A case study tested the premise that people cope with ambiguity in particular ways within an organizational context, negotiating for understanding and choice through the manipulation of power, ideology, and technology. The study focused on the implementation of a satellite communications network in local Catholic Church offices and on staff…

The way that affirmative action fits into the faculty appointment process at Stanford University and the University of California at Berkeley was studied, based on 50 faculty interviews and supporting documentation. Traditions of governance at the universities determined the responses to faculty affirmative action. At Stanford University,…

This paper explores notions of empowerment, as variously constructed in contemporary educational discourse, in an attempt to better understand what it means to adopt empowering rhetoric. The discussion is framed around three questions: (1) What is empowerment in contemporary educational discourse? (2) What is desirable, and what should teachers be…

Chapter 7 of a revised volume on school leadership, this chapter advocates the use of participative decision-making (PDM) at the school site level, outlines implementation guidelines, and describes the experiences of some schools with PDM systems. A cornerstone of a reform movement to make organizational operations more democratic and less…

Plato's "Republic" and George Orwell's "1984" both posit visionary worlds, one where humans are virtuous and understand what Plato refers to as "the Good," and the other where citizens are pawns of a government which uses language as a form of tyranny and control. Despite these overarching differences in philosophical…

Rural communities have traditionally been overshadowed by urban centers, thus losing the political clout necessary for adequate rural social service program development/delivery. Social service delivery in rural areas is complicated by lack of power and organization and represents a complex interplay among values, beliefs, social organization,…

It has often been suggested that knowledge of the underlying power sturcture is essential to understanding the day-to-day functioning of the nuclear family and that such knowledge may be of special relevance for understanding violence between husbands and wives. To explore the relationship of the family power structure (e.g., wife-dominant,…

Previous research on marriage indicates that perceptions of control are important to marital satisfaction. To investigate the relationship between attributions of personal control and other variables in marriage, e.g., measures of satisfaction, decision making, and task performance, and attributions of control over decisions and tasks, and to…

Three methods of data collection (nomination technique, survey instruments, and interviews) were used in a study that examined the way power was perceived by men and women in an organization and how women acquired and manifested power in a male-dominated organization. A total of 86 teachers and administrators were interviewed with the following…

The work experiences of college presidents, deans, and midlevel administrators are examined, with attention to job characteristics, degree of participation in college decision making, loyalty and commitment to the school, and job satisfaction. Extrinsic variables of the work environment include workload, rewards, supervision, and opportunities,…

While his responsibilities are growing rapidly, the superintendent's authority is shrinking. The board must tell its superintendent exactly what it is he or she is to be accountable for. (Author/WM)

Advocates the complete elimination of racism and sexism from the structure of American institutions and society in general. (SF)

Small powerful cliques that crystallize within organizations are often able to impose their ideas upon administrators, in the process effectively stifling innovation and creativity. (Author/WM)

A social power framework is utilized to locate those variables that influence adolescent perceptions of power in the parental unit. The variables are categorized as parental resources, family resources, family size, adolescents' religiosity, and adolescent demographic factors. A major focus of the study is to test the viability of resource theory…

This handbook for parents and citizens is concerned with three issues: the roles administrators, state school officers, boards of education, teachers and teacher organizations, parents/citizens, and students play in making decisions about what happens to children in the public schools; the power administrators, teachers, school boards, state…