Civil Society and the Professions in Eastern Europe: Social Change and Organizational Innovation in Poland PDF
Preview Civil Society and the Professions in Eastern Europe: Social Change and Organizational Innovation in Poland
Civil Society and the Professions in Eastern Europe Social Change and Organizational Innovation in Poland NONPROFIT AND CIVIL SOCIETY STUDIES An International Multidisciplinary Series Series Editor: Helmut K. Anheier London School of Economics and Political Science London, United Kingdom PRIVATE FUNDS, PUBLIC PURPOSE Philanthropic Foundations in International Perspective Edited by Helmut K. Anheier and Stefan Toepler CIVIL SOCIETY AND THE PROFESSIONS IN EASTERN EUROPE Social Change and Organizational Innovation in Poland S. Wojciech Sokolowski AContinuationOrderPlanisavailable for thisseries. Acontinuation orderwill bring deliveryof each new volume immediately upon publication. Volumes are billed only upon actual shipment. For further information please contact the publisher. Civil Society and the Professions in Eastern Europe Social Change and Organizational Innovation in Poland S. WOJCIECH SOKOLOWSKI Johns Hopkins University Baltimore,Maryland KLUWERACADEMIC PUBLISHERS NEW YORK, BOSTON,DORDRECHT, LONDON, MOSCOW eBook ISBN: 0-306-47177-9 Print ISBN: 0-306-46250-8 ©2002 Kluwer Academic Publishers New York, Boston, Dordrecht, London, Moscow All rights reserved No part of this eBook may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, recording, or otherwise, without written consent from the Publisher Created in the United States of America Visit Kluwer Online at: http://www.kluweronline.com and Kluwer's eBookstore at: http://www.ebooks.kluweronline.com To my parents Hegelremarks somewhere thatall facts andpersonages ofgreatimportancein world history occur, as itwere,twice.Heforgot to add: the firsttime as tragedy, the second as farce....Men make their own history, but they do not make it just astheyplease;theydonotmakeitundercircumstanceschosenbythemselves, but under circumstances directly encountered,givenandtransmitted fromthe past. The tradition of all the dead generations weighs like a nightmare on the brain of the living. And just when they seem engaged in revolutionizing themselves and things, in creatingsomething that has never existed,precisely in suchperiods ofrevolutionary crisis theyanxiously conjureup the spirits of the past totheirserviceandborrowfromthem names, battle cries andcostumes in order to present the new scene of world history in this time-honoured disguise and this borrowed language.... Thus the awakening of the dead in those revolutions served the purpose of glorifying the new struggles, not parodying the old;of magnifying the given task inimagination, not of fleeing from its solutioninreality;offindingoncemore the spiritofrevolution,notof making its ghost walk about again. KarlMarx, The EighteenthBrurnaireof LouisBonaparte, NewYork: International Publishers, [1852] 1987,pp. 15–17. Preface Thisresearch project owes its inspiration to the desideratumof therenowned FrenchsociologistAlainTouraine(1988)to “returnto theactor”insociologi- calanalyses.It therefore addsa new dimension to the sociologyof voluntary organizations:anempirical investigation intothemotivesofpeoplewhoestab- lish this typeoforganization.Whilecollectiveinterestsofvariousstakeholders innonprofitservices have been examinedbymajor theoriesofnonprofitorga- nizations, the interests of the social actors most directly involved in the cre- ation ofthe entitiesin question—professional serviceproviders—received less attention. Organizationsdonotemergeex nihilo, bythe power oftheinvisiblehand. It is real people who create them. Moreover, different people create and use different types of organizations forvariousreasons. Uncovering thosespecific reasons can offerimportantinsights that add to ourunderstanding of the ori- ginsofformal organizations. Therecent proliferation oforganizational forms (called “voluntary,” “non- profit,”ornongovernmental’’inEnglish)is a worldwidephenomenon(Salamon andAnheier, 1994). However, EasternEuropeoffersauniqueopportunityfor studying this phenomenon. The social–political reform which swept that re- gion upon the end of nearly fiftyyears of Sovietdomination spurred the cre- ationofasignificantnumberof organizationsunderasimilarsetofconditions. Moreover, the circumstances of that creation defy the conventional wisdom enshrined inmajor economictheories ofnonprofit organizations. Central and Eastern Europe occupy a rather peculiar place in cognitive cartography (conventional representations that mix chunks of geographical spacewithculturalvaluesandstereotypes).Until the beginning of thetwenti- ethcentury,itwastheplace that,in thewordsofthe French playwrightAlfred Jarry,epitomized “nowhere,”ametaphor foruncivilized quagmire ofconflict- inginterestsandmessypolitics that givebirthtosuchcliches as “balkanization” or“Polnische wirtschaft,”1and“Russianbanks.”2 ix x PREFACE Afterthe Russian Revolution of 1917andafter the Sovietdomination of the region thatfollowedWorldWar II, Central and Eastern Europe became a placeendowedwithtwocontradictorymeanings: forsomeitwasa“promised land”ofnewsocialorderthatwastodeliverhumankindfrompoverty,inequal- ity, and exploitation;forothers it epitomizedthe totalitarianbastionofoppres- sionandthegraveyardofhumanfreedom.ThiscognitivecartographyofEast- ernEuropesetthestageforendlessnarratives,reiteratedinpopularmediaand scholarlywork, of amortalstrugglebetween the menacingjuggernaut of the bureaucratic stateandthepopular willtopursue libertyandhappiness. Thisbookattemptstomovebeyond suchimagery of thecosmicstruggle betweenGoodandEvilthatdominatedaccountsofthesocial–politicalchanges takingplaceinCentralandEasternEuropeupon thedemiseof theSovietem- pire.Thebookgrewoutofmyfrustrationwiththeconventionalparadigmthat viewsCentralandEasternEuropeasasui generis entity,aseparateislandthat has little in common with the rest of the world and thus can be understood onlyinitsown terms. Instead of treatingEastern European development asa unique experience that defies the rules of rational organization of economy andsociety,Iviewitasanessentiallyrationalresponseofsocialactorstotheir specificsocial–politicalenvironment.Thisapproachhastheobviousbenefitof acomparativestudy:Itallowsobservationsof asimilarthemeunder different conditionsinorder todiscover causalrelationships amongsocialfacts. This book takes a case study approach as it is understood in Weberian sociology,where “case”represents a geographically and historically specific social phenomenon that requires an explanation (Ragin and Becker, 1992). The specific case under investigation is the emergence ofservice-providing organizations established by health and human service professionals in Po- land. This phenomenon is important mainly because of itsstrategicposition defined by the juncture of professional and political interests of the people involved intheprocess,andthehistorical circumstancesthatpushed them to seeknovel institutionalvenues to pursue those interests. The casestudy ap- proachoffersanopportunitytoinvestigateconnectionsbetweenorganizational forms,socialorganizationsofproduction,andoccupationalinterestsofprofes- sionalserviceproducers. Toexplaintheseconnections,Iproposeatheoreticalmodel,whichIcall organizationalusesandgratifications,thatpositsformalorganizationsandpoli- ciesserveas tools and resources that different individuals use to accomplish theirinterestsandgoals.Thismodelcanexplainnotonlythebehaviorofvari- ousgroupsofsocialactorsunder thecentralplanningregimebut alsothepe- culiarusesofWesterninstitutionalresources transferredenmasseintheafter- mathof the 1989reform (Wedel, 1998). PREFACE xi Theorganizationalusesandgratificationsmodelholdsthatnonprofit,non- governmentalorganizations have their origins rootedinthe interests ofservice providers. In the specificcase of human service professionals, these interests involve marketing their services to the public and establishing or protecting their occupational status inthefaceofnumerouschallengesrangingfrompub- licdistrust to indifferenceorresistance of public authorities, and to competi- tion fromother kinds of service providers. Therefore, they have vested inter- ests in building public trust in their service, and they deflect or neutralize potential or actual challengesto that trust.This book willshowhow the non- profit organizational form was used by these professionals to overcomeanin- formationasymmetryproblem, build public trust, and influence public policy. The analysis offered in this book will thus allow us to formulate an em- piricallygrounded theory oftheoriginsofnonprofit, nongovernmental organi- zations,as well as add to the understandingofEasternEuropean development. Ithighlights the relationship between major social forcesinthat development, professionalandoccupational groups, different types ofinstitutionalresources, and different types of social–political constraints under which they operate. Themodel can bea theoreticalguidance in further analysisofsocial, political, andeconomic changes intheneighboringEasternEuropean countries, aswell asotherregions of the world. While the books orientation is primarily aimed at theory building, the empirical material also has more practical implications.For one part, it con- tributes to abetter understandingof the keyrole of professionals andhuman serviceorganizationsinsocialpolicy.Foranotherpart,ithelpsustosystemati- callyexplore cross-cultural and normative differences in perceptions of non- profit organizations and their social functions. In turn, this knowledge can fosteramore meaningful dialogue andunderstandingbetween researchers study- ingthe nonprofit sector andthe practitioners in thefield. Thisproject would nothave been possible withoutthe generous support and assistance ofmany people. I would like to thank my graduate advisor at Rutgers University andfriend, Helmut K.Anheier,forhis comments, sugges- tions,andassistancesincetheinception ofthis project. Hisgrantonbehalf of the editorialboardofVOLUNTAS (InternationalJournal ofVoluntary andNon- profit Organizations) made thejourneyacross the ocean and the collection of thequalitative data possible. Iwouldalso like tothankmy Polishfriends,especiallytheResearchTeam KLON andJakubWygnanski andFilipRosciszewskiinparticular, formaking the electronic data file KLON available for this research, and for their assis- tance in selecting and contacting the organizations for in-depth interviews. Ewa Les of Warsaw University provided useful comments, suggestions, and xii PREFACE invaluable assistance in data gathering. Krzysztof Frysztacki of the Jagiellonian University kindly provided organizational resources, which made it possible to include Krakow-based organizations in the qualitative phase of this project. No scholarly work is created in an intellectual vacuum. It needs a nurtur- ing and challenging intellectual atmosphere to stimulate the investigator to examine different ideas, look at facts from different angles, and provide expla- nations that will sustain critical examination. I was lucky to find such an envi- ronment at the graduate program in sociology at Rutgers University. I am par- ticularly indebted to Eviatar Zerubavel for his inspiration to examine the role of cognitive factors in the structuring of everyday life, and to Lee “Chip” Clarke for his lessons in critical approach to organizational behavior. This book also benefited from the knowledge of Jozsef Borocz and Joanna Regulska who re- viewed and critiqued an early version of this manuscript. Last but not least, I am especially grateful to the people I interviewed who served as sources for this project—Anna Banas, M.D., Wojciech Biernat, Artur Dobrowolski, Father Eugeniusz Dutkiewicz, Krystyna Duto, Jan Dziedzic, Ryszard Jasniewicz, Barbara Klopocka, Stanislaw Kowalski, Elzbieta Luczywek, M.D., Tomasz Majewski, Zygmunt Mieroslawski, Krystyna Mika, M.D., Krystyna Roginska, Anna Struminska, Tomasz Tomasik, M.D., Andrzej Urmanski, Aleksandra Wlodarczyk, and Grzegorz Zalewski—for sharing their knowledge about their own organizations, as well as the health and social service sector in Poland. As with any investigative project, the final task of interpreting empirical data requires a great deal of intuition and judgment calls in addition to system- atic analysis. The investigator must decipher the oft ambiguous or incomplete bits of information and then decide which pieces are relevant and which are not, which provide useful links and which are dead ends. The responsibility for those judgment calls and any errors of fact or interpretation inevitably falls on the investigator, and I accept that responsibility gladly. NOTES 1 “Polish economy”: a derogatory term denoting disorderly conduct of business affairs. 2 Cf. a derisive comment that the Russian banks operate on a principle that translates into English as “your deposits won’t be wasted with us, but you won’t get them back either.”
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