Monoculture: How One Story is Changing Everything (12 page)

1. What Is a Monoculture?

1. Isaiah Berlin,
The Roots of Romanticism: The A.W. Mellon Lectures in the Fine Arts
. Edited by Henry Hardy (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1999).

Additional Sources

The epigraph is from Robert Fulford’s
The Triumph of Narrative:
(New York: Broadway Books, 2000).

2. The One Story

1. June Singer’s comments on personal mythologies are found in the foreword of David Feinstein and Stanley Krippner’s
The Mythic Path
(New York: Putnam Books, 1997).

2. See, for example, Tibor Scitovsky,
The Joyless Economy
(New York: Oxford University Press, 1992).

3. Alan Wolfe,
Whose Keeper? Social Science and Moral Obligation
(Berkeley: University of California Press, 1989).

4. Tibor Scitovsky,
The Joyless Economy
(New York: Oxford University Press, 1992).

5. On being irrational and making wrong decisions systematically, see, for example, Dan Ariely,
Predictably Irrational
(New York: HarperCollins, 2008).

6. See Stephen Marglin,
The Dismal Science: How Thinking Like An Economist Undermines Community
(Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2008) for more on behavior as an expression of your preferences.

7. Russell Keat,
Cultural Goods and the Limits of the Market
(London: MacMillan Press, 2000).

8. Entrepreneurs are described, for example, in J. Gregory Dees, Jed Emerson and Peter Economy’s
Enterprising Nonprofits: A Toolkit for Social Entrepreneurs
(New York: Wiley, 2001).

9. For more on the desire for satisfaction, see Tibor Scitovsky,
The Joyless Economy
(New York: Oxford University Press, 1992).

10. In a world made of markets, even activity that happens outside of markets is described in terms of markets. Nonmarket economics, for example, which examines work that is hard to price because it isn’t paid for directly, like cooking and cleaning that happens in the home, defines itself using the market as a reference point: it’s not-the-market.

11. As John Kenneth Galbraith said, “To the charge of misuse of power there is the simple, all-embracing answer: your quarrel is with the market. The paradox of power in the classical tradition is, once again, that while all agree that power exists in fact, it does not exist in principle.” From his book,
Economics in Perspective: A Critical History
(Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1987).

12. Market boundaries are described by Russell Keat in
Cultural Goods and the Limits of the Market
(London: MacMillan Press, 2000).

13. For more on choice, see Alan Wolfe’s
Whose Keeper? Social Science and Moral Obligation
(Berkeley: University of California Press, 1989).

Additional Sources

The epigraph is from Georg Hegel’s
Phenomenology of Spirit
(Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1977).

3. Your Work

1. Peter Cappelli describes the workplace of “the old days” in
The New Deal at Work: Managing the Market-Driven Workforce
(Massachusetts: Harvard Business School Press, 1999). So does Arne L. Kalleberg in “Nonstandard Employment Relations: Part-time, Temporary and Contract Work,”
Annual Review of Sociology
26 (2000): 341-365.

2. Charles Perrow highlights how many of us are working for organizations in
Organizing America: Wealth, Power, and the Origins of Corporate Capitalism
(Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2002).

3. Peter Cappelli,
The New Deal at Work: Managing the Market-Driven Workforce
(Massachusetts: Harvard Business School Press, 1999).

4. The pressure organizations are under to compete is described by Brian Becker and Barry Gerhart in “The Impact of Human Resource Management on Organizational Performance: Progress and Prospects,”
Academy of Management Journal
39 (1996): 779-801.

5. Daniel H. Pink describes the rosy world of the free agent in “Free Agent Nation,” Fast Company 12 (December 1997).

6. Contingent work is being discussed by a number of researchers, including Anne E. Polivka and Thomas Nardone, “On the definition of ‘contingent work’,”
Monthly Labor Review
112 (1989): 9-16; Arne L. Kalleberg, “Nonstandard Employment Relations: Part-time, Temporary and Contract Work,”
Annual Review of Sociology
26 (2000): 341-365; Catherine E. Connelly and Daniel G. Gallagher, “Emerging Trends in Contingent Work Research,”
Journal of Management
30 (2004): 959-983; Flora Stormer, “The Logic of Contingent Work and Overwork,”
Relations Industrielles/Industrial Relations
63 (2008): 343-362; Arne L. Kalleberg, “Nonstandard Employment Relations: Part-time, Temporary and Contract Work,”
Annual Review of Sociology
26 (2000): 341-365.

7. Anthony Winson and Belinda Leach describe the social effect of contingent work on people’s lives in
Contingent Work, Disrupted Lives
(Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2002), emphasis in original.

8. Peter F. Drucker says business exists to make money compared to other kinds of organizations in
The Practice of Management
(New York: HarperBusiness, 1954).

9. Richard De George,
Business Ethics: Fourth Edition
(New Jersey: Prentice Hall, 1995).

10. For example, in 2007, the conference theme for the Academy of Management (the main professional association for almost 18,000 scholars of management and organizations around the world) was “Doing Well by Doing Good.”

11. Flora Stormer, “Making the Shift: Moving From ‘Ethics Pays’ to an Inter-Systems Model of Business,”
Journal of Business Ethics
44 (2003): 279-289.

12. David Drobis, “Public Relations: Priorities in the Real Economy,”
Vital Speeches of the Day
67 (October 15, 2000: 15-18).

13. Gareth M. Green and Frank Baker,
Work, Health and Productivity
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991).

14. Paul Osterman, ‘Work/Family Programs and the Employment Relationship,”
Administrative Science Quarterly
40 (1995): 681-700.

15. Garry A. Gelade and Mark Ivery, “The Impact of Human Resource Management and Work Climate on Organizational Performance,” Personnel Psychology 56 (2003): 383-405; Dee W. Edington, “Emerging Research: A View From One Research Center,”
American Journal of Health Promotion
15 (2001): 341-349.

16. For a fascinating overview of how whistleblowing turns out for whistleblowers, see C. Fred Alford’s, “Whistle-blowers,”
American Behavioral Scientist
, 43 (1999): 264-277.

17. The quote, “We hope, through this report and by our future actions, to show that the basic interests of business and society are entirely compatible — that there does not have to be a choice between profits and principles” is found in
The Shell Report 1998
, p. 5, cited in Peter Kok, Ton van der Wiele, Richard McKenna, and Alan A. Brown’s “A Corporate Social Responsibility Audit within a Quality Management Framework,”
Journal of Business Ethics
31 (2001: 285-297).

18. Peter Pruzan describes his experience of working with executives and their personal and corporate values in “The Question of Organizational Consciousness: Can Organizations Have Values, Virtues and Visions?”
Journal of Business Ethics
29 (2001: 271-284).

19. Worker satisfaction, overwork, and burnout are discussed, for example, in Madeleine Bunting’s
Willing Slaves: How the Overwork Culture is Ruling Our Lives
(Toronto: HarperCollins, 2004); Richard Brisbois’
How Canada Stacks Up: The Quality of Work — An International Perspective
, Canadian Policy Research Networks, December 19, 2003; and in the Bureau of Labor Statistics,
Issues in Labor Statistics: Twenty-First Century Moonlighters,
U.S. Department of Labor, September 2002.

20. “’Overwork’ kills Toyota employee,”
BBC News
, July 10, 2008.

21. Johann Hari, “Johann Hari: And now for some good news,”
The Independent
, August 6, 2010.

22. Kelley Holland, “Working Long Hours, and Paying a Price,”
The New York Times
, July 27, 2008.

23. Deborah L. Rhode,
In the Interests of Justice: Reforming the Legal Profession
(New York: Oxford University Press, 2000); John R. Sapp,
Making Partner: A Guide for Law Firm Associates, Third Edition
(U.S.: American Bar Association Law Practice Management Section, 2006).

24. Deborah L. Rhode,
In the Interests of Justice: Reforming the Legal Profession
(New York: Oxford University Press, 2000).

25. John R. Sapp,
Making Partner: A Guide for Law Firm Associates, Third Edition
(U.S.: American Bar Association Law Practice Management Section, 2006).

26. Robert Devlin describes his 18-hour days in John Bowe, Marisa Bowe, and Sabin Streeter’s
Gig: Americans Talk About Their Jobs at the Turn of the Millennium
(New York: Crown, 2000).

27. For an excellent overview of work/life conflict, see Linda Duxbury and Chris Higgins’
Work-Life Balance in the New Millennium
, Canadian Policy Research Networks, October 23, 2001; and Lotte Bailyn, Robert Drago, and Thomas A. Kochan’s
Integrating Work and Family Life: A Holistic Approach
, Sloan Work-Family Policy Network, September 14, 2001.

Additional Sources

The first epigraph from the IBM executive is from Peter F. Drucker’s
The Practice of Management
(New York: HarperBusiness, 1954).

The second epigraph is from Andrew Grove’s
High Output Management
(New York: Vintage, 1995).

4. Your Relationships With Others and the Natural World

1. Alan Wolfe talks about what it means to belong to a group in
Whose Keeper? Social Science and Moral Obligation
(Berkeley: University of California Press, 1989).

2. For example, Trudie Knijn, “Marketization and the Struggling Logics of (Home) Care in the Netherlands.” In
Care Work: Gender, Class, and the Welfare State
. Edited by Madonna Harrington Meyer (New York: Routledge, 2000), pp. 232-248.

3. Ana Maria Peredo notes that kin relationships were an obstacle to corporate development in “Nothing thicker than blood? Commentary on ‘Help one another, use one another: Toward an anthropology of family business,’
Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice
27 (2003): 397-400; Alan Wolfe,
Whose Keeper? Social Science and Moral Obligation
(Berkeley: University of California Press, 1989).

4. Claudia Goldin describes how women surged into the workforce in
Understanding the Gender Gap: An Economic History of American Women
(New York: Oxford University Press, 1990); so does the U.S. Bureau of the Census,
Statistical Abstract of the U.S.,
Washington, D.C., 2002.

5. Community goals and the dignity of all human beings are traditional focal points in the field of social work. F.G. Reamer,
Ethical Standards in Social Work: A Critical Review of the NASW Code of Ethics
(Washington: NASW Press, 1983), cited in Bob Lonne, Catherine McDonald, Tricia Fox, “Ethical Practice in the Contemporary Human Services,”
Journal of Social Work
4 (2004): 345-367.

6. Alan Wolfe outlines the moral stature of markets and families in
Whose Keeper? Social Science and Moral Obligation
(Berkeley: University of California Press, 1989).

7. Angelika Krebs does a comprehensive job of outlining our justifications for valuing nature in
Ethics of Nature
(Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 1999).

8. Zygmunt Bauman’s description of reality television appears in
Society Under Siege
(Cambridge, UK: Polity Press, 2002).

9. Sheila Riddell and Alastair Wilson explore how people with learning difficulties are “deemed to be of only marginal economic value” in “Captured Customers: People with Learning Difficulties in the Social Market,”
British Educational Research Journal
25 (1999): 445-461.

10. Claudia Goldin,
Understanding the Gender Gap: An Economic History of American Women
(New York: Oxford University Press, 1990); U.S. Bureau of the Census,
Statistical Abstract of the U.S.
, Washington, D.C., 2002.

11. Arlie Russell Hochschild,
The Time Bind: When Work Becomes Home and Home Becomes Work
(New York: Metropolitan Books, 1997).

12. Suzanne M. Bianchi, John P. Robinson, Melissa A. Milkie,
Changing Rhythms in American Family Life
(New York: Russell Sage Foundation, 2007); Alan Wolfe,
Whose Keeper? Social Science and Moral Obligation
(Berkeley: University of California Press, 1989).

13. Pamela Paul discusses the reasons people give for having fewer children in “Childless by Choice,”
American Demographics
23 (2001): 44-50; Arlie Russell Hochschild describes “time famine” in
The Time Bind: When Work Becomes Home and Home Becomes Work
(New York: Metropolitan Books, 1997).

14. Sylvia Ann Hewlett’s discussion of how professional life impacts family is found in “Executive Women and the Myth of Having It All,”
Harvard Business Review
80 (2002).

15. Non-market economist Nancy Folbre points out the link between having a family and economic vulnerability in
The Invisible Heart: Economics and Family Values
(New York: New Press, 2001).

16. Charles Taylor,
The Malaise of Modernity
(Toronto: Anansi Press, 1991).

17. Stephen Marglin,
The Dismal Science: How Thinking Like An Economist Undermines Community
(Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2008).