Abstract
After having located the corporation as a work, this chapter serves to clearly establish what kind of work the corporation is. This is accomplished along the lines of Heidegger’s thinking on technology. To do this it is critical to clearly work out Heidegger’s understanding of technology, not in the superficial sense of technology as devices and processes, but in terms of his understanding of the very nature of technology, which designates a background of understanding within which everything is revealed in instrumental terms. This exposes the corporation as a work that is both unoriginal and ‘blocking off’ the understanding of its own very nature. Building on these insights about the very nature of the corporation, it becomes possible to get to an understanding of the very nature of dealing with the entity ‘corporation’, the activity of ‘corporate management’. The task of corporate management is usually understood as the task of shaping, developing, changing and governing the corporation. This gives little insight into the nature of this task. Given the unoriginality of the corporation and the total denial by the corporation of its nature as a work, this chapter explains corporate management as fundamentally inappropriate for dealing with the corporation as a work and with many other entities in an appropriate way with devastating ethical consequences.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Notes
- 1.
There is not a direct translation for the English word ‘corporation’ in German. The two words that are closest to the word ‘corporation’ as used by Heidegger are ‘Organisation’ and ‘Betrieb’. ‘Betrieb’ is a word that could be translated as ‘hustle’, ‘busyness’, ‘business’, ‘firm’, ‘company’ or ‘corporation’. The word ‘organisation’ is the same in English as in German, except for the fact that nouns in German are spelt with a capital first letter. In Heidegger’s texts, the word ‘Betrieb’, similarly to ‘industry’ and ‘organisation’, appears in connection with notions of technology and the critique of the Cartesian tradition and science (SZ: 178/BT: 222).
- 2.
In his personal life, though, Heidegger preferred to keep things simple, basic and frugal and he steered clear of technological gadgets and devices as much as possible (Safranski, 1994).
- 3.
The word realise [Wirken] is here understood as making something happen, as in saying ‘I realised one of the dreams of my youth’. In a similar fashion, ‘the real’ [das Wirkliche] refers to that which makes something happen.
- 4.
The word ‘Ge-stell ’ is usually translated an en-framing. ‘Ge-stell’ usually means ‘something put together’, as in the frame of a bed, a ‘rack’, although Heidegger seems to choose it primarily for the verb ‘stellen’, which means ‘to put, to place’. In many cases, the German words ‘stellen’ [put, bring to stand] or ‘stehen’ [stand] are used where the English word ‘sit’ would be appropriate. An example is that, in German, an asset [Bestand ] would ‘stand’ [stehen] on the balance sheet, while in English an asset would sit on the balance sheet. The word asset carries with it a derivation of ‘sitting’, while the German translation of asset as ‘Bestand’ carries with it a derivation of ‘stehen’ [stand]. In many translations of Heidegger’s texts, the word ‘Bestand’ is translated as ‘standing reserve’. This misses the notion that ‘Be-stand’, which suggests that something stands, can in English be understood as something that ‘sits’. Thus, rather than translating ‘Bestand’ as ‘standing-reserve’, the literal translation of ‘Bestand’ as ‘asset’ seems to be more appropriate. In the context of technology, where everything is an asset, the more courageous translation of ‘Ge-stell’ is adopted. ‘Ge-stell’ is translated as ‘em-bankment ’, which carries the connotation that what it does is ‘banking’ and ‘being sat’, rather than ‘standing up’ as ‘Ge-stell’ would suggest. An embankment of a river is also built to control the river and set it up (not ‘standing up’) for use, which is the connotation that is intended here.
- 5.
In the sense of ‘stored’.
- 6.
As opposed to ‘true’.
- 7.
The word ‘Betrieb’ can also be translated as ‘corporation’.
- 8.
All other metaphors have been dealt with in Chapter 2.
References
Alchian, A.A., and H. Demsetz. 1972. Production, information costs, and economic organization. American Economic Review 62: 777–795.
Donnelly, J.H., and J.L. Gibson. 1990. Fundamentals in management. Boston, MA: BPI Irwin.
Hellrigel, D., and J.W. Slocum. 1989. Management. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley.
Holt, D.H. 1987. Management: Principles and practices. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.
Introna, L. 1997. Management, information and power. London: Macmillan.
Kreitner, R. 1989. Management. Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin.
Mintzberg, H., B. Ahlstrand, and J. Lampel. 1998. Strategy safari. Hertfordshire: Prentice-Hall.
Morgan, G. 1997. Images of organization. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
Polt, R. 1999. Heidegger: An introduction. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.
Pugh, D.S., and D.J. Hickson. 1996. Writers on organizations, fifth edition. London: Penguin Books.
Putterman, L., and R.S. Kroszner (eds.) 1997. The economic nature of the firm: A reader. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Robbins, S.P. 1988. Management: Concepts and applications. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.
Safranski, R. 1994. Ein Meister aus Deutschland. München: Carl Hanser Verlag.
Scoville, J.G. 2001. The Taylorization of Vladimir Ilich Lenin. Industrial Relations: A Journal of Economy and Society October 40(4): 620–626.
Senge, P. 1990. The fifth discipline. New York, NY: Doubleday.
Spinosa, C., F. Flores, and H.L. Dreyfus. 1997. Disclosing new worlds: Entrepreneurship, democratic action, and the cultivation of solidarity. Cambridge: MIT Press.
Williamson, O.E. 1985. The economic institutions of capitalism: Firms, markets, and relational contracting. New York, NY: The Free Press.
Winograd, T., and F. Flores. 1986. Understanding computers and cognition. Norwood, NJ: Ablex Corporation.
Dreyfus, H.L. 1993. Heidegger on the connection between nihilism, art, technology and politics. In ed. C.B. Guignon, 289–316.
Lovitt, W. 1977. Introduction. In QCT, xiii–xxxix.
Coase, R.H. 1937. The nature of the firm. Economica 4: 386–405. Reprinted in American economic association, readings in price theory. Chicago, IL: Irwin 1952: 331–351; Also reprinted in Williamson & Winter (1991: 18–33).
Porter, M.E. 1980. Competitive strategy: Techniques for analysing industries and competitors. New York, NY: Free Press.
Porter, M.E. 1985. Competitive advantage: Creating and sustaining superior performance. New York, NY: Free Press.
Drucker, P. 1993. Post-capitalist society. New York, NY: Harper Business.
Taylor, F.W. 1911. Principles of scientific management. New York, NY: Harper & Row.
The Economist. 2001. The future of the company, 76–78. London: The Economist Newspaper Limited. December 22nd 2001.
Friedman, M. 1970. The social responsibility of business is to increase its profits. New York, NY: The New York Times Magazine, September 13th 1970 [http://www.umich.edu/~thecore/doc/Friedman]. Accessed 2 Apr 2011.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2011 Springer Science+Business Media B.V.
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Heil, D. (2011). The Corporation as Technological Work and the Nature of Management. In: Ontological Fundamentals for Ethical Management. Issues in Business Ethics, vol 35. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-1875-3_3
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-1875-3_3
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht
Print ISBN: 978-94-007-1874-6
Online ISBN: 978-94-007-1875-3
eBook Packages: Humanities, Social Sciences and LawPhilosophy and Religion (R0)