Beyond the undertheorized role of organizational power as political power in theories of the state

Critics express concerns over the theoretical pluralism in theories of the state and state power. This paper explores how organizational theories can provide more focus to theories of the state and state power thereby increasing their explanatory power. After summarizing concerns raised by political sociologists over pluralism in theories of the state and state power, the analysis focuses on existing theories of the state that employ concepts from organizational theory to understand the organizational state and its relationship to society. Particular attention is given to the state as a resource extraction and distribution mechanism, the resource dependent relationships among organizational entities inside and outside the state, and the power relations between states and organizations in their environment. This focus brings greater attention to the how groups, corporations, industries, and class fractions exercise power through organizations to influence the policy formation process.     

Do organizational and political–legal arrangements explain financial wrongdoing?

The 2008 financial crisis was a systemic problem with deep‐rooted structural causes that created opportunities to engage in financial malfeasance, a form of corporate wrongdoing. However, few quantitative studies exist on the effects of organizational and political–legal arrangements on financial malfeasance. In this paper, we examine the effects of organizational and political–legal arrangements that emerged in the 1990s in the FIRE sector (i.e., financial, insurance, and real estate) on financial malfeasance. Our historical contextualization demonstrates how changes in the political–legal arrangements facilitate the emergence of new corporate structures and opportunities for financial malfeasance. Our longitudinal quantitative analysis demonstrates that US FIRE sector corporations with a more complex organizational structure, larger size, lower dividend payment, and higher executive compensation are more prone to commit financial malfeasance.     

Specificity of the Tuberculin Skin Test and the T-SPOT.TB Assay Among Students in a Low–Tuberculosis Incidence Setting

Abstract

Objective: Interferon-γ release assays (IGRAs) are an important tool for detecting latent Mycobacterium tuberculosis infection (LTBI). Insufficient data exist about IGRA specificity in college health centers, most of which screen students for LTBI using the tuberculin skin test (TST). Participants: Students at a low–TB incidence college health center. Methods: TST and T-SPOT.TB were performed on prospectively recruited students. TB exposure risk was assessed using a questionnaire: Those at low risk were assumed to not have LTBI in order to calculate test specificity. Results: Of 184 students enrolled, 143 had results available for both TST and T-SPOT.TB. Agreement of the tests was 97% (kappa statistic 0.717; 95% confidence interval, 0.399–1.00). Among 124 low-risk students, specificity for TST and T-SPOT.TB were 98.4% and 100%, respectively. Conclusions: T-SPOT.TB specificity was high among low-risk students. Additional studies such as cost-effectiveness analyses using T-SPOT.TB as a single or confirmatory test to TST are needed to contribute to LTBI screening policy decisions.     

Changing economic conditions and their effects on professional autonomy: An analysis of family practitioners and oncologists

This study examines the effects of dimensions of the social structure on professional autonomy. Little support exists for arguments suggesting professional dominance or professional-bureaucratic confrontation. The study supports a theory of social change that places physicians in their historical, political, and economic context. There are four important findings. First, the degree of autonomy varies across physician specializations, and the social structure affects the autonomy of family practitioners and oncologists in different ways. Second, the Federal Drug Administration constrains the responsibility autonomy of both oncologists and family practitioners, and the innovative autonomy of family practitioners. Third, bureaucracy either has no effect or enhances physicians' autonomy. The fourth, and most consistent, finding demonstrates that profit-seeking corporations external to the work setting constrain physicians' autonomy. Findings suggest that researchers should give more attention to shifts in the loci of power and the effects of organizations external to the work setting, especially corporations, on professions.An earlier draft of this paper was presented at the American Sociological Association annual meeting, Miami, Florida, August 1993.     

Buzzes and barriers: young people's attitudes to participation in the arts

SUMMARY: This article draws on evidence collected through interviews with 700 young people between the ages of 14 and 24 in five different regions of England. Material from this source is used to construct a tentative typology of attitudes towards participation in the arts. This typology contains a set of twelve positive attitudes (or motivations) associated with arts involvement, followed by a set of eight negative attitudes which emerge as barriers to participation. In addition, an attempt is made to identify those positive attitudes which most frequently appeared to accompany high levels of involvement in the arts. It is suggested that a self-identity or self-expression motive (‘I participate in the arts because it's how I define myself, it's a means of self-expression’) and a physiological motive (‘I participate in the arts because of feeling a real buzz’) are particularly evident among arts enthusiasts.     

Corporate Form and the State: Business Policy and Change from the Multidivisional to the Multilayered Subsidiary Form*

The largest industrial corporations are changing to a multilayered subsidiary form. Whereas corporations have used subsidiaries to organize their assets since the tum of the century, the number of wholly owned subsidiaries in the 100 largest industrial corporations doubled between 1981 and 1993. The question addressed here is: Why are corporations changing their form now? I suggest that the question is historically contingent and that the answer is, in part, explained by changes in state business policy. A capital dependence framework is elaborated to examine the relationship between state business policy and corporations in the 1970s and 1980s. Business policy changes–resulting in the Tax Reform Act of 1986 and the Revenue Act of 1987–provided corporations with tax-free procedures for parent companies to simultaneously restructure their divisions as subsidiaries and restructure their debt. There are additional incentives for corporations to restructure their divisions as subsidiaries: (1) creating a liability firewall between the parent company and its subsidiary corporations, limiting the financial risk of parent companies, and (2) creating an internal capital market, providing an alternative form of financing thereby reducing corporations’dependence on external capital markets.