some bya desire for control.The politicians who committed state and local govern-ments to create and finance canals in the name of public prosperity, theentrepreneurs who organized the construction companies in the name offamily enterprise, the judges who molded the corporation as a private legalindividual in the name of ancient tradition, the financiers who reinvestedtheir railroad profits into industrial mergers in the name of economic order,the workers who reinforced the process of combination in the name of soli-darity all played a role.Whether they were truly motivated by the principlesthey were acting in the name of is less important than the dynamics andoutcome of this multifaceted interaction.2.Within this complex, multifaceted social world of differentially moti-vated actors the terms by which interaction takes place are very uneven, andthis unevenness is intimately connected to the way people are tied into thesocial structure.Insofar as power operates, people vary in the extent towhich their behavior must be explained in relation to other actors.Somepeople can define the terms of interaction, including the definition of thesituation, the nature and quantity of resources to be exchanged, and theeventual outcomes, more than others.Governments were able to dictate theterms on which early canal and railroad companies were chartered, butwhen the canal companies were rendered unprofitable by poor planning,political logrolling, an unforeseen depression, and competition from rail-roads, the governments could only react to minimize their losses and cedeactive control to private interests.As more and more productive activityproduced articles for markets rather than consumption, legislators andjudges used market criteria as the standard by which to judge personal dis-putes [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
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.(4) The institutional structure at any point in time is the contextwithin which actions are set and shapes the consequences of any behavior,which in turn reflexively perpetuate that institution and create change.(5).The large corporation did not dissolve the dynamics of property; it so-cialized property, socialized not within the institutional structure of pub-licly accountable government, but within the institutional structure of cor-porate capitalism; thus it did not render class irrelevant so much as itchanged the particular social relationships within which intraclass and in-terclass relations were framed.These five propositions help us assess thesocial significance of socializing capital in the large corporation.1.Institutions are constructed by extensive and complex interaction ofmany parties with a variety of motivations and resources, not just thosewith positions of formal managerial authority.Investors, bankers, workers,lawyers, and political figures played critical roles in the rise of the largecorporation, acting out of logics of action very different from the logic ofefficiency.Efficiency theory focuses almost entirely on the actions and deci-sions of managers, who are treated as synonymous with the corporation.For example, Chandler (1990) defines modern industrial enterprise as acollection of operating units, each with its own specific facilities and per-sonnel, whose combined resources and activities are coordinated, moni-tored, and allocated by a hierarchy of middle and top managers.It is theexistence of this hierarchy that makes the activities and operations of thewhole enterprise more than the sum of its operating units (15).This isbasically a technocratic definition, in the sense that running the organiza-tion is equated with governing the technology.3 The organization is merelya collection of operating units. Facilities and personnel are logicallyequivalent, reducing labor to another asocial factor of production alongwith capital and raw materials.All other actors, such as government, in-vestors, and consumers, are treated as exogenous.What managers do ismaximize the productivity of these various factors; their interests are seenas ultimately compatible with those of workers, investors, consumers, andthe public.Chandler describes the rational manager as a new subspecies of eco-nomic man, the salaried manager.With their coming, the world received anew type of capitalism one in which the decisions about current opera-tions, employment, output, and the allocation of resources for future opera-tions were made by salaried managers who were not owners of the enter-prise.Once modern transportation and communication systems were inplace, the new institution and the new type of economic man provided acentral dynamic for continuing economic growth and transformation (1990, 2).In efficiency theory, on the one hand, managers are seen as at-tempting to maximize productivity, and efficiency and success are validated C O N C L U S I O N 267by survival.Productive and efficient firms survived while inept and wastefulfirms failed.The perspective thus assumes a smooth congruence betweenthe internal operation of the firm and the environmental dynamics.A rela-tional perspective, on the other hand, assumes that outcomes are deter-mined by the interaction of many actors with many motivations, in contrastto efficiency theory s singular, asocial technological determinism.Manag-ers, owners, workers, consumers, politicians, judges, and others have inter-acted together, some motivated by financial gain, some by personal stabil-ity, some by quality considerations, some by a sense of justice, and some bya desire for control.The politicians who committed state and local govern-ments to create and finance canals in the name of public prosperity, theentrepreneurs who organized the construction companies in the name offamily enterprise, the judges who molded the corporation as a private legalindividual in the name of ancient tradition, the financiers who reinvestedtheir railroad profits into industrial mergers in the name of economic order,the workers who reinforced the process of combination in the name of soli-darity all played a role.Whether they were truly motivated by the principlesthey were acting in the name of is less important than the dynamics andoutcome of this multifaceted interaction.2.Within this complex, multifaceted social world of differentially moti-vated actors the terms by which interaction takes place are very uneven, andthis unevenness is intimately connected to the way people are tied into thesocial structure.Insofar as power operates, people vary in the extent towhich their behavior must be explained in relation to other actors.Somepeople can define the terms of interaction, including the definition of thesituation, the nature and quantity of resources to be exchanged, and theeventual outcomes, more than others.Governments were able to dictate theterms on which early canal and railroad companies were chartered, butwhen the canal companies were rendered unprofitable by poor planning,political logrolling, an unforeseen depression, and competition from rail-roads, the governments could only react to minimize their losses and cedeactive control to private interests.As more and more productive activityproduced articles for markets rather than consumption, legislators andjudges used market criteria as the standard by which to judge personal dis-putes [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]