Managerial Prerogative and the Question of Control (Routledge Revivals) by John Storey

Author:John Storey [Storey, John]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Social Science, Sociology, General, Research, Human Services, Urban
ISBN: 9781317586173
Google: NQLEBAAAQBAJ
Publisher: Routledge
Published: 2014-10-10T05:58:08+00:00

This, of course, is the line argued by Abrahamsson and Bromstrom who think they can demonstrate that the rights of labour can be justified in precisely these terms. As we will see in a moment, apologists of private ownership of the means of production feel they too can make an equally sound case in the opposite direction. (28)

I want to argue here that, to understand rights in general and managerial rights in particular, we will find it useful to locate our analysis in the context of our earlier general framework. Rights in this context relate to rules. Rights, duties, and rules are all social products. Social scientists cannot make moral judgments which pronounce that someone should be bound by a duty or should have his rights recognised. These are moral or normative statements. The social scientist can, however, make descriptive statements. Thus rights and duties are important in our framework in so far as they are part of the meaning systems of the actors we are studying. They are significant if we can, therefore, produce descriptive statements based on the probability of patterned behaviour. That is, the normative discourse of our subjects is of great interest to us if it helps shape their actions. We can then describe when classes or groups will in all probability have their behaviour shaped in this way, and why it is that these groups and not others will feel so compelled.

Sociologically, it will prove most appropriate and illuminating to view rights as social rules. Rules prescribe behaviour, and although, like all prescriptions, and all rules, there will be occasions on which they are ignored or violated, this does not vitiate the rule itself in more general terms. Different types of rules, too, can be identified - moral, legal, and customary. Quite often participants will, of course, regard these as interrelated. Though the lawyer may show no interest in extra-legal ‘rules’, the social scientist is quite properly inquisitive. Sociologists have long been involved with norms, values, mores, tradition and folkways; and these can comprise important constraints on behaviour irrespective of their legal position. Nor are moral and customary ‘rules’ fully coterminous. Not all moral questions can be settled by determining majority view in Gallup-poll fashion. Claims to the rights of minorities would often be discounted if this were the criterion.

If there are extra-legal ‘rules’, then there can be extra-legal ‘rights’. These must find their sanctioning, therefore, from some source other than the law. Much of the classic formulaic work of Elliot Jacques on the sanctioning of ‘Authority’ is founded upon this kind of analysis. The rights of those holding authority derive from the sanctioning of the authority structure according to Jacques. This sanctioning process involves the making of agreed rules. Sanctioning comes from without and from within. From without it derives from the sanctioning of the product (by customers) and the task (by investors); from the government; from professional standards; from the community, which will not tolerate major violations of its cultural standards. It derives

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