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Table of contents:

Alfred de Grazia

A GENERAL THEORY OF MANAGEMENT

Reprinted From ADMINISTRATIVE SCIENCE QUATERLY
From December 1960 and March 1961

I. ADMINISTRATION AS ACTION
 
Action Purposive
Uniqueness of Action
Action Internalized or Externalized
Action Creative or Habitual
Administration as Institutionalized Habitual Action
 
II. ADMINISTRATION AS SCIENCE
 
Bureaucracy Not Sole Model for Administrative Theory
Science of Administration Selective
Science of Administration Abstractive
Fallacy of "Practical" Criticisms of Administrative Abstractions
Criteria for Choice of Generalizations
Unconscious values
Conscious choice of issues.
Creative and imaginative values.
Instrumental criteria.
Criteria of fit into established science.
Determining What to Generalize
Confusion of Science of Administration with "Scientoid" Administration
 
III. ELEMENTARY PROPOSITIONS ABOUT ADMINISTRATION
 
Dimensions of Administrative Actions
Administration's Organizational Context
Effects of Degree of Administrativeness
Actors of Administration
Subjective perspectives of actors
Substantive and Instrumental Goals
General administrative theory concerns both types of goals
Use of Abstract Values in Classifying Goals
Power as an Instrumental Value
Internal Administrative Power Is Control
Omnipresence of Deduction in Administration
Weakness of Induction
Formality arid Co-ordination Related to Control
Increases in Co-ordination
Interactive Effects of the Goals and Actors
 
IV. POWER, INCOME, AND PRESTIGE AS GOALS IN ADMINISTRATION
 
Power as a Dominant External and Internal Value
Income as the Dominant Administrative Goal
Prestige the Dominant Goal
 
V. DEVELOPMENT OF ADMINISTRATION
 
Relation of Increase in Creativity to Increased Administration
Values in Origin and Development of Administration
 
VI. THE APPLIED SCIENCE OF ADMINISTRATION
 
Sources of Palsies for Applied Science
Practicality of Applied Science
The example of economics
The example of medicine
Applied Science Suffused by Evaluations
Elements in Formula of Applied Science
Inevitable deviation of particular actions from formula
Art of administration as unique action
Relations between Applied Science and Science Proper
Historical view of applied administration
Problems of translating applied and lure science
Usefulness not always associated with specificity
Unconscious Seeking of Value Accord
Impossibility of Absolute Applied Science
 
VII. IDEOLOGIES OF APPLIED SCIENCES OF ADMINISTRATION
 
Executive Centralism
Evaluative meaning of efficiency.
Human Relations Engineering
Authoritative Legalism
Supposed Contrast Afforded by the Realpolitik Theory
Participantism
Democratic-neutralistic pretensions
Participant rule by constitutional form
Postulative-analytic View
Other Deviations from Executive-Centered Model
 
CONCLUSION