Inventing a Mythology of Empowerment
نویسنده
چکیده
Adopting a historical perspective, this paper examines the ideological and philosophical antecedents of current popular management approaches which advocate programs of workplace empowerment that are enacted through the implementation of teamwork. These approaches frequently assume that a propensity toward teamwork is an essential characteristic of ‘human nature’. It is argued that this is an invented tradition, based on a romanticized and mythical depiction of preindustrial work. This invention serves a useful ideological purpose for advocates of teamwork as it legitimates programs of extensive organizational change. Moreover, criticism of the operation of teamwork can be neutralized by invoking the defense that working in teams is an expression of human nature. By revealing the mythical roots of this tradition, this paper contributes to a developing critique of the experience of empowerment under conditions of teamwork that avoids the normative and ideological distortions of instrumental management discourse.
منابع مشابه
Inventing Paradigms , Monopoly , Methodology , and Mythology at ' Chicago ' : Nutter and Stigler
This paper focuses on Warren Nutter’s The Extent of Enterprise Monopoly in the United States, 1899-1939. 2 This started out as a (1949) doctoral dissertation at The University of Chicago, part of Aaron Director’s Free Market Study. Besides Director, O.H. Brownlee and Milton Friedman were closely involved with supervising it. It was published by The University of Chicago Press in 1951. In the 19...
متن کاملPsychological Analysis of Kiumarth Myth in the Light of the Personality Psychology of Jung
Mythology allocated a large part, fundamental and effectively to the human mind. The knowledge of mythology in fact recognizes the important infrastructure of ideas, culture and civilization. One of the most common ways to study mythology is to implement psychological ideas in mythology. The result is not only a better understanding of mythology, but also a better understanding of human psyche ...
متن کاملCritique of Research Book (Literature)/ A look at the book Psycho-mythology: The Culture of Mythical Neuroticism: Nasrin Shakibi Momtaz
متن کامل
Traces of Greek Mythology in Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot
This study addresses Samuel Beckett’s most celebrated play, Waiting for Godot, in an effort to analyze its characters from a novel perspective. Since Greek mythology has been undisputedly influential on Western culture and literature, the researcher attempts to investigate a connection between Greek mythology and the play. This study aims to reveal that even after more than fifty seven years of...
متن کامل