Power, empowerment and organisational communication

Abstract

Power is an integral part of organisational life. Main schools of thought on the subject of powerin an organisational setting consider power to be either a resource held by individuals anddepartments, or an inherent feature of organisational structure and society. While it is relativelyeasy to identify surface manifestations of power, the deep structures of power are much moredifficult to analyse. Public relations literature focuses on power “held” by public relations practitionersand the power of public relations departments in their relations with other departments in anorganisation, as well as the imbalances of power between the organisations and their respectivepublics. In the context of the increasing complexity of the organisational environment, this articlesuggests the application of organisational cybernetics to public relations theory, and it considersthe role that organisational communication plays in releasing the productive power of employeesand in designing effective organisations through the introduction of recursive organisationalstructures.