Jeffery Harvey
I came across Jackall's Moral Mazes as a citation in a research article discussing the use of discourse in management. From that standpoint, I tend to agree with what I read somewhere that one of the key findings of Jackall's text is the manager's role in manipulating symbols.
I was interested in this piece at the start, but that interest turned into a sort of morbid curiosity. I've read texts where the author took a contrarian position and wrote with a pessimistic or overly didactic tone. Moral Mazes was not that. Jackall writes with what I can only call bemusement at the lengths to which managers in a bureaucracy will go to protect themselves and their confidants. I was taken aback at that stance, not in a bad way, but in such a way that I became interested in what Jackall would write next.
I take note of the original publication (though I read a re-issued edition) and the cultural tenor of that era. Jackall does not shy away from having "the pretty secretary" as a perk of upper-level management, and similarly, even though he will often acknowledge men and women in management roles, he clearly acquiesces to the majority of management roles being filled by men at that time as somehow "right." There's a passage where he writes about "ozone depletion theory" in skeptical terms, clearly as was likely the case with his subjects. Ultimately, while the text is a study of the "moral rules-in-use" (to use something akin to Jackall's own words) in corporations and Jackall keeps the content presumably accurate to his data, it reads like a study of bureaucracy commissions by an in-control bureaucracy somewhere behind the scenes.
With all of that said, I am considering using the introduction and first chapter as well as the author's note at the end of the text in a qualitative research course. I appreciated the narrative constructed from 140+ interviews with managers, and I thought Jackall did an acceptable job of describing his data collection. Students often can't make sense of how qualitative data collection can transpire across a multi-year period, and this book is an example of that.
I'm glad I stuck with it and read this one. I can't say that I'd recommend it in its entirety to many, but this one has its place.
I came across Jackall's Moral Mazes as a citation in a research article discussing the use of discourse in management. From that standpoint, I tend to agree with what I read somewhere that one of the key findings of Jackall's text is the manager's role in manipulating symbols.
I was interested in this piece at the start, but that interest turned into a sort of morbid curiosity. I've read texts where the author took a contrarian position and wrote with a pessimistic or overly didactic tone. Moral Mazes was not that. Jackall writes with what I can only call bemusement at the lengths to which managers in a bureaucracy will go to protect themselves and their confidants. I was taken aback at that stance, not in a bad way, but in such a way that I became interested in what Jackall would write next.
I take note of the original publication (though I read a re-issued edition) and the cultural tenor of that era. Jackall does not shy away from having "the pretty secretary" as a perk of upper-level management, and similarly, even though he will often acknowledge men and women in management roles, he clearly acquiesces to the majority of management roles being filled by men at that time as somehow "right." There's a passage where he writes about "ozone depletion theory" in skeptical terms, clearly as was likely the case with his subjects. Ultimately, while the text is a study of the "moral rules-in-use" (to use something akin to Jackall's own words) in corporations and Jackall keeps the content presumably accurate to his data, it reads like a study of bureaucracy commissions by an in-control bureaucracy somewhere behind the scenes.
With all of that said, I am considering using the introduction and first chapter as well as the author's note at the end of the text in a qualitative research course. I appreciated the narrative constructed from 140+ interviews with managers, and I thought Jackall did an acceptable job of describing his data collection. Students often can't make sense of how qualitative data collection can transpire across a multi-year period, and this book is an example of that.
I'm glad I stuck with it and read this one. I can't say that I'd recommend it in its entirety to many, but this one has its place.