Cultural change through networks and civic engagement in organizations

Cultural Change Within an Organization

The concept of culture, adopted from the Anthropology field has many definitions depending upon the perspective is defined from. Shafritz and Ott (1992) write that there are many meanings applied to culture and "when the term 'culture' is paired with the term 'organization' resulting is a "conceptual and semantic confusion." p. 492 Networks within the organization are not of the future indeed, for networking within organizational structure is the reality of right now or as stated by Linpnack and Stamps (1994) and cited by Agranaoff (2006) "the age of the network" has arrived. In fact, stated is the fact that networks are even supplanting the traditional hierarchy and markets. (paraphrased: Powell, 1990 cited By Agranaoff, 2006) and public managers "are enmeshed in a series of collaborative horizontal and vertical networks (Agranaoff and McGuire, 2003) and finally it is stated by Agranaoff who cites O'Toole (1997) is the fact that in today's world public administration should treat networks as being a very serious entity to contend with.

I. Networks Defined

Networks are defined in the work of Agranaoff (2006) first by stating that the definition must fit the activity of: "...cooperation or mutual action without being so broad that it encompasses every human connection." The issues raised in the work of Agranaoff are based on a study of the operations of 14 public management networks in the central states. inclusive of federal, state, regional and local government officials and nongovernmental managers -- that is, officers from nonprofits, for-profits, universities, and other organizations," (Ibid) therefore, it can be understood as defined by Agranaoff and McGuire (2003) that networks are: "...the process of facilitating and operating in multi-organizational arrangements to solve problems that cannot be solved, or solved easily, by single organizations" (2003, p.4)

III. Six Required Variables

The work of Cooper, Bryer, and Meek states that six variables are required in order to achieve a "well-functioning citizen-centered collaborative public management" and those variables are stated to be: (1) government trust in citizens; (2) citizen efficacy, (3) citizen trust in government; (4) citizen competence; (5) government responsiveness; and (6) government legitimacy.

IV. Five Approaches to Civic Engagement

Adversarial' approaches are one approach that is stated to be: "...common...to civic engagement" and one that "...employs processes and efforts that seek collective or individual forms of adversarial action to achieve desired community or societal ends." (Ibid) Second, are the 'Electoral' approaches inclusive of actions of voting, running for public office, volunteering for an issue or candidate, contributions, and participating in rallies in support or against specific candidates or issues. The third approach is the "Legislative and Administrative Information Exchange" approach. This approach is "associated with the legislative and administrative hearing" and is a tool seldom realized in effecting either engagement or education of citizenry. Furthermore, this method is limited due to the meeting site being too small allowing only a very small attendance. Harter (1997) is cited as having described the failure in this type of governance because of the limitation of the consensus allowed as a decision outside of the administrations own "self-interest and expertise" is to be feared. (Cooper, Bryer and Meek, 2006; paraphrased) Fourth is the 'Civil Society' approach stated to be one that allows citizens to interact with politicians or public administrators in the interest of affecting policy or politics."(Ibid) The Fifth Approach is stated of Cooper, Bryer and Meek (2006) to be that of the "Deliberative" approach which are those that seek to "create a universal 'us' Mansbridge 1983)." (Cooper, Bryer, and Meek, 2006) Stated to be an example of the 'Deliberative' approach is the model that is collaborative in nature. This is the model characterized by the "National Issues Forum (NIF) that effectively creates a "public dialogue on issues of importance to counter the sound-bite politics that dominate contemporary political discourse (Matthews 1999)" (Ibid) Positives outcomes have been stated in terms of "citizen efficacy and self-actualization, enhanced citizen knowledge, skills, and competency. NIF used as a pedagogical tool has been found to: (1)(enhance student knowledge about citizenship; (2) develop new civic skills; assist in the adoption of new attitudes consistent with ideals for active citizenship; students found to be more competent and open-minded in dealing with a policy issue than those not participating in NIF classrooms. (Doble and Peng, 1999) (Cooper, Bryer and Meek, 2006 paraphrased) Cooper, Bryer and Meek (2006) state that there are "five dimensions of civic engagement" which are those as follows: (1) Who is Involved? (2)Who initiatives civic engagement? (3) Why are citizens involved? (4) How are citizens involved? And (5) Where does the engagement take place?

V. Ten Lessons Learned from a Large Study of Public Networks

Agranaoff states that ten lessons derived from a large study of public networks and furthermore that the lessons were derived as well from: "...empirically...grounded-theory methodology (Strauss and Corbin 1988)" (2006) The ten lessons are stated to be:

1) "The network is not the only vehicle of collaborative management;

2) Managers continue to do the build of their work within the hierarchy;

3) Network involvement brings several advantages that keep busy administrators involved;

4) Networks are different from organizations but not completely different;

5) Not all networks make the types of policy and program adjustments ascribed to them in the literature;

6) Collaborative decisions are the products of a particular type of mutual learning and adjustment;

7) The most distinctive collaborative activity of all the networks provided to be their work in public sector knowledge management;

8) Despite the cooperative spirit and aura of accommodation in collaborative efforts, networks are not without conflicts and power issues;

9) Net works have their collaborative costs as well as their benefits; and 10) Networks alter the boundaries of the state only in the most marginal ways; they do not appear to be replacing public bureaucracies in any way." (Agranaoff, 2006)

Summary and Conclusion

From the literature reviewed in this study, the researcher gains knowledge inclusive of the fact that an organization is effectively defined by the multi-layered networking that exists within the organization. Furthermore, in order to understand how cultural change takes place within the organization one must first understand the complex series of networks that exist within the organization. Furthermore, the cultural change initiative in an organization must take into consideration the various ways that societal culture affects and impact the culture of an organization. Finally, the literature reviewed in this study provides knowledge and emphasis of the role that 'civic engagement' plays in defining and shaping the organizational culture specifically in terms of public administration and government organizational culture.