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Organization theory is presently dominated by theories of strategic choice and politics. Managers are seen as exercising a wide choice and maximizing their personal self-interest through complex power struggles. This stimulating volume challenges these views, arguing instead that managerial decisions are determined by the situation and serve the interests of the whole organization. Showing that organizations follow laws which generalize across organizations of many different kinds in many different national cultures, the book rejects the model of organizational configurations or types. The author offers a critical assessment of leading organization theorists such as Henry Mintzberg, John Child, Michael Hann.

Knowledge in organizations and, more particularly, in knowledgeintensive firms is an important topic. However, some contemporary approaches tend to over-use the concept of tacit knowledge leading to mystification and magification. Knowledge creation, storage and transmission in organizations may be rationalized and foster bureaucratization, consonant with the Weberian tendency towards formal rationality. The ideationalist nature of certain theorizing may lead to unrealistic accounts of knowledge in organizations. Antithetic positivist theory can offer illumination on some aspects of organizations and so analysts should not confine themselves to ideationalist theories. Arguments for the importance of knowledge in organizations can become enmeshed in claims that society is post-capitalist, which are best avoided. Future researchers would do better to follow the lead of the articles in this special edition and analyse knowledge in organizations in a careful empirical and skeptical fashion.

Astley and Zammuto (Astley, W. Graham, Raymond F. Zammuto. 1992. Organization science, managers and language games. Organ. Sci. 3 (4) 443–460.) have contributed a provocative theoretical analysis of the present state of organizational science and suggest that the solution to current difficulties lies in a fuller realization of the concept of organizational science as a language game. They address contemporary criticisms that organizational research lacks applications and reject the view that renewed efforts should be made to create a body of organizational engineering knowledge which offers highly specific advice to managers. Instead Astley and Zammuto (Astley, W. Graham, Raymond F. Zammuto. 1992. Organization science, managers and language games. Organ. Sci. 3 (4) 443–460.) invoke the philosophical concept of a language game and see organization theory as primarily consisting of stories and myths to provide symbolic representation and legitimation for management. Far from being highly specific in terminology, preferred language games are seen as being stated in an abstract language, the better to widely generalize, and indeed as being ambiguous, so as to appeal broadly and to facilitate consensus in fraught situations.

This paper reports the results of an evaluation study into the effects of a job enlargement exercise on female assemblers of electrical domestic appliances. Data on job satisfaction and perceptions of job attributes are analysed, and a comparison is made between the group with the enlarged job and another group of operatives who are performing tasks fairly similar to those which the enlarged group were performing prior to job enlargement. The results indicate that the expected increases in satisfaction associated with greater work variety, novelty and felt use of abilities were achieved. There were some dissatisfying outcomes related to decreased social interaction and somewhat increased effort of work. It is suggested that opportunities for social interaction could have been maintained by a different job redesign. The increased effort of work was hypothesized to relate to the presence of multiple motives for change among the management team. The need is stressed to conceptualize job enlargement as a phenomenon involving multiple variables and outcomes, and as an interactive social process of implementation.

A new theory of organizational change and success has recently been proposed, organizational portfolio theory (Donaldson, 1999). One purpose of this theory is to provide a fresh perspective on the determinants and consequences of board composition. After outlining organizational portfolio theory, this paper suggests some implications of the new theory for understanding the dynamic relationship between board composition and firm performance.