Organizational social structure

Abstract

This chapter considers organizational structure as the concept that made the greatest impression on organization theory of all the concepts used to explain, understand, and appreciate organization and its successes and failures. It refers to two types of structure that organization theorists are particularly interested in: physical and social. It also mentions an organization's physical structure that covers the spatial–temporal relationships between its material elements. The chapter details the historical development of theorizing about organizational social structure, which began with Max Weber's theory of bureaucracy. This theory produced the classic concepts of hierarchy, division of labour, and formalization. Modernists have developed Weber's theory further into measurable dimensions. The theories of structural change, including those based on evolutionary models taken from the modernist perspective, are highlighted.