Sources of Power of Lower Participants in Complex Organizations

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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 ofsecretaries, hospital attendants, prison inmates, and other lower partici-

pants within organizations. Power is seen as resulting from access toand control over persons, information, and instrumentalities. Amongthe variables discussed affecting power are normative definitions, per-ception of legitimacy, exchange, and coalitions. Personal attributesrelated to power include commitment, effort, interest, willingness touse power, skills, and attractiveneses. Finally, various attributes ofsocial structure are discussed which also help to account for the powerof lower participants: time spent in the organization, centrality ofposition, duality of power structures, and replaceability of persons.'

David Mechanic is assistant professor of sociology, Department ofSociology, University of Wisconsin.

IT is not unusual for lower participants2in complex organizationsto assume and wield considerable power and influence not associ-

1Paper presented at the Ford Foundation Seminar in the Social Science of Organi-

zations, University of Pittsburgh, June 10-22, 1962.2The term "lower participants" comes from Amitai Etzioni, A Comparative Analy-

sis 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, cus-

tomers, and inmates. We shall use the term in this paper in a relative sense denot-ing position vis-a'-vis a higher-ranking participant.



350 ADMINISTRATIVE SCIENCE QUARTERLY

ated with their formally defined positions within these organiza-tions. In sociological terms they have considerable personal powerbut no authority. Such personal power is often attained, for exam-

ple, by executive secretaries and accountants in business firms, byattendants in mental hospitals, and even by inmates in prisons.The personal power achieved by these lower participants doesnot necessarily result from unique personal characteristics,although these may be relevant, but results rather from particularaspects of their location within their organizations.

INFORMAL VERSUS FORMAL POWER

Within organizations the distribution of authority (institution-alized power) is closely if not perfectly correlated with the prestigeof positions. Those who have argued for the independence of thesevariables3 have taken their examples from diverse organizationsand do not deal with situations where power is clearly compara-ble.4 Thus when Bierstedt argues that Einstein had prestige butno power, and the policeman power but no prestige, it is apparent

that he is comparing categories that are not comparable. Generallypersons occupying high-ranking positions within organizationshave more authority than those holding low-ranking positions.

One might ask what characterizeshigh-ranking positions withinorganizations. What is most evident, perhaps, is that lower partici-pants recognize the right of higher-ranking participants to exercisepower, and yield without difficulty to demands they regard aslegitimate. Moreover, persons in high-ranking positions tend to

have considerable accessand control over information and personsboth within and outside the organization, and to instrumentalitiesor resources. Although higher supervisory personnel may be iso-lated from the task activities of lower participants, they maintainaccess to them through formally established intermediary posi-tions 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 whichthey 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.



POWER OF LOWER PARTICIPANTS 351

Since formal organizations tend to structure lines of access andcommunication, 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 theinformal power structure that develops within organizations some-

what incongruent with the formally intended plan. It is thesevariables that allow work groups to limit production throughnorms that contravene the goals of the larger organization, that

allow hospital attendants to thwart changes in the structure of ahospital, 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 explain-

ing why lower participants in organizations can often assume and

wield considerable power which is not associated with their posi-

tions as formally defined within these organizations. For the pur-

poses of this analysis the concepts "influence," "power,"and "con-

trol" will be used synonymously. Moreover, we shall not be con-

cerned 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 becauseit 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.




is closely related to dependence. To the extent that a person isdependent on another, he is potentially subject to the other per-son's power. Within organizations one makes others dependent

upon him by controlling access to information, persons, andinstrumentalities, which I shall define as follows:

a. Information includes knowledge of the organization, knowl-

edge about persons, knowledge of the norms, procedures, tech-

niques, 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 comparableunits. Thus we shall strive for clarification by attempting to over-

simplify 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 aclassic statement of our problem in Weber's discussion of the

political bureaucracy.Weber indicated the extent to which bureau-

crats may have considerable power over political incumbents, as a

result, in part, of their permanence within the political bureauc-

racy, as contrasted to public officials,who are replaced rather fre-

quently.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 clearlytestable.

80p. cit.

9Max Weber, "The Essentials of Bureaucratic Organization: An Ideal-Type Con-

struction," in Robert Merton et al., Reader in Bureaucracy (Glencoe, Ill., 1952),

pp. 18-27.




familiar with the organization-its rules and operations, the workflow, and so on, which gives him considerable power over the newpolitical incumbent, who might have higher rank but is not as

familiar with the organization. While Weber does not directlystate the point, his analysis suggests that bureaucratic permanencehas some relationship to increased access to persons, information,and instrumentalities. To state the hypothesis suggested somewhatmore formally:

HI Other factors remaining constant, organizational power is

related to access to persons, information, and instrumen-talities.

H2 Other factors remaining constant, as a participant's lengthof time in an organization increases, he has increased accessto persons, information, and instrumentalities.

While these hypotheses are obvious, they do suggest that a care-ful scrutiny of the organizational literature, especially that dealingwith the power or counterpower of lower participants, might leadto further formalized statements, some considerably less obvious

than the ones stated. This kind of hypothesis formation is treatedlater 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 influ-ence in terms of its sources and strategies; he might undertake a

study of the flow of influence; he might concentrate on the struc-

ture of organizations, seeing to what extent regularities in behav-

ior 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 pointsof departure leads to different theoretical emphases. For our pur-

poses the most important emphasis is that presented by role

theorists.Role theorists approach the question of influence and power in




terms of the behavioral regularities which result from establishedidentities 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 throughsocialization within specific organizations, and much behavior isroutine and established through learning the traditional modes ofadaptation in dealing with specific tasks. Thus the positions per-sons 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, thebasic premises underlying their thought have been rather con-sistent. The argument is essentially that knowledge of one's identi-ty or social position is a powerful index of the expectations sucha person is likely to face in various social situations. Since behaviortends to be highly correlated with expectations, prediction ofbehavior is therefore possible. The approach of role theorists tothe study of behavior within organizations is of particular meritin 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 linkingsocial structure, social process, and social character.

Many problems pertaining to role theory have been raised. Attimes it is not clear whether role is regarded as a real entity, atheoretical construct, or both. Moreover, Gross has raised the issueof role consensus, that is, the extent to which the expectations

impinging upon a position are held in common by persons occupy-ing reciprocal positions to the one in question.'0 Merton has

attempted to deal with inevitable inconsistencies in expectationsof role occupants by introducing the concept of role-set whichtreats differences in expectations as resulting, in part, from thefact that any position is differently related to a number of recipro-cal 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.




factor which Etzioni has found to be related intimately to the kindof power exercised in organizations.'3 Perhaps these various criti-cisms 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 influ-ence and power can be exercised without conflict. This occurswhen power is integrated with a legitimate order, when sentimentsare held in common, and when there are adequate mechanismsfor introducing persons into the system and training them torecognize, accept, and value the legitimacy of control within theorganization. By providing the conditions whereby participantswithin an organization may internalize the norms, these general-ized rules, values, and sentiments serve as substitutes for inter-personal influence and make the workings of the organizationmore agreeable and pleasant for all.

It should be clear that lower participants will be more likelyto 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, whenlower participants become alienated from the organization, coer-cive power is likely to be required if its formal mandates are tobe fulfilled.'4

Moreover, all organizations must maintain control over lowerparticipants. To the extent that lower participants fail to recog-nize 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, in-so-far as higher participants can create the impression that theycan or will exert sanctions above their actual willingness to usesuch sanctions, control over lower participants will increase. It isusually to the advantage of an organization to externalize andimpersonalize controls, however, and if possible to develop

positive sentiments toward its rules.In other words, an effective organization can control its partici-pants in such a way as to make it hardly perceivable that it exer-cises the control that it does. It seeks commitment from lower

"3Etzioni, op. cit. 14Ibid.




participants, and when commitment is obtained, surveillance can

be relaxed. On the other hand, when the power of lower partici-

pants in organizations is considered, it often appears to be clearly

divorced from the traditions, norms, and goals and sentiments ofthe 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 preced-

ing point. Scheff, for example, reports on the failure of a state

mental hospital to bring about intended reform because of theopposition 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 respon-

sibilities 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 demand-

ing attention and recognition. When the attendant withheld

co-operation, the physician had difficulty in making a gracefulentrance and departure from the ward, in handling necessary

paper work (officiallyhis 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.




tion needed to deal adequately with daily treatment and behaviorproblems. When attendants opposed change, they could wieldinfluence 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 Hesuggests that although guards could report inmates for disobedi-ence, frequent reports would give prison officials the impressionthat the guard was unable to command obedience. The guard,therefore, had some stake in ensuring the good behavior of pri-soners without use of formal sanctions against them. The resultwas a trading agreement whereby the guard allowed violations ofcertain rules in return for co-operative behavior. A similar situ-ation is found in respect to officers in the Armed Services or fore-men in industry. To the extent that they require formal sanctionsto bring about co-operation, they are usually perceived by theirsuperiors as less valuable to the organization. For a good leader isexpected to command obedience, at least, if not commitment.

FACTORS AFFECTING POWER

Expertise

Increasing specialization and organizational growth has madethe expert or staff person important. The expert maintains powerbecause high-ranking persons in the organization are dependentupon him for his special skills and access to certain kinds of infor-mation. One possible reason for lawyers obtaining many high

governmental offices is that they are likely to have access to ratherspecialized but highly important means to organizational goals.'7

We can state these ideas in hypotheses, as follows:H3 Other factorsremaining constant, to the extent that a low-

ranking participant has important expert knowledge notavailable to high-ranking participants, he is likely to havepower 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 sub-

cabinet officials, 63 senators, and 230 congressmen are lawyers (New Yorker, April14, 1962, p. 62). Although one can cite many reasons for lawyers holding political

posts, an important one appears to be their legal expertise.




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 toreplace 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 high-

ranking participants in an organization, the same hypotheses that

explain the power of lower participants are relevant in explainingthe 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 remain-

ing unchanged, the medical administrator has clear advantage

over the lay administrator. Where lay administrators receive pref-erence, 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 physi-

cian who contests an administrative decision on the basis of medi-

cal necessity. Usually hospitals are viewed primarily as universal-

istic 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 finan-

cial 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 agroup 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




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 tremen-dous potentialities for power by withholding information, provid-ing incorrect information, and so on, and to the extent that

experts are dissatisfied, the probability of organizational sabotageincreases.

Effort and Interest

The extent to which lower participants may exercise power

depends in part on their willingness to exert effort in areas wherehigher-ranking participants are often reluctant to participate.

Effort exerted is directly related to the degree of interest one hasin an area.

H6 Other factors remaining constant, there is a direct rela-tionship 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 powerto 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 politereluctance to furnish supplies, ignoring his preferences for the

scheduling of classes, and giving others preference in the alloca-

tion of services.While the power to make such decisions may easily

be removed from the jurisdiction of the lower participant, it canonly 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 jeop-

ardy, 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 preju-

dicial basis as a result of complaints to the chairman of the depart-ment 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-




ing secretarial services because of preferences among the secre-tarial staff. If in attempting to eliminate discretion by the secre-tarial staff, the chairman establishes a rule ordering the allocation

of services on the basis of the order in which work appears, therule can easily be made ineffective by complete conformity to it.Deadlines for papers, examinations, and the like will occur, andflexibility in the allocation of services is required if these dead-lines are to be met. Thus the need for flexibility can be made toconflict with the rule by a staff usually not untalented in suchoperations.

When an organization gives discretion to lower participants, it isusually trading the power of discretion for needed flexibility. Thecost of constant surveillance is too high, and the effort requiredtoo great; it is very often much easier for all concerned to allowthe secretary discretion in return for co-operation and not toogreat an abuse of power.

H7 Other factors remaining constant, the less effort and inter-est higher-ranking participants are willing to devote to a

task, the more likely are lower participants to obtain powerrelevant to this task.

A ttractiveness

Another personal attribute associated with the power of low-ranking persons in an organization is attractiveness or what somecall "personality." People who are viewed as attractive are morelikely to obtain access to persons, and, once such access is gained,

they may be more likely to succeed in promoting a cause. But onceagain dependence is the key to the power of attractiveness, forwhether a person is dependent upon another for a service he pro-vides, or for approval or affection, what is most relevant is therelational bond which is highly valued.

H8 Other factors remaining constant, the more attractive aperson, the more likely he is to obtain access to personsand control over these persons.

Location and Position

In any organization the person's location in physical space andposition in social space are important factors influencing access





36,2 ADMINISTRATIVE SCIENCE QUARTERLY

of a particular group that controls activities relating to the task.While these tasks usually are co-ordinated at the highest levels ofthe organization, they often are not coordinated at intermediate

and lower levels. It is not unusual, however, for coalitions to formamong lower participants in these multiple structures. A secre-tary may know the man who manages the supply of stores, or theperson assigning parking stickers. Such acquaintances may giveher the ability to handle informally certain needs that would bemore time-consuming and difficult to handle formally. Her abilityto 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 partici-pants can use their knowledge of the norms of the organization tothwart attempted change. In discussing the various functions ofbureaucratic rules, Gouldner maintains that such rules serve asexcellent substitutes for surveillance, since surveillance in addi-tion to being expensive in time and effort arouses considerablehostility and antagonism.20Moreover, he argues, rules are a func-tional equivalent for direct, personally given orders, since theyspecify the obligations of workers to do things in specific ways.Standardized rules, in addition, allow simple screening of viola-tions, facilitate remote control, and to some extent legitimize pun-ishment when the rule is violated. The worker who violates a

bureaucratic rule has little recourse to the excuse that he did notknow what was expected, as he might claim for a direct order.Finally, Gouldner argues that rules are "the 'chips' to which thecompany staked the supervisors and which they could use to playthe game" 21 that is, rules established a punishment which couldbe withheld, and this facilitated the supervisors' bargaining powerwith lower participants.

While Gouldner emphasizes the functional characteristics of

rules within an organization, it should be clear that full compli-ance to all the rules at all times will probably be dysfunctional forthe organization. Complete and apathetic compliance may do

OAlvin W. Gouldner, Patterns of Industrial Bureaucracy (Glencoe, Ill., 1954).21Ibid., p. 173.




everything but facilitate achievement of organizational goals. Low-er participants who are familiar with an organization and its rulescan often find rules to support their contention that they not do

what they have been asked to do, and rules are also often a rational-ization for inaction on their part. The following of rules becomesespecially complex when associations and unions become involved,for there are then two sets of rules to which the participant canappeal.

What is suggested is that rules may be chips for everyone con-cerned in the game. Rules become the "chips" through which the

bargaining process is maintained. Scheff, as noted earlier, observedthat attendants in mental hospitals often took on responsibilitiesassigned legally to the ward physician, and when attendantsrefused to share these responsibilities the physician's positionbecame extremely difficult.22

The wardphysicianis legally responsiblefor the careand treatmentof each ward patient. This responsibilityrequiresattention to a hostof details. Medicine,seclusion,sedation and transferorders,for exam-

ple, require the doctor's signature. Tranquilizers are particularlytroublesome n this regardsince they require frequent adjustmentofdosage in order to get the desired effects. The physician'sorder isrequiredto eachchangein dosage.With 150patientsunderhis careontranquilizers,and several changes of dosages a week desirable, thephysician could spend a major portion of his ward time in dealingwith this single detail.

Given the time-consuming ormal chores of the physician,and his

many other duties, he usually worked out an arrangementwith theward personnel, particularly the charge (supervisoryattendant), tohandle these duties. On severalwards,the chargecalled specificprob-lems to the doctor'sattention, and the two of them, in effect, wouldhave a consultation. The chargeactually made most of the decisionsconcerningdosage change in the back wards. Since the doctor dele-gated portions of his formal responsibilities to the charge, he wasdependent on her good will toward him. If she withheld herco-operation,the physician had absolutely no recoursebut to

do allthe work himself.23

In a sense such delegation of responsibility involves a considera-tion of reward and cost, whereby the decision to be made involves

22Scheff,op. cit. 2Ibid., p. 97.




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 illegi-timate by lower participants, and they may disregard them. Gould-

ner 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 com-

mitment to work than on authority. Even within nonvoluntary

groups dangerous tasks are regarded usually as requiring taskcommitment, 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 relation-

ships 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 com-

mitment participants have to the organization, the formal struc-

ture of the organization, and so on. In short, we have attempted

to discuss power processeswithin organizations in a manner some-

what divorced from other major organizational processes.We have

emphasized variables affecting control of access to persons,

information, and facilities within organizations. Normative defini-tions, 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: commit-

ment, effort, interest, willingness to use power, skills, attractive-

ness, and so on. And we have discussed some other variables: time,

centrality, complexity of power structure, and replaceability of per-

sons. It appears that these variables help to account in part for

power exercised by lower participants in organizations.

24Gouldner, op. cit.

Sources of Power of Lower Participants in Complex Organizations

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