The Democratic Corporation: A Radical Prescription for Recreating Corporate America and Rediscovering Success

This sophisticated study describes how the modern firm interacts with society. Ackoff, chair of the Institute for Interactive Management and professor emeritus of the Wharton School, traces the evolving conception of organizations since the Renaissance, first as machines then as organisms and today as social systems; he argues for fundamental changes in the way work is designed and organized and in the way companies are managed. He espouses the stakeholder theory of the firm, in which employees, suppliers, customers, investors, creditors, debtors and government all play a role in helping a company to grow and develop. Ackoff maintains that corporations can be transformed to improve employees' quality of life. An epilogue critiques business schools as ``bastions of dynamic conservatism'' and suggests ways they can better train leaders for the competitive global business environment. Illustrations. (June)