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The mailed fist beneath the greying bun
Twenty years ago, when I first entred the world of full-time paid employement, I didn't realise that there are two kinds of institutions in this world: those which ascribe to an authoritarian model, and those which do not. And it was another decade or before I would come to realise that, in the world of paid work, those in the second group are but a tiny percentage, consisting mostly of such marginal enterprises as small cooperatives, idealistic non-profits, and techy start-ups, all predominately concentrated on the Left Coast.
The more practical division is between those which openly acknowledge that they are authoritarian in conception and those which don't. It's hard for me to really judge where one category predominates over the other--probably because there's no clear dividing line. You could end up working for the one openly tyrannical manager in an otherwise warm-and-fuzzy corporation or the one progressive one in an overwhelmingly backwards-looking operation. But whether it's chiefly because the positions I've held have been in academic operations or at firms located in Midwest ("Where passive-aggressiveness is king!"), I've always ended up at the latter.
I'm not at all surprised that some many overseers can subscribe to the doublethink of describing their unit as a "family" while treating it like a fiefdom. After all, I've seen how they live the rest of their lives. But it is still kind of weird to me how our society as a whole can spend so much of its time fetishising "democracy" while fatalistic accepting that, practically speaking, it's a rare bird outside the realm of electoral politics and some volunteer activities. Like class, it isn't something most people even seem capable of participating in a dialogue about. Everyone bitches about work, but anyone who seriously proposes changes to the status quo is derided as a crank. Is it the same as with our dominant economic model: The majority accept the inequalities because they still fantasise about coming out on top?
Did I ever have those fantasies? I've been so cynical for so long I can't even remember. For years, it was enough to earn my little wage for being left alone to do my work. But when you're a manager, your work also includes sticking up for your employers, and that puts you on a collision course with the Powers That Be. I've thought about jumping ship, but as I mentioned before, the only employers I can see that are conceived progressively enough to be qualitatively different on this score are also lower-paying, less stable, or both. And since I long ago came to the conclusion that I value comfort and stability too much to hop from one shop to another, here I am, still in bed with the devil I know and, like everyone else, trying to find the best balance I can between earnings and integrity.
The more practical division is between those which openly acknowledge that they are authoritarian in conception and those which don't. It's hard for me to really judge where one category predominates over the other--probably because there's no clear dividing line. You could end up working for the one openly tyrannical manager in an otherwise warm-and-fuzzy corporation or the one progressive one in an overwhelmingly backwards-looking operation. But whether it's chiefly because the positions I've held have been in academic operations or at firms located in Midwest ("Where passive-aggressiveness is king!"), I've always ended up at the latter.
I'm not at all surprised that some many overseers can subscribe to the doublethink of describing their unit as a "family" while treating it like a fiefdom. After all, I've seen how they live the rest of their lives. But it is still kind of weird to me how our society as a whole can spend so much of its time fetishising "democracy" while fatalistic accepting that, practically speaking, it's a rare bird outside the realm of electoral politics and some volunteer activities. Like class, it isn't something most people even seem capable of participating in a dialogue about. Everyone bitches about work, but anyone who seriously proposes changes to the status quo is derided as a crank. Is it the same as with our dominant economic model: The majority accept the inequalities because they still fantasise about coming out on top?
Did I ever have those fantasies? I've been so cynical for so long I can't even remember. For years, it was enough to earn my little wage for being left alone to do my work. But when you're a manager, your work also includes sticking up for your employers, and that puts you on a collision course with the Powers That Be. I've thought about jumping ship, but as I mentioned before, the only employers I can see that are conceived progressively enough to be qualitatively different on this score are also lower-paying, less stable, or both. And since I long ago came to the conclusion that I value comfort and stability too much to hop from one shop to another, here I am, still in bed with the devil I know and, like everyone else, trying to find the best balance I can between earnings and integrity.
no subject
That's more or less the thesis of my second book, on the history of the company, from the VOC to Halliburton: there's this idea kicking around certain parts of academia that somehow corporate capitalism is related both to liberal ideals and to democracy, but on the inside, capitalist corporations are generally monarchies or semi-secret oligarchies, where workers who protest are quickly ejected.