MICHAEL DEMPSEY - Cranfield University

in analysing not for profit organisations. In particular, it has enabled the
activities of trade union managers to be related to culture and to values
– to ‘meanings’ and ‘norms’ – and thus to be explained and understood
in their context.
Management as a problematic concept
Ouroussof (1993) suggested that management was a problematic
concept within the unions that made up UNISON. She said that the
word manager was (1993B:13) ‘synonymous with indifference to
people with less institutional power than themselves’. Kelly and Heery
(1994) also identified a deal of hostility towards managers by trade
union ‘officials’.
Various trade union managers have suggested that management is
undervalued, that managers feel embarrassed to manage, that some
individual experiences have been centred on defending people rather
than holding them to account, that on occasion being a manager has
invited conflict and being a trade union ‘officer’ has involved, on
occasion, a great deal of autonomy. The study suggests that these
cultural or experiential circumstances can tend to inhibit the
undertaking of managerial roles, particularly those which might involve
taking judgmental stances.
The study links in this way the idea that management is problematic
with some actual or perceived consequences, and so develops the
original finding by looking at what it might mean in a context where
trade union managers are seeking to manage in such an environment.
The theory of polyarchy
This study offers support for what is known as the theory of polyarchy,
that unions consist of a variety of interest groups whose goals are
sometimes shared, sometimes in conflict, and who contend for power
and influence (Kelly and Heery 1994:15). Different writers have posited
different ‘cleavages’ in unions, many of which are outdated because,
for example, they do not take account of the existence of groups such
as women, black and Asian members, disabled members and gay and
lesbian members.
However, Banks (1974) identified the primary locus of competition as
being officers and lay activists. In that this study has identified a
category of union ‘officer’ described as a trade union manager, this
category needs to be understood as one of the groups within any
description of what the theory of polyarchy means in trade union terms.
Trade union governance
Cornforth (2002) reviewed a number of theories of governance as they
applied to public and non-profit organisations. Trade unions are nonprofit
organisations; Paton (1992) describes voluntary and non-profit
organisations as value-based organisations in the social economy and
the TUC is fond of describing them as the country’s largest voluntary
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