Worker Attachment and Workplace Authority

Abstract

This paper develops a sociological approach to worker attachment that differs markedly from the capital value model of labor economics and the job satisfaction/organizational committment approach of organizational psychology. Given that the worker's subordination is a key structural feature of the employment relation, the paper argues that the experience of subordination, as shaped by institutionalized normative codes governing the organization of domination, ought to be a central feature of models of attachment. Drawing on Weber's theory of authority, the paper holds that attachment is partly the outcome of a process whereby workers grade employer governance practices by reference to legitimating beliefs that prescribe proper modes of domination. Focusing on the American case, it is argued that this process of legitimation and attachment is governed largely by a belief in legality. A qualitative review of historical evidence suggests that, controlling for the economic rewards of work, the relationship between forms of governance and attachment over the last hundred years may be understood by reference to workers' belief in legality. The findings of an exploratory analysis of data from a firm and a national sample of workers lends additional support to the approach. The evidence weighs in favor of an approach that links normative principles of domination to worker attachment.