The Organizational Evolution of the American National Red Cross: An Austrian and Bloomington Approach to Organizational Growth and Expansion
The Austrian and Bloomington Schools of Political Economy
ISBN: 978-1-78714-844-4, eISBN: 978-1-78714-843-7
Publication date: 17 October 2017
Abstract
The American National Red Cross is in many ways the iconic symbol for disaster response and recovery. The organization, founded in 1881, has a long track record for coming to the aid of those in need in the wake of wars, natural disasters, and other crises. However, in the wake of recent disasters, the Red Cross has been criticized for underperforming. By combining the literature on bureaucracy in Austrian economics and the literature on monocentricity in the work of Vincent Ostrom and Elinor Ostrom, we provide an analysis of the Red Cross that helps explain the organization’s evolution over time and that also yields implications for disaster management more broadly. Specifically, the Red Cross is a bureaucracy that has become increasingly centralized and rigid as it has become further enmeshed with governmental responsibilities.
Keywords
Citation
Grube, L.E., Haeffele-Balch, S. and Davies, E. (2017), "The Organizational Evolution of the American National Red Cross: An Austrian and Bloomington Approach to Organizational Growth and Expansion", The Austrian and Bloomington Schools of Political Economy (Advances in Austrian Economics, Vol. 22), Emerald Publishing Limited, Bingley, pp. 89-105. https://doi.org/10.1108/S1529-213420170000022006
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
Copyright © 2017 Emerald Publishing Limited