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This chapter revisits and extends the multiple-source, multiple-object theory of legitimacy in organizations. It introduces the idea of legitimized regimes and uses it to extend the theory’s range beyond the usual focus on power and domination. The theory describes mechanisms that: (1) establish the legitimacy of new or contested regimes; and (2) facilitate the spread of legitimacy to structures and processes that lie outside organizational boundaries. The chapter uses current affirmative action debates to illustrate the mechanisms under study. The work concludes with a summary that includes discussion of prospects for research on extensions of the multiple-source, multiple-object theory.

As part of an exploratory study on the nature of global leaders' power, we interviewed 23 global leaders to address the question: “How do the task, culture, and relationship complexities of global leadership shape the way global leaders exercise power and influence their followers?” We identify five complicating factors that shape the use of power by global leaders: Language, culture, time zones, physical distance, and matrix organizational structures. When compared with domestic leaders, these five factors make the use of power more complex for global leaders and require global leaders to invest substantially more time and energy into building relationships, sharing leadership, and prioritizing communication to ensure common understanding of vision and goals. We highlight a sixth factor, high-quality relationships, as an enabling resource for global leaders to succeed despite contexts of global leadership complexity. We provide a conceptual model summarizing how global leader influence attempts are complicated and enhanced and offer implications for future research and practice.

The use of routines in the decision-making process of individuals, groups and organizations is a well accepted yet taken for granted phenomenon. One goal of organizations is to develop group routines that are efficient, but at the same time flexible. However, this presents a paradox because routines that are efficient at one point in time, or for a particular task, may persist, be unquestioned, and become increasingly inefficient for the group and the organization. This chapter develops a formal theory that describes the processes by which the legitimation of particular group structures impacts the development and use of group routines. The theory presented draws from theories of legitimation, expectation states theory, and institutional theory. The theory formally depicts three sources of legitimation: a referential belief structure (set of cultural beliefs) about expertise and leadership, authorization or superordinate support of a leader, and endorsement (support by group) of a leader. Specifically, the theory addresses: (1) how different sources of legitimation make groups more or less hierarchical; and (2) how the different sources of legitimation make group routines more or less flexible.

Although there has been much psychological research about children's sibling relations, it has been a neglected area of study in sociology (exceptions are Brannen et al., 2000; Kosonen, 1996; Mauthner, 2002). This paper, based on empirical research on siblings in Scotland, explores the nature of the generational power structure within families from children's perspectives. Childhood is a relational concept which forms part of the generational order. Alanen explains this as “a complex set of social processes through which people become (are constructed as) ‘children’ while other people become (are constructed as) ‘adults’” (2001, pp. 20, 21). Generational processes shape the nature of child-parent relations (Mayall, 2002). Alanen states that:one position (such as the parental position) cannot exist without the other (child) position; also what parenting is – that is, action in the position of a parent – is dependent on its relation to the action “performed” in the child position, and a change in one part is tied to change in the other (Alanen, 2001, p. 19).In other words, child-parent relations are based on the understanding that childhood is relational with parenthood (see also Mayall, 2002). Alanen (2001) argues that the social construction of childhood and adulthood involves a process, including the agency of both children and adults, which she refers to as a set of “practices”:It is through such practices that the two generational categories of children and adults are recurrently produced and therefore they stand in relations of connection and interaction, of interdependence (Alanen, 2001, p. 21).These practices of generationing may be “childing” practices through which people are constructed as children or “adulting” practices through which a distinct adult position is produced. The ways in which children in the present study talked about the differences between their relationships with their parents and their siblings indicated that there are a range of generationing practices that take place within families. They referred to particular kinds of behaviour that were acceptable to engage in with other children (in this case with their siblings) but not with their parents. Overwhelmingly the key issue which children highlighted as distinct between their relations with parents and siblings was the differential nature of power in these relationships. Whilst it is not surprising that children perceive the distribution of power to be more unequal between children and parents than between siblings, the aim of this paper is to explore the nature of this power and how it is experienced from children's point of view. In particular the paper discusses the ways in which children perceive child-parent relations compared with their sibling relationships in relation to the giving and receiving of power within the home.

The processes of legitimation and institutionalization are difficult to study because they are hard to measure. Instead, theories of legitimacy use its elements to explain various effects. We propose that these effects are due to the trust-building aspects of legitimation and institutionalization. If research can establish the trust-building nature of legitimation, then theoretical research programs in the area may progress more rapidly. Research on leadership in groups can be used to assess fundamental questions of legitimacy and trust because group leadership represents an interface between research on organizations and basic group processes. We describe an experimental setting to investigate legitimation, institutionalization, and trust.

This essay outlines a critical theory of everyday resistance. This theory adopts a de-centered conception of law and power, and draws upon the theory of deliberative democracy to specify the conditions under which such power becomes illegitimate. This allows us to see everyday resistance as a symptom that discursive power has been generated under unjust conditions. Such an approach opens a new path of research in which we study everyday resistance as a response to the participatory deficits that exist in contemporary systems of power, and then identify the possibilities and obstacles for remedying those deficits.

Recent corporate scandals such as WorldCom, Enron, and others suggest a failure of corporate governance, that is, of the allocation of power and its lawful use and accountability within the corporation.

This chapter presents a game theoretic model for analyzing the power dynamics among the three groups responsible for oversight in the Anglo-American corporate model – namely the Board of Directors through its audit committee, corporate management, and the external auditors.

The chapter shows, among other findings, that the current governance structure results in an extreme imbalance of power among the three groups that not only permits but even induces management to conceal necessary financial data and often to ignore the long-term interests of the firm.

The chapter also derives changes in principles of governance that can right such imbalances and prevent defalcations from taking place through institutionalizing effective ex-ante checks and balances of power in addition to the ex post measures that come into play only after a wrong has been committed and which are the case with recent exchange rules and Congressional enactments.

None.

No prior analysis along these lines.