Sources of Power of Lower Participants in Complex Organizations
Author(s): David Mechanic
Source: Administrative Science Quarterly, Vol. 7, No. 3 (Dec., 1962), pp. 349-364
Published by: Johnson Graduate School of Management, Cornell University
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David Mechanic
Sources of Power of Lower
Participants in Complex
Organizations
This paper explores various factors that account for the power of
secretaries, hospital attendants, prison inmates, and other lower participants within organizations. Power is seen as resulting from access to
and control over persons, information, and instrumentalities. Among
the variables discussed affecting power are normative definitions, perception of legitimacy, exchange, and coalitions. Personal attributes
related to power include commitment, effort, interest, willingness to
use power, skills, and attractiveneses. Finally, various attributes of
social structure are discussed which also help to account for the power
of lower participants: time spent in the organization, centrality of
position, duality of power structures, and replaceability of persons.'
David Mechanic is assistant professor of sociology, Department of
Sociology, University of Wisconsin.
IT is not unusual for lower participants2 in complex organizations
to assume and wield considerable power and influence not associ1Paper presented at the Ford Foundation Seminar in the Social Science of Organizations, University of Pittsburgh, June 10-22, 1962.
2The term "lower participants" comes from Amitai Etzioni, A Comparative Analysis of Complex Organizations (New York, 1961) and is used by him to designate
persons in positions of lower rank: employees, rank-and-file, members, clients, customers, and inmates. We shall use the term in this paper in a relative sense denoting position vis-a'-vis a higher-ranking participant.
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ated with their formally defined positions within these organizations. In sociological terms they have considerable personal power
but no authority. Such personal power is often attained, for example, by executive secretaries and accountants in business firms, by
attendants in mental hospitals, and even by inmates in prisons.
The personal power achieved by these lower participants does
not necessarily result from unique personal characteristics,
although these may be relevant, but results rather from particular
aspects of their location within their organizations.
INFORMAL VERSUS FORMAL POWER
Within organizations the distribution of authority (institutionalized power) is closely if not perfectly correlated with the prestige
of positions. Those who have argued for the independence of these
variables3 have taken their examples from diverse organizations
and do not deal with situations where power is clearly comparable.4 Thus when Bierstedt argues that Einstein had prestige but
no power, and the policeman power but no prestige, it is apparent
that he is comparing categories that are not comparable. Generally
persons occupying high-ranking positions within organizations
have more authority than those holding low-ranking positions.
One might ask what characterizes high-ranking positions within
organizations. What is most evident, perhaps, is that lower participants recognize the right of higher-ranking participants to exercise
power, and yield without difficulty to demands they regard as
legitimate. Moreover, persons in high-ranking positions tend to
have considerable access and control over information and persons
both within and outside the organization, and to instrumentalities
or resources. Although higher supervisory personnel may be isolated from the task activities of lower participants, they maintain
access to them through formally established intermediary positions and exercise control through intermediary participants.
There appears, therefore, to be a clear correlation between the
prestige of positions within organizations and the extent to which
they offer access to information, persons, and instrumentalities.
$Robert Bierstedt, An Analysis of Social Power, American Sociological Review,
15 (1950), 730-738.
'Robert A. Dahl, The Concept of Power, Behavioral Science, 2 (1957), 201-215.
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Since formal organizations tend to structure lines of access and
communication, access should be a clue to institutional prestige.
Yet access depends on variables other than those controlled by the
formal structure of an organization, and this often makes the
informal power structure that develops within organizations somewhat incongruent with the formally intended plan. It is these
variables that allow work groups to limit production through
norms that contravene the goals of the larger organization, that
allow hospital attendants to thwart changes in the structure of a
hospital, and that allow prison inmates to exercise some control
over prison guards. Organizations, in a sense, are continuously at
the mercy of their lower participants, and it is this fact that makes
organizational power structure especially interesting to the
sociologist and social psychologist.
Clarification of Definitions
The purpose of this paper is to present some hypotheses explaining why lower participants in organizations can often assume and
wield considerable power which is not associated with their positions as formally defined within these organizations. For the purposes of this analysis the concepts "influence," "power," and "control" will be used synonymously. Moreover, we shall not be concerned with type of power, that is, whether the power is based on
reward, punishment, identification, power to veto, or whatever.5
Power will be defined as any force that results in behavior that
would not have occurred if the force had not been present. We
have defined power as a force rather than a relationship because
it appears that much of what we mean by power is encompassed
by the normative framework of an organization, and thus any
analysis of power must take into consideration the power of norms
as well as persons.
I shall also argue, following Thibaut and Kelley,6 that power
5One might observe, for example, that the power of lower participants is based
primarily on the ability to "veto" or punish. For a discussion of bases of power,
see John R. P. French, Jr., and Bertram Raven, "The Bases of Social Power," in D.
Cartwright and A. Zander, eds., Group Dynamics (Evanston, Ill., 1960), pp. 607-623.
"John Thibaut and Harold H. Kelley, The Social Psychology of Groups (New
York, 1959). For a similar emphasis on dependence, see Richard M. Emerson,
Power-Dependence Relationships, American Sociological Review, 27(1962), 31-41.
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is closely related to dependence. To the extent that a person is
dependent on another, he is potentially subject to the other person's power. Within organizations one makes others dependent
upon him by controlling access to information, persons, and
instrumentalities, which I shall define as follows:
a. Information includes knowledge of the organization, knowledge about persons, knowledge of the norms, procedures, techniques, and so forth.
b. Persons include anyone within the organization or anyone
outside the organization upon whom the organization is in some
way dependent.
c. Instrumentalities include any aspect of the physical plant of
the organization or its resources (equipment, machines, money,
and so on).
Power is a function not only of the extent to which a person
controls information, persons, and instrumentalities, but also of
the importance of the various attributes he controls.7
Finally, following Dahl,8 we shall agree that comparisons of
power among persons should, as far as possible, utilize comparable
units. Thus we shall strive for clarification by attempting to oversimplify organizational processes; the goal is to set up a number
of hypothetical statements of the relationship between variables
taken two at a time, "all other factors being assumed to remain
constant."
A Classic Example
Like many other aspects of organizational theory, one can find a
classic statement of our problem in Weber's discussion of the
political bureaucracy.Weber indicated the extent to which bureaucrats may have considerable power over political incumbents, as a
result, in part, of their permanence within the political bureaucracy, as contrasted to public officials, who are replaced rather frequently.9 Weber noted how the low-ranking bureaucrat becomes
7Although this paper will not attempt to explain how access may be measured,
the author feels confident that the hypotheses concerned with access are clearly
testable.
80p. cit.
9Max Weber, "The Essentials of Bureaucratic Organization: An Ideal-Type Construction," in Robert Merton et al., Reader in Bureaucracy (Glencoe, Ill., 1952),
pp. 18-27.
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familiar with the organization-its rules and operations, the work
flow, and so on, which gives him considerable power over the new
political incumbent, who might have higher rank but is not as
familiar with the organization. While Weber does not directly
state the point, his analysis suggests that bureaucratic permanence
has some relationship to increased access to persons, information,
and instrumentalities. To state the hypothesis suggested somewhat
more formally:
HI Other factors remaining constant, organizational power is
related to access to persons, information, and instrumentalities.
H2 Other factors remaining constant, as a participant's length
of time in an organization increases, he has increased access
to persons, information, and instrumentalities.
While these hypotheses are obvious, they do suggest that a careful scrutiny of the organizational literature, especially that dealing
with the power or counterpower of lower participants, might lead
to further formalized statements, some considerably less obvious
than the ones stated. This kind of hypothesis formation is treated
later in the paper, but at this point I would like to place the
discussion of power within a larger theoretical context and discuss
the relevance of role theory to the study of power processes.
IMPLICATIONS OF ROLE THEORY FOR
THE STUDY OF POWER
There are many points of departure for the study of power
processes within organizations. An investigator might view influence in terms of its sources and strategies; he might undertake a
study of the flow of influence; he might concentrate on the structure of organizations, seeing to what extent regularities in behavior might be explained through the study of norms, roles, and
traditions; and, finally, more psychologically oriented investigators
might concentrate on the recipients of influence and the factors
affecting susceptibility to influence attempts. Each of these points
of departure leads to different theoretical emphases. For our purposes the most important emphasis is that presented by role
theorists.
Role theorists approach the question of influence and power in
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terms of the behavioral regularities which result from established
identities within specific social contexts like families, hospitals,
and business firms. The underlying premise of most role theorists
is that a large proportion of all behavior is brought about through
socialization within specific organizations, and much behavior is
routine and established through learning the traditional modes of
adaptation in dealing with specific tasks. Thus the positions persons occupy in an organization account for much of their behavior.
Norms and roles serve as mediating forces in influence processes.
While role theorists have argued much about vocabulary, the
basic premises underlying their thought have been rather consistent. The argument is essentially that knowledge of one's identity or social position is a powerful index of the expectations such
a person is likely to face in various social situations. Since behavior
tends to be highly correlated with expectations, prediction of
behavior is therefore possible. The approach of role theorists to
the study of behavior within organizations is of particular merit
in that it provides a consistent set of concepts which is useful
analytically in describing recruitment, socialization, interaction,
and personality, as well as the formal structure of organizations.
Thus the concept of role is one of the few concepts clearly linking
social structure, social process, and social character.
Many problems pertaining to role theory have been raised. At
times it is not clear whether role is regarded as a real entity, a
theoretical construct, or both. Moreover, Gross has raised the issue
of role consensus, that is, the extent to which the expectations
impinging upon a position are held in common by persons occupying reciprocal positions to the one in question.'0 Merton has
attempted to deal with inevitable inconsistencies in expectations
of role occupants by introducing the concept of role-set which
treats differences in expectations as resulting, in part, from the
fact that any position is differently related to a number of reciprocal positions.11 Furthermore, Goffman has criticized role theory
for its failure to deal adequately with commitment to roles2 -a
"0Neal Gross, Ward S. Mason, and Alexander W. McEachern, Explorations in
Role Analysis (New York, 1958).
"Robert Merton, The Role-Set: Problems in Sociological Theory, British Journal
of Sociology, 8 (1957), 106-120.
12Erving Goffman, Encounters (Indianapolis, Ind., 1961), pp. 85-152.
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factor which Etzioni has found to be related intimately to the kind
of power exercised in organizations.'3 Perhaps these various criticisms directed at role theory reflect its importance as well as its
deficiencies, and despite the difficulties involved in role analysis,
the concept of role may prove useful in various ways.
Role theory is useful in emphasizing the extent to which influence and power can be exercised without conflict. This occurs
when power is integrated with a legitimate order, when sentiments
are held in common, and when there are adequate mechanisms
for introducing persons into the system and training them to
recognize, accept, and value the legitimacy of control within the
organization. By providing the conditions whereby participants
within an organization may internalize the norms, these generalized rules, values, and sentiments serve as substitutes for interpersonal influence and make the workings of the organization
more agreeable and pleasant for all.
It should be clear that lower participants will be more likely
to circumvent higher authority, other factors remaining constant,
when the mandates of those in power, if not the authority itself,
are regarded as illegitimate. Thus as Etzioni points out, when
lower participants become alienated from the organization, coercive power is likely to be required if its formal mandates are to
be fulfilled.'4
Moreover, all organizations must maintain control over lower
participants. To the extent that lower participants fail to recognize the legitimacy of power, or believe that sanctions cannot or
will not be exercised when violations occur, the organization loses,
to some extent, its ability to control their behavior. Moreover, inso-far as higher participants can create the impression that they
can or will exert sanctions above their actual willingness to use
such sanctions, control over lower participants will increase. It is
usually to the advantage of an organization to externalize and
impersonalize controls, however, and if possible to develop
positive sentiments toward its rules.
In other words, an effective organization can control its participants in such a way as to make it hardly perceivable that it exercises the control that it does. It seeks commitment from lower
"3Etzioni, op. cit.
14Ibid.
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participants, and when commitment is obtained, surveillance can
be relaxed. On the other hand, when the power of lower participants in organizations is considered, it often appears to be clearly
divorced from the traditions, norms, and goals and sentiments of
the organization as a whole. Lower participants do not usually
achieve control by using the role structure of the organization,
but rather by circumventing, sabotaging, and manipulating it.
SOURCES OF POWER OF LOWER PARTICIPANTS
The most effective way for lower participants to achieve power
is to obtain, maintain, and control access to persons, information,
and instrumentalities. To the extent that this can be accomplished,
lower participants make higher-ranking participants dependent
upon them. Thus dependence together with the manipulation of
the dependency relationship is the key to the power of lower
participants.
A number of examples can be cited which illustrate the preceding point. Scheff, for example, reports on the failure of a state
mental hospital to bring about intended reform because of the
opposition of hospital attendants.'5 He noted that the power of
hospital attendants was largely a result of the dependence of ward
physicians on attendants. This dependence resulted from the
physician's short tenure, his lack of interest in administration, and
the large amount of administrative responsibility he had to assume.
An implicit trading agreement developed between physicians and
attendants, whereby attendants would take on some of the responsibilities and obligations of the ward physician in return for
increased power in decision-making processes concerning patients.
Failure of the ward physician to honor his part of the agreement
resulted in information being withheld, disobedience, lack of
co-operation, and unwillingness of the attendants to serve as a
barrier between the physician and a ward full of patients demanding attention and recognition. When the attendant withheld
co-operation, the physician had difficulty in making a graceful
entrance and departure from the ward, in handling necessary
paper work (officially his responsibility), and in obtaining informa-5Thomas J. Scheff, Control over Policy by Attendants in a Mental Hospital,
Journal of Health and Human Behavior, 2 (1961), 93-105.
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tion needed to deal adequately with daily treatment and behavior
problems. When attendants opposed change, they could wield
influence by refusing to assume responsibilities officially assigned
to the physician.
Similarly, Sykes describes the dependence of prison guards on
inmates and the power obtained by inmates over guards.'6 He
suggests that although guards could report inmates for disobedience, frequent reports would give prison officials the impression
that the guard was unable to command obedience. The guard,
therefore, had some stake in ensuring the good behavior of prisoners without use of formal sanctions against them. The result
was a trading agreement whereby the guard allowed violations of
certain rules in return for co-operative behavior. A similar situation is found in respect to officers in the Armed Services or foremen in industry. To the extent that they require formal sanctions
to bring about co-operation, they are usually perceived by their
superiors as less valuable to the organization. For a good leader is
expected to command obedience, at least, if not commitment.
FACTORS AFFECTING POWER
Expertise
Increasing specialization and organizational growth has made
the expert or staff person important. The expert maintains power
because high-ranking persons in the organization are dependent
upon him for his special skills and access to certain kinds of information. One possible reason for lawyers obtaining many high
governmental offices is that they are likely to have access to rather
specialized but highly important means to organizational goals.'7
We can state these ideas in hypotheses, as follows:
H3 Other factors remaining constant, to the extent that a lowranking participant has important expert knowledge not
available to high-ranking participants, he is likely to have
power over them.
"'Gresham M. Sykes, "The Corruption of Authority and Rehabilitation," in A.
Etzioni, ed., Complex Organizations (New York, 1961), pp. 191-197.
17As an example, it appears that 6 members of the cabinet, 30 important subcabinet officials, 63 senators, and 230 congressmen are lawyers (New Yorker, April
14, 1962, p. 62). Although one can cite many reasons for lawyers holding political
posts, an important one appears to be their legal expertise.
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Power stemming from expertise, however, is likely to be limited
unless it is difficult to replace the expert. This leads to two further
hypotheses:
H4 Other factors remaining constant, a person difficult to
replace will have greater power than a person easily
replaceable.
H5 Other factors remaining constant, experts will be more
difficult to replace than nonexperts.
While persons having expertise are likely to be fairly highranking participants in an organization, the same hypotheses that
explain the power of lower participants are relevant in explaining
the comparative power positions of intermediate- and high-ranking
persons.
The application of our hypothesis about expertise is clearly
relevant if we look at certain organizational issues. For example,
the merits of medical versus lay hospital administrators are often
debated. It should be clear, however, that all other factors remaining unchanged, the medical administrator has clear advantage
over the lay administrator. Where lay administrators receive preference, there is an implicit assumption that the lay person is
better at administrative duties. This may be empirically valid but
is not necessarily so. The special expert knowledge of the medical
administrator stems from his ability legitimately to oppose a physician who contests an administrative decision on the basis of medical necessity. Usually hospitals are viewed primarily as universalistic in orientation both by the general public and most of their
participants. Thus medical necessity usually takes precedence
over management policies, a factor contributing to the poor financial position of most hospitals. The lay administrator is not in
a position to contest such claims independently, since he usually
lacks the basis for evaluation of the medical problems involved
and also lacks official recognition of his competence to make such
decisions. If the lay administrator is to evaluate these claims
adequately on the basis of professional necessity, he must have a
group of medical consultants or a committee of medical men to
serve as a buffer between medical staff and the lay administration.
As a result of growing specialization, expertise is increasingly
important in organizations. As the complexity of organizational
tasks increases, and as organizations grow in size, there is a limit
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to responsibility that can be efficiently exercised by one person.
Delegation of responsibility occurs, experts and specialists are
brought in to provide information and research, and the higher
participants become dependent upon them. Experts have tremendous potentialities for power by withholding information, providing incorrect information, and so on, and to the extent that
experts are dissatisfied, the probability of organizational sabotage
increases.
Effort and Interest
The extent to which lower participants may exercise power
depends in part on their willingness to exert effort in areas where
higher-ranking participants are often reluctant to participate.
Effort exerted is directly related to the degree of interest one has
in an area.
H6 Other factors remaining constant, there is a direct relationship between the amount of effort a person is willing
to exert in an area and the power he can command.
For example, secretarial staffs in universities often have power
to make decisions about the purchase and allocation of supplies,
the allocation of their services, the scheduling of classes, and, at
times, the disposition of student complaints. Such control may in
some instances lead to sanctions against a professor by polite
reluctance to furnish supplies, ignoring his preferences for the
scheduling of classes, and giving others preference in the allocation of services. While the power to make such decisions may easily
be removed from the jurisdiction of the lower participant, it can
only be accomplished at a cost-the willingness to allocate time
and effort to the decisions dealing with these matters. To the
extent that responsibilities are delegated to lower participants, a
certain degree of power is likely to accompany the responsibility.
Also, should the lower participant see his perceived rights in jeopardy, he may sabotage the system in various ways.
Let us visualize a hypothetical situation where a department
concludes that secretarial services are being allocated on a prejudicial basis as a result of complaints to the chairman of the department by several of the younger faculty. Let us also assume that,
when the complaint is investigated, it is found to be substantially
correct; that is, some of the younger faculty have difficulty obtain-
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ing secretarial services because of preferences among the secretarial staff. If in attempting to eliminate discretion by the secretarial staff, the chairman establishes a rule ordering the allocation
of services on the basis of the order in which work appears, the
rule can easily be made ineffective by complete conformity to it.
Deadlines for papers, examinations, and the like will occur, and
flexibility in the allocation of services is required if these deadlines are to be met. Thus the need for flexibility can be made to
conflict with the rule by a staff usually not untalented in such
operations.
When an organization gives discretion to lower participants, it is
usually trading the power of discretion for needed flexibility. The
cost of constant surveillance is too high, and the effort required
too great; it is very often much easier for all concerned to allow
the secretary discretion in return for co-operation and not too
great an abuse of power.
H7 Other factors remaining constant, the less effort and interest higher-ranking participants are willing to devote to a
task, the more likely are lower participants to obtain power
relevant to this task.
A ttractiveness
Another personal attribute associated with the power of lowranking persons in an organization is attractiveness or what some
call "personality." People who are viewed as attractive are more
likely to obtain access to persons, and, once such access is gained,
they may be more likely to succeed in promoting a cause. But once
again dependence is the key to the power of attractiveness, for
whether a person is dependent upon another for a service he provides, or for approval or affection, what is most relevant is the
relational bond which is highly valued.
H8 Other factors remaining constant, the more attractive a
person, the more likely he is to obtain access to persons
and control over these persons.
Location and Position
In any organization the person's location in physical space and
position in social space are important factors influencing access
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to persons, information, and instrumentalities.18 Propinquity
affects the opportunities for interaction, as well as one's position
within a communication network. Although these are somewhat
separate factors, we shall refer to their combined effect as
centrality'9 within the organization.
H9 Other factors remaining constant, the more central a person is in an organization, the greater is his access to
persons, information, and instrumentalities.
Some low participants may have great centrality within an
organization. An executive's or university president's secretary
not only has access, but often controls access in making appointments and scheduling events. Although she may have no great
formal authority, she may have considerable power.
Coalitions
It should be clear that the variables we are considering are at
different levels of analysis; some of them define attributes of
persons, while others define attributes of communication and
organization. Power processes within organizations are particularly
interesting in that there are many channels of power and ways of
achieving it.
In complex organizations different occupational groups attend
to different functions, each group often maintaining its own power
structure within the organization. Thus hospitals have administrators, medical personnel, nursing personnel, attendants, maintenance personnel, laboratory personnel, and so on. Universities,
similarly, have teaching personnel, research personnel, administrative personnel, maintenance personnel, and so on. Each of these
functional tasks within organizations often becomes the sphere
:8There is considerable data showing the powerful effect of propinquity on communication. For summary, see Thibaut and Kelley, op. cit., pp. 39-42.
"9The concept of centrality is generally used in a more technical sense in the
work of Bavelas, Shaw, Gilchrist, and others. For example, Bavelas defines the central region of a structure as the class of all cells with the smallest distance between
one cell and any other cell in the structure, with distance measured in link units.
Thus the most central position in a pattern is the position closest to all others.
Cf. Harold Leavitt, "Some Effects of Certain Communication Patterns on Group
Performance," in E. Maccoby, T. N. Newcomb, and E. L. Hartley, eds., Readings in
Social Psychology (New York, 1958), p. 559.
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of a particular group that controls activities relating to the task.
While these tasks usually are co-ordinated at the highest levels of
the organization, they often are not coordinated at intermediate
and lower levels. It is not unusual, however, for coalitions to form
among lower participants in these multiple structures. A secretary may know the man who manages the supply of stores, or the
person assigning parking stickers. Such acquaintances may give
her the ability to handle informally certain needs that would be
more time-consuming and difficult to handle formally. Her ability
to provide services informally makes higher-ranking participants
in some degree dependent upon her, thereby giving her power,
which increases her ability to bargain on issues important to her.
Rules
In organizations with complex power structures lower participants can use their knowledge of the norms of the organization to
thwart attempted change. In discussing the various functions of
bureaucratic rules, Gouldner maintains that such rules serve as
excellent substitutes for surveillance, since surveillance in addition to being expensive in time and effort arouses considerable
hostility and antagonism.20Moreover, he argues, rules are a functional equivalent for direct, personally given orders, since they
specify the obligations of workers to do things in specific ways.
Standardized rules, in addition, allow simple screening of violations, facilitate remote control, and to some extent legitimize punishment when the rule is violated. The worker who violates a
bureaucratic rule has little recourse to the excuse that he did not
know what was expected, as he might claim for a direct order.
Finally, Gouldner argues that rules are "the 'chips' to which the
company staked the supervisors and which they could use to play
the game";21 that is, rules established a punishment which could
be withheld, and this facilitated the supervisors' bargaining power
with lower participants.
While Gouldner emphasizes the functional characteristics of
rules within an organization, it should be clear that full compliance to all the rules at all times will probably be dysfunctional for
the organization. Complete and apathetic compliance may do
OAlvin W. Gouldner, Patterns of Industrial Bureaucracy (Glencoe, Ill., 1954).
21Ibid., p. 173.
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everything but facilitate achievement of organizational goals. Lower participants who are familiar with an organization and its rules
can often find rules to support their contention that they not do
what they have been asked to do, and rules are also often a rationalization for inaction on their part. The following of rules becomes
especially complex when associations and unions become involved,
for there are then two sets of rules to which the participant can
appeal.
What is suggested is that rules may be chips for everyone concerned in the game. Rules become the "chips" through which the
bargaining process is maintained. Scheff, as noted earlier, observed
that attendants in mental hospitals often took on responsibilities
assigned legally to the ward physician, and when attendants
refused to share these responsibilities the physician's position
became extremely difficult.22
The ward physicianis legally responsiblefor the care and treatment
of each ward patient. This responsibilityrequires attention to a host
of details. Medicine, seclusion, sedation and transferorders, for example, require the doctor's signature. Tranquilizers are particularly
troublesomein this regard since they require frequent adjustment of
dosage in order to get the desired effects. The physician's order is
requiredto each change in dosage.With 150 patients under his care on
tranquilizers,and several changes of dosages a week desirable, the
physician could spend a major portion of his ward time in dealing
with this single detail.
Given the time-consumingformal chores of the physician, and his
many other duties, he usually worked out an arrangementwith the
ward personnel, particularly the charge (supervisoryattendant), to
handle these duties. On several wards, the charge called specific problems to the doctor's attention, and the two of them, in effect, would
have a consultation. The charge actually made most of the decisions
concerning dosage change in the back wards. Since the doctor delegated portions of his formal responsibilities to the charge, he was
dependent on her good will toward him. If she withheld her
co-operation,the physician had absolutely no recourse but to do all
the work himself.23
In a sense such delegation of responsibility involves a consideration of reward and cost, whereby the decision to be made involves
22Scheff, op. cit.
2Ibid., p. 97.
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a question of what is more valuable-to retain control over an
area, or to delegate one's work to lower participants.
There are occasions, of course, when rules are regarded as illegitimate by lower participants, and they may disregard them. Gouldner observed that, in the mine, men felt they could resist authority
in a situation involving danger to themselves.24They did not feel
that they could legitimately be ordered to do anything that would
endanger their lives. It is probably significant that in extremely
dangerous situations organizations are more likely to rely on commitment to work than on authority. Even within nonvoluntary
groups dangerous tasks are regarded usually as requiring task
commitment, and it is likely that commitment is a much more
powerful organizational force than coercive authority.
SUMMARY
The preceding remarks are general ones, and they are assumed
to be in part true of all types of organizations. But power relationships in organizations are likely to be molded by the type of
organization being considered, the nature of organizational goals,
the ideology of organizational decision making, the kind of commitment participants have to the organization, the formal structure of the organization, and so on. In short, we have attempted
to discuss power processes within organizations in a manner somewhat divorced from other major organizational processes. We have
emphasized variables affecting control of access to persons,
information, and facilities within organizations. Normative definitions, perception of legitimacy, exchange, and coalitions have all
been viewed in relation to power processes. Moreover, we have
dealt with some attributes of persons related to power: commitment, effort, interest, willingness to use power, skills, attractiveness, and so on. And we have discussed some other variables: time,
centrality, complexity of power structure, and replaceability of persons. It appears that these variables help to account in part for
power exercised by lower participants in organizations.
24Gouldner, op. cit.