Passing the buck in the garbage can model of organizational choice
Tóm tắt
We reconstruct Cohen, March and Olsen’s Garbage Can model of organizational choice as an agent-based model. In the original model, the members of an organization can postpone decision-making. We add another means for avoiding making decisions, that of buck-passing difficult problems to colleagues. We find that selfish individual behavior, such as postponing decision-making and buck-passing, does not necessarily imply dysfunctional consequences for an organization. The simulation experiments confirm and extend some of the most interesting conclusions of the Garbage Can model: Most decisions are made without solving any problem, organization members face the same old problems again and again, and the few problems that are solved are generally handled at low hierarchical levels. These findings have an implication that was overseen in the original model, namely, that top executives need not be good problem-solvers.
Tài liệu tham khảo
Bendor J, Moe TM, Shotts KW (2001) Recycling the garbage can: An assessment of the research program. Am Polit Sci Rev 95(1):169–190
Carley KM (1986a) Efficiency in a garbage can: Implications for crisis management. In: March JG, Weissinger-Baylon R (eds) Ambiguity and command: Organizational perspectives on military decision-making. Pitman, Marshfield, pp 195–231. Chap IX
Carley KM (1986b) Measuring efficiency in a garbage can hierarchy. In: March JG, Weissinger-Baylon R (eds) Ambiguity and command: Organizational perspectives on military decision-making. Pitman, Marshfield, pp 165–194. Chap VIII
Cohen MD, March JG, Olsen JP (1972) A garbage can model of organizational choice. Adm Sci Q 17(1):1–25. Reprinted as Cohen et al. (1986, 1988)
Cohen MD, March JG, Olsen JP (1986) A garbage can model of organizational choice. In: March JG, Weissinger-Baylon R (eds) Ambiguity and command: Organizational perspectives on military decision-making. Pitman, Marshfield, pp 311–336. Chap Appendix
Cohen MD, March JG, Olsen JP (1988) A garbage can model of organizational choice. In: March JG (ed) Decisions and organizations. Basil Blackwell, Oxford, pp 294–334. Chap XIV
Cohen MD, Axelrod R, Riolo RL (1997) Advancing the art of simulation in the social sciences. In: Conte R, Hegselmann R, Terna P (eds) Simulating social phenomena. Springer, Berlin, pp 21–40. Chap I
Conaldi G, Lomi A (2010) The network structure of organizational problem solving in open source software projects. Technical report, University of Lugano
DiMaggio PJ, Powell WW (1983) The iron cage revisited: Institutional isomorphism and collective rationality in organizational fields. Am Sociol Rev 48(2):147–160. Reprinted in Powell and DiMaggio (1999)
Fioretti G, Lomi A (2008a) An agent-based representation of the garbage can model of organizational choice. J Artif Soc Soc Simul 11(1)
Fioretti G, Lomi A (2008b) The garbage can model of organizational choice: An agent-based reconstruction. Simul Model Pract Theory 16(2):192–217
Janis IL, Mann L (1977) Decision making: A psychological analysis of conflict, choice, and commitment. The Free Press, New York
Kingdon JW (1984) Agendas, alternatives, and public policies. Little, Brown, and Company, Boston
Leach S (1997) The local government review: A ‘policy process’ perspective. Local Gov Stud 23(3):18–38
Levitt B, Nass C (1989) The lid on the garbage can: Institutional constraints on decision making in the technical core of college-text publishers. Adm Sci Q 34(2):190–207
Lipson M (2007) A garbage can model of UN peacekeeping. Glob Gov 13(1):79–97
Lomi A, Larsen ER (eds) (2001) Dynamics of organizations. The MIT Press, Cambridge
Lynn LH (1982) How Japan innovates: A comparison with the US in the case of oxygen steelmaking. Westview Press, Boulder, pp 13–97. Chap II
March JG (1994) A primer on decision making. The Free Press, New York
March JG (2001) Foreword. In: Lomi A, Larsen ER (eds) Dynamics of organizations. The MIT Press, Cambridge, pp ix–xvii
March JG, Olsen JP (eds) (1976) Ambiguity and choice in organizations. Universitetsforlaget, Bergen
March JG, Olsen J (1989) Rediscovering institutions: The organizational basis of politics. The Free Press, New York
March JG, Weissinger-Baylon R (eds) (1986) Garbage can decision processes in naval warfare. Pitman, Marshfield
Martin J (1981) A garbage can model of the psychological research process. Am Behav Sci 25(2):131–151
Masuch M, LaPotin P (1989) Beyond garbage cans: An AI model of organizational choice. Adm Sci Q 34(1):38–67
Meyer JW, Rowan B (1977) Institutionalized organizations: Formal structure as myth and ceremony. Am J Soc 83(2):340–363. Reprinted in Powell and DiMaggio (1999)
Mezias SJ, Scarselletta M (1994) Resolving financial reporting problems: An institutional analysis of the process. Adm Sci Q 39(4):654–678
Musselin C (1996) Organized anarchies: A reconsideration of research strategies. In: Warglien M, Masuch M (eds) The logic of organizational disorder. Walter De Gruyter, Berlin, pp 55–72
Olsen JP (2001) Garbage cans, new institutionalism, and the study of politics. Am Polit Sci Rev 95(1):191–198
Padgett JF (1980) Managing garbage can hierarchies. Adm Sci Q 25(4):583–602
Powell WW, DiMaggio PJ (1991) The new institutionalism in organizational analysis. The University of Chicago Press, Chicago
Richardson J (2001) Policy-making in the EU: Interests, ideas and garbage cans of primeval soup. In: Richardson J (ed) European Union: Power and policy-making, 2nd edn. Routledge, London, pp 3–26. Chap I
Savage L (1954) The foundations of statistics. Wiley, New York
Takahashi N (1997) A single garbage can model and the degree of anarchy in Japanese firms. Hum Relat 50(1):91–108
Troitzsch KG (2008) The garbage can model of organisational behaviour: A theoretical reconstruction of some of its variants. Simul Model Pract Theory 16(2):218–230
Weick KE (1976) Educational organizations as loosely coupled systems. Adm Sci Q 21(1):1–19