Why People Obey: Theoretical Observations on Power and Obedience in Complex

Organizations
Author(s): Gary G. Hamilton and Nicole Woolsey Biggart
Source: Sociological Perspectives , Jan., 1985, Vol. 28, No. 1 (Jan., 1985), pp. 3-28
Published by: Sage Publications, Inc.

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 WHY PEOPLE OBEY

Theoretical Observations on Power

and Obedience in Complex Organizations

GARY G. HAMILTON
NICOLE WOOLSEY BIGGART
University of California, Davis

Recent sociological studies of power in organizations, although oriented

toward practical ends, offer promise for a general sociological theory of
power. Empirically grounded organizational studies examine social life as
practiced by actors and preserve the tension between structure and action.
Exchange theory and structural theories of power, in contrast, are
abstract and theoretical; by asserting the primacy of structures (structural
theories) or action (exchange theory), they cannot account well for the
dialectic of human agency and structural constraint. We suggest the
theoretical implications of organizational analysis and compare this
perspective with traditional sociological approaches to power.

Why do people obey? Although unanswerable in a final form, this

question, along with the companion question of how to gain
power, has stimulated more writing than perhaps any other in the
history of Western political philosophy. In this article we examine
the dominant modern answers to the enduring questions of power
and obedience the social scientific approaches of utilitarianism
and structuralism. Our intent is to show that utilitarian and
structuralist thought, particularly as expressed in the sociological
approaches of exchange theory and Marxism, have important
limitations for the study of social power. In contrast, we argue,
sociological organization theory, which has not been viewed as a
powerful theoretical tradition, has a contribution to make to a

AUTHORS' NOTE: An earlier draft of this article was presented at the annual
meetings of the American Sociological Association, Detroit, September, 1983.
We would like to thank John Sutton, Helen Roland, and James C. Cramerfor
their helpful comments.

SOCIOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVES, Vol. 28 No. 1, January 1985 3-28

? 1985 Pacific Sociological Assn.

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4 SOCIOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVES / JANUARY 1985

general theory of power. First, we briefly describe reasons for the

dominance of utilitarian and structuralist theories today. We then
discuss the thinking of organization theorists whose approaches
to power have been largely empirical. Finally, we suggest how
empiricist organization theories of power can be fruitfully joined
to the more formal theories of utilitarianism and structuralism.

EARLY THEORIES OF POWER

At the heart of the inquiry into the nature of power and

obedience is the perennial attempt to resolve the tension between
individual freedom and collective order. Aristotle's Politics and
Plato's The Republic are but two of the earliest and best-known
efforts to fashion answers that would provide, in theory, for
optimal measures of both freedom and order. That these works,
along with Hobbes's Leviathan, Machiavelli's The Prince, Rous-
seau's The Social Contract and many others, should reach such
different conclusions suggests the impossibility of answering the
question once and for all.
What should be apparent, with the aid of hindsight, is that the
answers reflect the social reality and climate opinion of their day.
Thomas Aquinas and other thirteenth century theologians could
only view earthly obedience in terms of its ultimate connection
with God, the unmoved Mover and the uncaused Cause. John
Locke, David Hume, and the other Enlightenment thinkers
rested their understanding of obedience on Natural Laws, truths
held to be self-evident, if not always easily proven. Whether
justified by faith or logic, the given reasons that people should
obey reproduce the social reality of those attempting to discover
the relation between power and obedience.
In the past 150 years the understanding of obedience has been
increasingly subject to the reality of a scientific mode of
reasoning. With the rise of social science the transcendental
justifications for power and obedience (e.g., in God and Natural
Law) have been gradually replaced by immanent justifications.
Social science has placed the ultimate rationale for obedience
within the individual in psychological and sociological pro-

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 Hamilton, Biggart / WHY PEOPLE OBEY 5

cesses-and has progressively made that rationale less absolute

and more situational.
For instance, British utilitarian philosophers arguing that
obedience derives from a weighing of pleasure and pain and Marx
and other socialist writers showing that obedience arises from
class oppression and alienation share this immanent vision of
obedience and attempt to ground the vision in essential causes. As
the twentieth century began, however, the realistic implications of
this immanent rationale were developed by such people as
William James and John Dewey in America, and Max Weber and
Emile Durkheim in Europe. On both sides of the Atlantic social
scientists reached the same conclusions: that social reality is
relative, that order is socially based and problematic, and that
obedience rests on situational factors.
Despite the writings of the latter group, the predominant
theories of power and obedience are extensions of utilitarian
tradition on the one hand, and of a Marxian tradition on the
other. There are two basic reasons for this continuity. First, from
the beginning sociologists have been working within and adding
to the basic social science positions staked out by the utilitarians
and Marx. The utilitarians placed the center of society in the logic
and actions of individuals. Although greatly developed and
somewhat changed during the past century, the utilitarian
position is still the principal orientation of economics and, within
the sociological literature on power and obedience, is known as
"exchange theory." The Marxians and many who have tried to
qualify Marx's structural analysis typically see society as shaped
by a stratificational structure. Scholars have developed this view
in diverse ways beyond the views of Marx and the early socialist
writers, and it too remains the principal orientation of most
macrosociological analysts, who use the view to develop theories
of stratification, inequality, and more generally, political economy.
The second reason for the continuity is that, during much of the
past century, the individualism of the utilitarian view and the
structuralism of the Marxist view, singly or in concert with each
other, seemed to represent, more or less adequately, the social
reality of politicians, policy analysts, and political subjects. This
point, of course, needs further elaboration, which goes beyond

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6 SOCIOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVES / JANUARY 1985

the purpose of this article. But it is sufficient here to say that the
centrality of economic thinking, at all levels of society, in policy
analysis and decision making served to increase the represented
reality of utilitarianism. At the same time, the orthodoxy of
utilitarianism spurred critics of the status quo to adopt the nearly
opposite structuralist point of view, which makes actor logic
reflect class positions.
In the last decade or so scholars, although embracing one of the
two traditions, have become disenchanted with the adequacy of
theories that embrace so one-sidedly either structure or individual
calculation.1 Simple utilitarian calculus and straightforward
Marxian analysis do not yield the level of predictive accuracy
desired by both practitioners and academics. Theorists in both
schools have been adapting, usually in a piecemeal way, an
organizational perspective to their particular areas of interest, in
large part because an organizational perspective allows for the
conceptualization of complexity and interdependence.
However, as many writers have noted, organization theory
seems to have a very limited view of power and, hence, seems to
offer an inadequate answer to questions about the reasons for
obedience.2 Although there is certainly considerable truth in this
view, in this article we want to draw out an organizational answer
about why people obey, and then to show how this answer can be
added to the more standard utilitarian and structuralist theories
of power.

OBEDIENCE IN COMPLEX ORGANIZATIONS

Our approach in this section is purposefully narrow. Drawing

on a wide range of organizational theory, we attempt to present in
summary form the normative rationale for obedience within
complex organizations. The first step in this direction is to
examine the theoretical interpretation of authority and power in
such settings. Attempting to understand power and obedience in
complex organizations allows, we argue, insights into the nature
of power and obedience in modern societies, because modern
societies are becoming progressively intra- and interconnected
and, hence, more like an exceedingly complicated organization
than ever before.

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 Hamilton, Biggart / WHY PEOPLE OBEY 7

Unlike power theorists in general sociology, organization

theorists have drawn little on the utilitarian and Marxian
traditions in order to decipher the patterns of organization.3
Instead, even more than conventional power theorists, organi-
zation theorists have adapted Durkheimian and Weberian per-
spectives to organizational analysis. Durkheimian views entered
organizational analysis by means of Mayo's and Barnard's
interest in the 1940s and became an important focus in the 1950s
with the influence of Parson's writings and of structural func-
tionalism more generally. Weber's work has had an even greater
impact. His analysis of bureaucracy is considered the foundation
on which modern organization theory has been built; and,
although many analysts have criticized it, they nonetheless
acknowledge its importance. Moreover, as in sociology in
general, in organization studies Weberian analysis is more
important than ever before. Considering the development of
Weberian and Durkheimian points of view and the relative lack
of utilitarian and Marxian influences, it should not be surprising
to find that organizational interpretations of power and authority
turn out to be somewhat different from those found in general
sociology.
To aid in the delineation of an organizational theory of power
and obedience, we identify five dimensions of an organizational
view. The first two dimensions spell out the distinction between
power and authority. By this distinction organization theorists
show that each concept synthesizes different sets of empirical
phenomena. As we discuss below, authority is a structural
concept and pertains to system variables; power is an interac-
tional concept and belongs with decision-making variables. The
first defines positions and formal rules and the second, the actions
of individuals in group settings. The other three dimensions of
power deal with the relation between organizational structure
and the actions of individuals in organized settings.

AUTHORITY AND ORGANIZATIONAL STRUCTURE

The distinction between power and authority varies from one

theorist to another, but the differences reflect the underlying

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8 SOCIOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVES / JANUARY 1985

attempt to distinguish the permanent, formal aspects of power in

organizations from the ephemeral, situational aspects. Authority
is the term used to define the more stable features of one's exercise
of control over another's actions. Based on a creative misreading
of Weber (1968), many theorists (Katz and Kahn, 1966: 203;
Dornbusch and Scott, 1975: 37; Scott, 1981: 281; Pfeffer, 1981:
4-6) define authority as "legitimate power.'4 By legitimate power,
these writers generally mean a distribution of power or hier-
archical structure of positions that has been set up by organiza-
tional rules and that is generally accepted as valid by members
of the organization. Writers view such a structure as being a
division of labor an arrangement of positions, an assignment of
duties, and an establishment of rules that are essentially artificial.
Structures are designed to produce effects on human behavior,
are designed to be manipulated so as to achieve an array of
possible goals. That organizational structure is constructed, that
it has a history, that it changes or can be changed are features of
structure that organizational theorists take for granted. The task
of an organizational theory of structure has been to define the
relations between alternative structures and their effects on action
in organizations. Theorists, for example, have studied the
relation between structural arrangements and innovation (Mintz-
berg, 1979), conflict (Morris, Steers, and Koch, 1979), and gender
relations (Kanter, 1977). Hence, the accent on authority in
organization is on its artificial and manipulatable nature, its
consensual character, and its many variations in producing
differential ends.

POWER AND THE CONTEXT OF DECISION MAKING

On the whole, organizational sociologists have been less

interested in authority and structure than they have been in power
and action. For instance, in his insightful book, Power in
Organizations (1981), Pfeffer distinguishes between power and
authority in the first chapter and devotes the rest of the book to
dimensions of power. Power, to him, is "a structural phe-
nomenon"; it derives in part from authority, but in action power

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 Hamilton, Biggart / WHY PEOPLE OBEY 9

is "organizational politics": "Organizational politics involves

those activities taken within organizations to acquire, develop,
and use power and other resources to obtain one's preferred
outcomes in a situation in which there is uncertainty or dissensus
about choices" (1981: 6). The process and outcomes of decision
making is what organizational politics is all about. Most other
organizational theorists define power in a similar way. To Kanter
(1977: 166), power, as distinct from "hierarchical domination," is
"the ability to get things done, to mobilize resources, to get and
use whatever it is that a person needs for the goals he or she is
attempting to meet." To Bacharach and Lawler (1980), power is
influence. To Hall (1982: 133), and to most of the others as well,
power is an aspect of relationships, but more than that, "power is
an act; it is something that is used or exercised."
With the use of the term "power," organizational theorists
imply a theory of action for organizational contexts. This theory
often goes by the names of decision making or rational choice
theory (March, 1981). These are so named, not so much because
decisions or choices are actually the topics of investigation, but
because the acts of making decisions place the analytic focus on
individual actors and their relationships in a structured context.
As March (1981) shows, recent developments in decision-making
theory reveal three areas of interplay between organizational
structure and individual actions: (1) the importance of normative
processes that channel actor conduct, but do not determine it; (2)
the importance of individuals acting with limited information
about possible choices and about the outcomes of those choices,
or what March (1978) calls acting in a condition of "bounded
rationality"; and (3) the importance of the symbolic value of
decisions and of the process of making decisions to the organi-
zation itself. These developments in decision-making theory
emphasize the centrality of organizational politics: If decisions
are not solely determined by a problem, are not simply the willful
act of fully informed, rational individuals, and are not merely
made to produce a stated result, then decision making is always
shaped by organizational actors attempting to control the
perceptions and actions of one another. Indeed, according to
organization theorists, decision making shows the essence of
power in organization as distinguished from structure.

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10 SOCIOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVES / JANUARY 1985

But how does structure influence organizational politics, or as

Kanter puts it, "the ability to get things done"? And how does
politics influence hierarchy? Organizational theorists have de-
veloped many ideas about the interaction between structure and
behavior. We have distilled these into the next three dimensions,
on role norms, role performances, and strategic evaluations.

CONTROL STRATEGIES
AND THE NORMS OF EXERCISING POWER

Organization theorists assume that people in organizations

create formal and informal norms to control behavior.5 These
norms include the rules and regulations recorded in procedure
manuals as well as those unofficial codes agreed upon in the halls
and workplace; they include the rewards and sanctions estab-
lished by the management as well as those established by one's
fellow workers. Many studies (e.g., Kanter, 1977) show the
obvious, that norms used to regulate conduct do not influence all
individuals equally; different norms apply to different structural
positions within organizations. Although a creation of organi-
zational actors, norms are essentially structural rules that define
organizational roles and prescribe appropriate behavior for
specific roles. As Katz and Kahn (1966: 457, our emphasis) state,
"role prescriptions specify the persons from whom one is to
accept influence and expect role-related communications, as well
as the persons over whom one is expected to exert such influence
and from whom such information is to be provided. The
authority structure of an organization is nothing more than the
pattern of such legitimized and influential communicative acts. "
An aspect of the norms of organizational roles is what March
(1981) calls "decision rules," those rules by which various
organizational actors prescriptively arrive at decisions. The
analysis of normative constraints is often referred to as the study
of organizational "control." Theorists have performed insightful
analyses of a range of control mechanisms in a variety of
organizational settings (see Punch, 1983; Ouchi and Jaeger, 1978;
Hill, 1981; Lawler and Rhode, 1976).

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 Hamilton, Biggart / WHY PEOPLE OBEY 11

Control strategies, especially role prescriptions, amount to

organized norms for exercising authority. These norms provide
models for how people in different positions are supposed to
direct their actions in relation to the actions of others. Whether a
person obeys or commands, is a supervisor or a subordinate, as
well as the content and style of the command or compliance, is
included in these structurally-based norms for exercising control.

STRUCTURAL PERFORMANCES AND PERSONAL LEGITIMACY

The existence of norms for exercising role authority, however,

does not mean that people mindlessly follow rules of conduct.
Quite the contrary, research repeatedly demonstrates that organi-
zational actors attempt to manipulate roles. In Goffman's terms,
they stage role performances in order to produce calculated
results (Biggart and Hamilton, 1984). To many theorists (e.g.,
Weick, 1979; Meyer and Rowan, 1977; Pfeffer, 1981), such
manipulations, through language and other symbolic means,
shape what actors see as "organizational reality."
But impression management is not unlimited; it is always
constrained by organizational structure (Weick, 1979). Kanter
found that power in organizations rests on a person's credibility,
his or her willingness to live up to role obligations. The people
Kanter (1977: 166-173) interviewed "agreed that 'credibility' was
more important than anything else.... Credibility meant power."
Bittner (1983) uses the term "accountability" to describe similarly
the performance of structural requirements by police officers.
In much the same way that Kanter and Bittner use the terms
credibility and accountability, other organizational theorists
(Katz and Kahn, 1966; Dornbusch and Scott, 1975; Pfeffer and
Salancik, 1978) talk about legitimacy and justification. Organi-
zational actors want to have their behavior viewed as credible and
their decisions as legitimate. Credibility and legitimacy are
interactional attributes assigned to individuals based on their
willingness and ability to tend to role obligations, including the
norms of exercising authority. In this sense, power in organi-
zation derives from the performance of obedience; that is, from
staging a convincing demonstration that one's actions are appro-

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12 SOCIOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVES / JANUARY 1985

priate to one's role (Biggart and Hamilton, 1984). Otherwise an

act of power would be seen as illegitimate, as an act of abusing
power. In organizational politics structural roles provide the
principal justification for actions (Katz and Kahn, 1966; Pfeffer
and Salancik, 1978; Weick, 1979). Hence, power in organizations
does not consist of willed acts of autonomous individuals but,
rather, stylized obedient acts of individuals who justify their
actions to other members of the group in terms of the group's
norms. The negotiated nature of organizational reality becomes
obvious as privatized, individual goals and interests become
endlessly intertwined with individual enactments of structural
roles (Weick, 1979; Hamilton and Biggart, 1984).

EVALUATION AND EFFECTIVENESS

Power may derive from the negotiated performance of struc-

tural roles, but to organizational actors power is equated with
effectiveness (Kanter, 1977; Hamilton and Biggart, 1984). The
performance of roles and the attribution of effectiveness are not
synonymous but, rather, are two components processionally
linked within the context of decision making. The performance of
roles occurs within a context of evaluation, in which actors
constantly interpret the actions of others in light of normative
prescriptions (Dornbusch and Scott, 1975). Such evaluations are
not merely casual assessments made to satisfy one's sense of
curiosity or even to supply topics for office gossip. More
important, evaluations of a person's role performance are directly
connected to the ability to plan decision-making strategies. To the
extent that one can predict the actions of others (e.g., whether or
not they will uphold their role obligations), they can be included
in complex strategies designed to achieve some outcome. A
credible person is one who can be counted on to do a predictable
role performance. Thus, predictability allows one to be used in
the planning of others, whereas unpredictability lessens one's
usefulness and, hence, one's effectiveness. To the extent that
power in organization is related to individual or unit effective-
ness, power is indeed related to the performance of structural

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 Hamilton, Biggart / WHY PEOPLE OBEY 13

roles. But it is the performance and not the structure itself that
determines power in organizations.
In answer to the question, "Why do people obey?" organization
theorists would argue that people obey to be effective, to be
powerful, to be counted as an influential person. In organizations
power and obedience are not opposite or conceptually discrete
phenomena but, rather, are phenomenologically interlinked and
conceptually indistinguishable. Being powerful rests on being
included in calculated strategies and ongoing decisions, being
included in strategies and decisions rests on others' evaluation of
one's accountability, which in turn rests on one's willingness to
obey group standards of behavior, which include the norms for
exercising power.

ADDING ORGANIZATION TO EXCHANGE

AND STRUCTURAL APPROACHES TO POWER

Having identified what we believe are the most important

features of an organization view of power and obedience, we now
turn to an evaluation of the two most important sociological
approaches to conceptualizing power. Our goal here is not to
discredit one approach or the other, but to show where an
organizational perspective might be added.

EXCHANGE AND CALCULATION

Almost all microsociological studies of power make a clear

distinction between power and obedience.6 Consider Dahl's
definition (1957): "The power of A over B is the capacity of A to
make B do something he would not have done without the
intervention of A." Like most depictions of power from this
approach, Dahl's definition makes what would seem to be a
commonsense assertion: Power rests on actor calculation. One
actor is said to have power and the other decides to act obediently.
Obedience is a caused phenomenon and is manifest in observable
acts. The cause of obedience is the perception of another person's
power, with power being defined in Dahl's terms as "capacity."

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14 SOCIOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVES / JANUARY 1985

Most theorists conceptualize capacity as something the power

holder has, namely his or her "resources." So viewed, power and
obedience emerge as components in an exchange relation be-
tween two or more people, in which subordinates obtain some
benefit to compensate them for their obedience.
The logic of this approach is simple enough. Emerson (1962), in
his parsimonious yet elegant formulation of an exchange theory
of power, states its basic premise as follows: "The power of A over
B is equal to, and based upon the dependence of B upon A," where
dependence of B upon A is "(1) directly proportional to B's
motivational investment in goals mediated by A, and (2) inversely
proportional to the availability of these goals to B outside of the
A-B relation." Roughly translated, Emerson argues that the more
B wants something that he or she can only get from A or through
A, the more power A has over their relationship and the more
willingly B obeys A. The causal mechanism explaining B's
obedience is his or her rational means-end calculation regarding
A's resources relative to his or her own goals. B rationally weighs
the resources of A against his or her own resources. If the
resources are balanced in A's favor and no more favorable
alternative exists, B obeys, if B is rational. Therefore, to
determine objectively if A has power, one observes the actions of
B, and to explain B's obedience one measures the resources of A
in relation to those of B.
Extending this logic, Emerson (1962, 1972) and Blau (1964)
show that structure can be deduced from the exchange principles.
Structure arises from the process of building and maintaining
coalitions; coalitions represent a joint pooling of resources
sufficient to overcome the opposing resources of another, which
when stabilized becomes a "structure." Once a coalition is
established and its patterning routinized, the resulting structure
will have developed roles, group norms, and authority relations.
According to Emerson (1962: 38): "Roles are defined and
enforced through a consolidation of power in a coalition
formation. Likewise with group norms. Thus the structure of a
group (its norms and prescriptions) will specify the makeup of the
coalition a member would face for any group-relevant act he
might perform."

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 Hamilton, Biggart / WHY PEOPLE OBEY 15

Although a number of points could be raised about this

perspective in contrast to an organizational view, we want to
stress two points in particular. First and most obvious, this
approach greatly oversimplifies both the structural contexts of
exercising power and the actors' understandings of power and
obedience within this context. In all fairness, the principal
theorists of this approach expressly desire to simplify structure
and to ignore the actors' knowledge of their situations. Their
attempt is to arrive at a deductive model of power that can be
applied anywhere, regardless of the structure or the actors
involved. But in making this attempt these theorists choose to
ignore one of the features of power that organization theorists feel
is most important: The exercise of power is always conditioned
socially by the situation in which people attempt to control one
another's behavior. As an organizational approach would sug-
gest, situations are structured by roles and relations among roles.
These role relations directly influence the nature of the power
being exercised as well as the nature of the obedience being
solicited. The meaning of power does not reside in capacity or
resources per se, but in the justification for action regarding those
resources. These justifications are based on the role relations
themselves, and are both structural and qualitative in nature.
Power is as much a matter of kind as of degree, shaped as much, if
not more, by contextual evaluation in relation to structure as by
an abstract model of actor logic.
This leads to organization theory's second contrast with
microsociological theories of power. In organization theory
individual calculation is a prominent feature of organizational
actors' understandings of their own and other people's actions.
However, this conceptualization of actor calculation differs
substantially from the model of actor logic presented in most
microsociological studies. In these models of actor logic calcu-
lation emerges as the market mentality common to micro-
economic theory. Essentially it is a utilitarian, psychological
theory of human behavior: maximize pleasure and profit, mini-
mize pain and loss. In more analytic terms, this model of actor
logic is based on rational means-end calculation, or what Weber
(1958: 77) calls "practical rationality."

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16 SOCIOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVES / JANUARY 1985

Organizational perspectives, however, usually suggest that

something more is at work than simple means-end calculation. To
be sure, individuals continually make means-end calculations in
attempting to influence the actions of others, but they make these
calculations in light of values, in light of their loyalties and their
commitments, which are in turn shaped by organizational
structure. This is not to say that individuals sincerely hold
organizational values or genuinely feel loyalty to roles. Rather,
regardless of their personal acceptance of ideal commitments,
individuals must act in reference to the prescriptions of these
commitments. To ignore such prescriptions is to place injeopardy
one's personal legitimacy to hold a role and to exercise the type of
authority attributed to that role (Hamilton and Biggart, 1984). In
contrast with practical rationality, Weber calls means-end calcu-
lation in relation to values "substantive rationality." Kalberg's
(1980, our emphasis) excellent analysis of "Max Weber's Types of
Rationality" describes the difference well:

Like practical rationality ... substantive rationality directly orders

action into patterns. It does so, however, not on the basis of a
purely means-ended calculation of solutions to routine problems,
but in relation to a past, present, or potential "value postulate.". . .
The practical rational way of life, characterized by a means-end
calculation of interests, lacks the methodical element calledforth
when values, particularly those believed in as ethical standards,
regulate action 'from within." Only substantive rationality pos-
sesses the analytical potential to master-or rationalize-reality
comprehensively. It does so by consciously and methodically
organizing action into patterns that are consistent with explicit
value constellations.

Although organization theorists seldom put it so abstractly,

their analysis points to the primacy of substantive rationality in
the exercise of power and in the acceptance of obedience. The
very notion of actors' self-constraint, their control from within,
suggests an orientation toward values as the means of guiding
behavior. Actions are invariably assessed and often publicly
motivated by role commitments and by models of role loyalty.
For example, Kanter (1977: 82) described the requirement that

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 Hamilton, Biggart / WHY PEOPLE OBEY 17

secretaries orient themselves to the personal needs of their bosses

as, "the demand that she identify his interests with her own."
Similarly, Reuss-Janni and lanni (1983) describe the moral
"codes" that underlie police cultures in different structural
situations. Actors in these instances orient themselves to sub-
stantive values, not toward objective organizational ends such as
profit or efficiency.
Normative orientations such as these arise from organizational
structure and establish internally consistent modes of commit-
ment that prescribe a comprehensive "way of life" in organiza-
tional matters, a way of life oriented toward ethical standards.
People judge others and are judged in turn by their apparent
willingness to uphold role commitments, to be loyal. The actors'
performances of structure encompass and blur the distinction
between power and obedience. Organizational actors make their
performed obedience to roles the basis of their ongoing effective-
ness, that is, their power.
Although only implicit in organizational theory, the theo-
retically significant point about these ethical commitments in
relation to power is that they arise within power relationships
rather than being external to them. Power relationships them-
selves, as established within formal organization structure, have
an internal logic of commitment. The standards of commitment
are not external to the power relationship and imposed upon it,
but are implied by the nature of the relationship itself. The
attempt to exercise power repetitively generates its own ethical
standards. In the main, these standards do not set up the criteria
to evaluate the structure of authority or the ideological basis of
that authority. Instead, evaluation centers on power, on the
"effectiveness" of individuals in exercising the authority defined
by their roles. By deducing organizational structure from prac-
tical means-end calculation, exchange theorists do away with
what is, after all, the essence of organization: a comprehensive,
value-oriented system of social control. As Hill (1981: 83) states
it, "organizational structure is ... the product of processes which
are as much political as economic."
The microsociological approach, by aiming at an abstract
formal theory of power, downplays both organizational structure

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18 SOCIOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVES / JANUARY 1985

and an actor's knowledge of that structure. From the viewpoint of

organizational theory, it is not parsimonious but a distortion to
suggest that power arises from an exchange relationship or that
structure represents formalized exchanges or long-term coali-
tions. Organization theory would have roles be prior to actor
calculation and power be the evaluated outcomes of the interplay
between formal structure and human interaction. To include this
aspect of power in exchange theory requires a reconceptuali-
zation of the exchange process. In organization theory exchange
becomes an exceedingly complex process that rests on what
Weick (1979: 74) calls multiple causal loops. In such a context
attributions of cause and effect are "arbitrary designations"
(Weick, 1979: 77). And what is important in the exchange process
that goes on in complex organizations is not a transfer of goods,
of whatever kind, but an enactment of norms. In his early works
on an exchange theory of power, Emerson (1962) makes a similar
suggestion, but he does not fully draw out the implications of
exchange in complex networks although he and his colleagues
(Cook et al., 1983) do acknowledge the necessity to move in that
direction. It is our conclusion that exchange theory, in order to be
a viable interpretation of power from an actor's point of view,
must begin to more fully incorporate notions of organizational
structure and organizational norms.

STRUCTURE AND ROLE RELATIONSHIPS

The second major perspective on power is a macrosociological

approach, sometimes identified as the social structure perspective
but also as a Marxian and, incorrectly, as a Weberian perspective.7
Obviously not all theorists of large-scale power phenomena adopt
the same approach, and we do not want to suggest that they do.
Instead our characterization of structural theories centers on
those in which structure, rather than interaction, defines power.
Although the themes and logic of these theories are usually
complex, their explanations of power and obedience often are
straightforward. A person's power derives from the position that
he or she holds in a structure of domination. Some positions, such

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 Hamilton, Biggart / WHY PEOPLE OBEY 19

as that of a banker in a capitalist society, bestow much power and

require little obedience. Other positions, such as that of a factory
worker, are relatively powerless and require much obedience.
From these observations it is a short step to the conclusion that in
a capitalist society the nature of a banker's power is different than
that of a factory worker. This conclusion seems to draw on the
obvious. Power and obedience are inversely related; the more
power one has, the less obedience is demanded of one. The
determining factor about the ratio of power and obedience is the
structural location of a person's position in a society of a given
type. The nature of power is invariably tied to structural and
institutional factors.
Although valid in some respects, such conclusions fail to
distinguish between the consequences and manner of exercising
power. Using the macrosociological approach, theorists typically
conceptualize power in terms of its effects. They confuse the
patterns of action by which individuals control one another with
the outcome of that control. A banker and a factory worker may
attempt to influence their friends and colleagues in similar ways,
but with potentially different effects on the society in which they
both live. Although it is important to look at the effects of
exercising power, the effects are not the phenomenon in totality.
The failure to distinguish between the manner and the conse-
quences of exercising power leads macrosociological theorists to
overlook some of the more important features of a sociology of
power.
Conceptualizing power in terms of its effect follows from the
general analytic approach that many macrosociologists adopt.
The method of generalization is to abstract from one or more
cases conceptualizations about some form of social phenomena.
What is the nature of totalitarianism, or of postindustrial society,
or of the modern family? To answer these questions, the analyst's
first step is to set this phenomenon off from similar ones: How
does totalitarianism differ from democracy or some other form of
government? The second step is to look for the essential
characteristics that explain the inner dynamics of the phenom-
enon: By what means is a totalitarian regime established and how
does it operate? In answering these two questions, theorists

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20 SOCIOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVES / JANUARY 1985

attempt to disengage these conclusions from empirical cases in

order to make them apply to any case that can be similarly
classified.
This procedure directly influences the way that power is
conceptualized. In arriving at an abstract description of a social
form, be it a type of government or a type of family, theorists
develop the essential characteristics of the internal structure of
the phenomenon. Structure, in this sense, is an analytic charac-
terization of positions necessary to the whole. These positions are
conceptualized as inherent to the structure and functional to its
operation. For instance, in Marx's description of capitalist
society the bourgeois and proletarian classes are essential ele-
ments of capitalism and serve necessary functions in its operation
and dialectical change. The conceptualization of power emerging
from macrosociological theories is fashioned from the logic of
structural analysis: Power is defined in terms of how positions
operate in relation to the whole.
Power in macrosociological theories, therefore, takes on a
double meaning. On one hand, power implies, as it does in
microsociological theories, an individual's control of another's
behavior. In this approach, however, this ability is embedded in
positions that individuals occupy. By virtue of their positions in
capitalist society, industrialists can control the actions of their
employees. On the other hand, power is simultaneously defined in
terms of its consequences; that is, it is defined functionally as an
inherent capacity to act in a given way in relation to the operation
of the whole. It is in the nature of capitalism for industrialists to
control workers. Actor logics, depicted as interests, derive not
from actor knowledge, but from the function of the position to
the operation of the social form. In this sense the definition of
power, as well as of actor knowledge, is depersonalized.
We believe that this approach overlooks two significant
structural dimensions of power that figure prominently in an
organization approach. First, by not making the distinction
between the consequences and manner of exercising power,
macrosociological theorists neglect the relational features of
power. Organizational theorists argue that organizational struc-
tures incorporate and institutionalize relationships that define the

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 Hamilton, Biggart / WHY PEOPLE OBEY 21

general obligations of obedience for the sets of roles within that

structure. By specifying the modes of obedience, role relations
provide actors with justifications to act in terms of that obe-
dience. In other words, obedience supplies a basis for power.
Obedience and power are not opposites.
Many macrosociological theorists, however, miss this overlap
of power and obedience. Because the approach downplays actual
actor knowledge, it makes that sharp analytic distinction between
power and obedience that does not exist in practice. In fact,
structuralists conceptualize power and obedience as opposites.
Equating power with its consequences, theorists see positions of
power as having large effects and positions of obedience small or
no effects. Leaders and followers, managers and the managed,
bourgeois and proletariat, upper and lower classes, elite and mass
society-these are but a few of the labels by which the theorists of
social structure identify the distinction between power and
obedience. In the end many structural theories of power are
simply theories of structured inequality; and power, defined as
effect, becomes one of the chief means by which structures of
inequality persist.
But structures of domination are more than just the conse-
quences of one set of positions having degrees of power over other
sets. As organization studies show, within structured settings
relational power is defined in terms of the normative forms of
interactions among roles. Insofar as people routinely try to
influence others, they attempt to justify their power by donning
the mask of structural roles and by appearing to be committed to
the prescriptive relationships among them. It is through these
means that the willing submission of others is solicited and
disobedience punished. But the very act of a subordinate's
supplying obedience to the more powerful provides a platform of
power for that subordinate. Just as the obedient child can make
demands of his or her parents, loyal subordinates can make
demands of their superiors with the expectation that, if their
superiors are committed to their roles, they will be forced to
comply with the "legitimate" requests of subordinates (see
Mechanic, 1962). In this sense the routine exercise of power,
whether by superordinates, subordinates, or equals, necessarily

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22 SOCIOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVES / JANUARY 1985

seeks justification for actions in relational models imposed on

roles, and it is from the performance of such relationships that
structure itself is created and recreated again and again.
Macrosociological theorists are correct in suggesting that the
exercise of power maintains structural continuity. But it seems to
us that they are wrong to argue that this continuity arises only as a
consequence of the powerful dominating the powerless. Instead,
it seems theoretically more sound to argue that the manner by
which power is exercised-through relationships based on sub-
stantive beliefs-supplies the social glue that holds structures
together. By virtue of the ethical commitments it implies and of
the justifications it provides, relational power gives a basis for
social reciprocity that binds people together and blurs the
distinction between one person's power and another's obedience.
The second structural dimension slighted by macrosociological
theorists is closely related to the first, namely that obedience and
loyalty within structures have their foundations in actor calcu-
lation. A number of theorists, including both Marxists and
structural-functionalists, explain obedience in terms of early
childhood socialization or in terms of a process of mystification.
Parsons (1951: 201-243), for instance, states in effect that
individuals tend to obey because they have been socialized that
way. A child is so trained to obey his or her parents that obedience
becomes habitual. As an adult the person transfers this socialized
tendency from his or her parents to other people occupying
legitimate positions of power. In this way, Parsons reduces
obedience to habit and uncalculated action. Obedience is blind
obedience. Similarly, some Marxists argue that obedience of the
lower to the upper class is not in its real class interests. Instead,
obedience arises from a lack of reflection or a lack of an ability to
reflect critically upon these interests. This inability results in
"false consciousness" and is produced by the institutional mani-
pulations of the upper class. Such manipulations cloud the
critical abilities of people in the lower class and mystify their
thinking. Although different, both interpretations eliminate an
actor's rational calculation as the explanation of obedience.
But organization theorists would argue that a better expla-
nation of obedience is to see it as falling within the orb of actor

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 Hamilton, Biggart / WHY PEOPLE OBEY 23

calculation. This is not to say that socialization is unimportant or

that the range of people's possible actions lays unobscured.
Rather, it is to say that an actor's willingness to obey can be
explained easily by that actor's critical evaluation of a structural
setting. In such a setting individuals recognize, at some level of
awareness, that the appearance if not always the fact, of loyalty to
roles is a source of influence with others. Therefore, wishing to
maintain a relationship and to have influence in it, individuals can
rationally decide to obey and to calculate their obedience based
on their prescriptive commitments.
In summary, the macrosociological approach primarily em-
phasizes one structural dimension of power: the effects that ensue
from structure. But the approach does not include, as dimensions
of power, the actors' own understandings of structural settings and
their knowledge of power and obedience in those settings. As a
result this approach overlooks several other structural dimen-
sions of power. We point to two: the relational basis of structural
power and continuity, and the calculability of obedience that
stems from the knowledge of the structural settings. Both are
aspects of an organizational interpretation of power and obe-
dience and both should be added more explicitly to a structuralist
view of power.

CONCLUSION

Organization theory's contribution to a general sociological

theory of power arises from its grounding in empiricism. The two
main sociological approaches to power, the micro and macro
traditions of exchange and structuralism, in contrast, tend to be
theoretical and abstract. They were developed in the 1950s and
1960s with the widespread attempt in sociology to build general
theory and, as a consequence, the most accepted treatments of
power at the time (e.g., Hunter, 1953; Dahl, 1957, 1961; French
and Raven, 1960; Emerson, 1962, 1972, 1975; Blau, 1964;
Parsons, 1967; Rose, 1967) were formalistic and propositional.
The two approaches drew their strength from being parsimoni-
o0us, by deducing structure from action in the case of micro

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24 SOCIOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVES / JANUARY 1985

theories, or the reverse, by deducing action from structure in the

instance of macrological theories.
With the passage of time and theory, however, the strength of
parsimony has turned into the weakness of reductionism. Lukes
(1977: 29) states this point of view succinctly:

Social life can only properly be understood as a dialectic of power

and structure, a web of possibilities for agents, whose nature is
both active and structured, to make choices and pursue strategies
within given limits, which in consequence expand and contract
over time. Any standpoint or methodology which reduces that
dialectic to a one-sided consideration of agents without . . .
structural limits or structures without agents, or which does not
address the problem of their interrelations, will be unsatisfactory.
No social theory merits serious attention that fails to retain an
ever-present sense of the dialectic of power and structure.

The relevance of studies of organizational life to general

sociology and to power theorists in particular is that they are
often founded precisely on the ever-present tension between
structure and action, a consequence of their pragmatic, ethno-
graphic orientation. Few organization theorists would consider
eliminating or attempting to resolve, once and for all, the tension
between the two.8 Indeed, it is the constant interplay between
organizational structure and human action that supplies organi-
zational studies with its central problems for analysis. Theories of
efficiency and productivity, as well as employee contentment and
participation, all derive in some manner from this interplay.
In addition to providing a sound basis for theory construction,
organizational theories are more than ever directly useful to those
who would understand the nature of power in modern society.
Social life today in almost all of its important aspects-political,
occupational, even religious- is self-consciously organized. As
an organizational paradigm envelops social life, a theory of social
power by needs becomes a theory of power in organizations.

NOTES

1. Critics of these dominant theories of power include Lukes (1974, 19

Giddens(1977,1979,1981), Clegg(1975,1979), Collins(1975,1981), and Fou
1980a, 1980b).

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 Hamilton, Biggart / WHY PEOPLE OBEY 25

2. We should note, as has Pfeffer (1981: 9-18), that most organization theorists
typically ignore power and authority in organizations. Our summary of the organizational
view of power is, of course, drawn from those theorists who do recognize the importance
of power phenomena. Accordingly, we do not attempt to cover all of organization theory,
but only that part of it that is the most informed by sociology and the most directed at
understanding domination and control in organizational contexts.
3. Some organizational schools of thought favor structural over interactional
explanations, or the reverse, as do general sociological theorists. But organization
theorists of recent years are self-conscious about the structure/ action debate and there
been considerable discussion of the relations between alternative orientations (see Silver-
man, 1970; Burrell and Morgan, 1979; Dunbar, 1983; Astley and Van de Ven, 1983).
4. To Weber (1968), authority is not "legitimate power." Legitimacy refers, according
to Weber, to the principles underlying the structures of domination. Organizations and the
structure of authority in organizations, may or may not be founded on legitimate
principles; that is, principles accepted as valid by the ruled as well as by the rulers.
5. Weick (1979: 3-4) states this point well: "Organizing is like a grammar in the sense
that it is a systematic account of some rules and conventions by which sets of interlocked
behaviors are assembled to form social processes that are intelligible to actors. It is also a
grammar in the sense that it consists of rules for forming variables and causal linkages into
meaningful structures."
6. The extensive literature on power from this perspective includes works by the
following early important writers: Simon (1953), Hunter (1953), Dahl (1957), Thibaut and
Kelley (1959), Emerson (1962), and Blau (1964). The following writers have followed and
expanded upon these earlier studies: Kadushin (1968), Cook (1977), and Burt (1977).
7. Some of these works explicitly about power include those by Poulantzas (1973),
Offe (1976), Mills (1956), Parsons (1967), Lehman (1969), and Whitt (1979).
8. Some, however, do. Population ecologists, for example, deny the influence of
human agency in understanding organizational outcomes. But theorists who examine
social life within organizations usually recognize, either implicitly or explicitly, the tension
between structural constraints and the intentionality of actors. It is these studies that we
believe hold promise for the development of a general theory of power.

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Gary G. Hamilton is Associate Professor of Sociology, University of California at

Davis. His research interests include the political sociology of China and historical
comparative methodology. His writings include "The Structural Sources of
Adventurism: The Case of the California Gold Rush," American Journal of
Sociology 83 (1978), and "Chinese Consumption of Foreign Commodities: A
Comparative Perspective," American Sociological Review 42 (1977). He is
coauthor, with Nicole Woolsey Biggart, of Governor Reagan, Governor Brown: A
Sociology of Executive Power, Columbia University Press (1984).

Nicole Woolsey Biggart is Assistant Professor of Administration and Sociology,

University of California at Davis. Her interests include the study of non-
bureaucratic organization forms and rationalization processes within organiza-
tions. Her writings have appeared in The Sociological Quarterly, Administrative
Science Quarterly, Social Problems, and Sociological Inquiry. She is now
conducting a study of direct selling organizations.

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