Resumen de The ascension of Kafkaesque bureaucracy in private sector organizations

Randy Hodson, Vincent J. Roscigno, Andrew W. Martin, Steven H. Lopez

• Although Weber�s ideal typical model of bureaucracy was developed primarily in relation to the state, studies of private sector organizations typically adhere to its formal-rational conceptions with little adjustment. This is unfortunate since bureaucracy in private sector economic organizations has many elements that are poorly captured by and potentially significantly at odds with Weber�s thinking. Most notable in this regard is the pervasiveness of particularistic and often informal, emergent arrangements - arrangements well documented for many decades by workplace ethnographers. This has significant implications for the conception of modern private sector organizations and indeed offers a picture that is more Kafkaesque than Weberian. Significant support for this point is provided by an analysis of content coded organizational ethnographies. Weberian dimensions of bureaucracy - most notably coordinated and specialized organization and training - are predominant in public institutions; private sector establishments, in contrast, witness significantly more particularism as well as uncertainty and fear as core organizing principles. Importantly, and as delineated in our over-time comparisons, such Kafkaesque elements of bureaucracy and organization appear to be increasingly