Organization Development Commons^™

The Development Of A Grassroots Citizen Action Organization, Mary Runge

Dissertations and Theses

The primary purpose of this study is to develop a model community organizing plan for persons wishing to establish a grassroots citizen action organization. Existential in nature, this model will be geared toward easy and practical application, i.e. a "cookbook" approach to the process of organizing a citizen action organization. A secondary purpose of this study is to provide students and beginning community organizers with a basic theoretical and historical orientation by which to understand the field of community organization.

The Vertically-Oriented Organization : A Theoretical Perspective, Beth M. Kurren

Dissertations and Theses

This study will focus on a particular program (The Area Agency on Aging) which was developed in response to the problems of fragmentation among the service delivery system for the aging.

In so doing, two very important questions will be answered:

1. To what extent do the characteristics of the Area Agency on Aging resemble a vertically-oriented organization?

2. To what extent does the Area Agency on Aging gear its activities toward the coordination of services for the elderly?

The basic assumption is that because the Area Agency on Aging resembles another vertically- oriented organization, its main focus of attention …

Danish Day Care As A Social Institution, Albert Sessions Belais, Ellane L. Kibel

Dissertations and Theses

A study of the social and cultural aspects of day care in Denmark. The thesis hypothesizes that experiences in the development of Danish day care are relevant to the future development of day care in the United States.

Interest in Danish day care was stimulated by the reports of Drs. Marsden and Mary Wagner (1970) which found Danish day care provided an intimate and innovative standard of care for young children.

Twenty centers of widely varied types were visited in Denmark. Information was gathered largely through unstructured interviews with child care staff and non-participant observation. Special attention was paid to …

The Behavior Of Coalitions As Interorganizational Structures: An Exploratory Study Using A Grounded Theory Approach, Elaine Marie Rothrock

Dissertations and Theses

This study is one of four exploratory studies concerned with coalitions of organizations that are formed to plan and develop social welfare programs within the local community. Although each study was conducted independently, taken together their major purpose was to develop some insights and knowledge into the behavior of organizations and the ways in which they interact as they work together to develop community programs. They are, then, exploratory studies of inter-organizational behavior.

Each of the studies had a different focus. One study attempted to identify the present areas of agreement and disagreement regarding inter-organization behavior by systematically reviewing the …

Inter-Bureau Power Relations; A Sociological Analysis Of An Ideal Type Organizational Model, Gerald Wayne Potterf

Dissertations and Theses

The research problem of this thesis is an examination of inter-bureau power relations. A modification of Max Weber’s classical ideal type bureaucracy is the conceptual model to which sociological analysis is made. An empirical examination of the variance between the conceptual model and data collected in the field is analyzed in order to illustrate inter-bureau power relations. The analysis of the conceptual model is based upon three assertions. They are: (1) inter-bureau power relations are based upon coercion and not cooperation; (2) normative standards that are established by the administrators of the bureaucracy are differentially enforced; and (3) goals that …