Abstract

Chester Barnard’s organisation theory is widely acknowledged to be grounded on a systems-theoretic approach which has however remained largely inchoate. The present paper ventures a hypothetical reconstruction of this approach by identifying the salient parallels between Barnard’s thought and Niklas Luhmann’s theory of social systems as well as Alfred North Whitehead’s philosophy of organism. While these parallels are by no means perfect, Barnard seems to have anticipated the Luhmannian view of organisations as complexity-reducing systems navigating a precarious outer environment. Drawing on Whitehead, Barnard argued that organisations may succeed with this task insofar as they operate as organismic wholes.

摘要

Chester Barnard 的组织理论被广泛认为是建立在系统理论方法的基础上的，但该方法在很大程度上仍处于起步阶段。本文通过确定巴纳德的思想与尼克拉斯·卢曼的社会系统理论以及阿尔弗雷德·诺斯·怀特黑德的有机体哲学之间的显着相似之处，对这种方法进行了假设性的重建。虽然这些相似之处绝不是完美的，但巴纳德似乎已经预料到了卢曼的观点，即组织是在不稳定的外部环境中航行的降低复杂性的系统。巴纳德引用怀特海德的观点认为，只要组织作为有机整体运作，组织就可能成功完成这项任务。