Workplace Diversity
Issues & Perspectives
What Will It Take for the High Priests and Priestesses to Change Their Minds?
Clayton P. Alderfer
Theories about human behavior matter. In reference to happenings
involving people, who does not ask, "Why did these events occur?" "Will
certain (desired or feared) outcomes take place?" "What would it take to create
this particular condition?" or "What is the meaning of these happenings?"
No matter what the answers are to questions such as these, some mode of abstract thinking
lies behind them (Kaplan, 1964). All of us—not just social scientists, historians,
and journalists—have ways of being theorists about human behavior.
But as important as theories are, they are not always explicit;
sometimes they are tacit (Polanyi, 1958). Theories are tacit whenever theorists are
unaware that they bring a conceptual position when they understand, explain, predict, and
intervene. In fact, we all are probably at least partially unaware of the theoretical
constructs we use.
This chapter explores several aspects of the explicit and tacit
theories we use to deal with multiculturalism. The key issues include whether or not we
have an explicit conception of groups and, if so, what that conception is; how, if at all,
we think of that conception as applying to ourselves; when we use explicit and when we use
tacit theories; and what implications our conception of groups has for how we think and
act in relation to multiculturalism.
The analysis involves two potential pitfalls. First, we sometimes think
that whether we have a conception of groups in our theory is a function of the culture,
that is, the groups to which we belong. According to some theorists (for example,
Triandis, Kurowski, & Gelfand, 1994), the choice of "individualism" or
"collectivism" as a way to explain social phenomena is a function of our ethnic
or national culture—not of one’s theory. A group relations perspective, on the
other hand, argues that our choice of theory about groups—including how we understand
individualism and collectivism—is in part an expression of our relationship to our
own group memberships, including ethnic, racial, and national groups (Alderfer, 1987). The
Triandis et al. (1994) view implies that they believe, perhaps tacitly, that a person is
either an independent individual or a group member in good standing, but not both. This
view derives from their perhaps tacit assumption about possible relationships between
individuals and groups. That view does not include the possibility that groups (for
example, families, work groups, and racial groups) can be supportive of individuals, but
rather that groups inevitably call on individuals to give up crucial aspects of themselves
in order to be group members in good standing (Smith & Berg, 1987).
Second, the very existence of talk about multiculturalism suggests that
a major conceptual reorientation may be occurring. Either an accelerated struggle among
differing schools of thought is occurring, or a paradigm shift among social scientists is
about to take place (Kuhn, 1970). We observe writers referring to themselves and to others
with terms such as "Afrocentric" or "Eurocentric." These terms imply
an awareness of conceptual systems having been shaped by group forces present in regions
and cultures. Taken to its logical conclusion, this line of reasoning, perhaps tacitly,
implies that intellectual products and exchanges inevitably are shaped by the groups and
intergroup relationships of the scholars who participate. How else would we explain the
use of terms like "Afrocentric" and "Eurocentric" (whether they are
applied to our own or to others’ groups)? The alternative view is that there is a
single set of standards (the canon) against which all are to be judged. But the argument
for a single canon (as compared to multiple canons) is so obviously ethnocentric as to be
indefensible in the long run.
However, this interpretation of the behavior about multiculturalism is
the product of a known conceptual position. Only from a group relations viewpoint are the
explanations offered here inevitable (Alderfer, 1987; Rice, 1969; Smith & Berg, 1987;
Wells, 1980). Other conceptual perspectives offer different interpretations.
Background
The ideas contained in this chapter follow from perspectives on depth
psychology, both group and individual. To those theoretical bases, I bring three decades
of experience as an organizational consultant on race relations, leadership, and
organizational change. The consultation work has been particularly influential in my
developing an embedded intergroup relations perspective for understanding organizations
(Alderfer, 1987).
A key event in my professional development was participation during the
early 1970s in an interdisciplinary seminar on groups, that was based at the Connecticut
Mental Health Center and involved faculty from Yale University’s Department of
Psychiatry and School of Organization and Management. The person most responsible for
introducing me to the Tavistock group relations perspective was Edward B. Klein. He
encouraged me to read the works of Wilfred Bion (1961) and A. K. Rice (1969) and to learn
through direct experience about the Tavistock way of thinking about groups and
organizations.
From my association with the Tavistock culture, I have learned how
important our personal psychoanalysis can be. It matters who analyzed our analyst, along
what theoretical lines our analyst traces her or his development, and with which pioneer
of psychoanalytic thought those ideas originated. For this reason, I feel somewhat obliged
to reveal my background—in no small measure because it is Jungian, not Freudian, and
Freud’s concepts are at the roots of Tavistock theory. My experience includes work
with male and female Jungian analysts, at least one of whose origins go to Esther Harding,
a close associate of Jung himself.
Those familiar with analytic history know that Freud and Jung once were
close friends and colleagues, but not after 1913. As a result, there were times when it
was unsafe to be Jungian in a Freudian group—and perhaps vice versa—although
Jung claimed not to believe in groups. Even today, however, when those tensions are less
severe than they once were, as a Jungian of sorts, I feel obliged to reveal this
potentially traitorous aspect of my history when discussing group relations theory that
has an intellectual debt to Freud.
It sometimes has been observed that people choose professions that
allow them to work on their basic conflicts. In fact, Jung (1931) meant something like
that when he observed, "The serious problems in life, however, are never fully
solved. If ever they should appear to be so, it is a sure sign that something has been
lost. The meaning and purpose of a problem seem to lie not in its solution but in our
working at it incessantly. This alone preserves us from stultification and
petrification"(p. 21). Thus, we see lawyers who are corrupt, business executives who
receive millions when their corporations lose money, physicians who abuse drugs, and
psychotherapists who have sex with their patients. In my case, I acknowledge that there is
no small paradox in my claiming expertise on groups and organizations, in part based on my
experience with an analytic psychology that focuses primarily, if not exclusively, on the
individual.
As a matter of fact, the fundamental insight for this chapter is
derived from Jungian theory. The terms "priests" and "priestesses" in
the title are meant to be understood as archetypes. Used in this sense, the words may not
always refer to representatives of institutionalized religion. As archetypes, the terms
refer to individuals with roles and unconscious interpretations of those roles, which
authorize them to determine accepted dogma about groups and the relations among cultures.
In the sections that follow, the concrete use of the terms refers both to representatives
from institutionalized religions and from other organizations.
Purposes
The four objectives of this work are (1) to describe four specific
historical events; (2) to frame those events in group relations terms; (3) to relate those
concepts to the struggles we as a society are experiencing with multiculturalism; and (4)
to place those difficulties within the context of struggles about alternative theories of
group relations. I shall pursue these aims by examining the four episodes in some detail.
Two are historical, and two are contemporary. Two concern physical science, and two
pertain to social science. The events have in common several properties. First, as they
have become known, they include strong effects from group and intergroup processes.
Second, they are intrinsically struggles about whose authority will prevail—an
existing establishment bent on maintaining the status quo or an alternative perspective
aimed at bringing about change. Third, the struggles are fundamentally or in substantial
part about how human beings view themselves in relation to the world; they are about
humankind’s conception of itself. Finally, the contending ideas have practical
implications; which ideas prevail affect many people’s lives.
Episode 1: Shape of the Earth
For this first example I draw on Daniel Boorstin’s 1983 work, The
Discoverers. In reading this book, I was especially affected by his account of the
changing views about whether the earth was flat or spherical—mainly because it so
altered what I recall being taught about that subject in courses on world history. To a
student of group relations, the Boorstin account provides a rich example of group and
organizational forces shaping beliefs about scientific theory and the nature of physical
reality.
The world history that I recall being taught located this debate in the
15th century, around the time Christopher Columbus set sail in a westerly direction to
arrive in the east. The Italian navigator sailing under a Spanish flag was portrayed as
undertaking a great experiment. If the earth was flat, as was widely believed at that
time, then sailing west would result in falling off the face of the earth. If the earth
was spherical, as he believed, then westward travel would eventually lead to the Far East.
As we all know, the westward trip supported the spherical theory even though it did not
lead as immediately to East Asia as Columbus expected.
What the Boorstin history told me for the first time was that the
debate about the shape of the earth was not at all new in 1492. Rather, the dispute was
nearly 2,000 years old when Columbus undertook his great adventure. The time during which
Columbus lived witnessed a reopening of minds to theory and data pertaining to the shape
of the earth that previously had been suppressed by dogma from the Christian Church for
more than a millennium.
Indeed, historians named the period during which the spherical theory
of the earth was suppressed the "Great Interruption." Readers attuned to the
unconscious sexual meanings of word choice will probably take additional information from
the historical terms. What comes to mind when you hear the words "great
interruption"? A variety of historical facts also give conscious rational meaning to
the development of knowledge that was being interrupted by the church’s insistence on
holding onto an apparently more secure construction of reality.
As early as the fifth century b.c., Greek scholars thought the earth
was a globe. Both Plato and Aristotle affirmed those beliefs. Plato argued for the
spherical theory on aesthetic grounds, but Aristotle made his case with physical evidence
from the movement of falling bodies and the phenomena of lunar eclipses.
Eratosthenes, who lived between approximately 276 and 195 b.c.,
developed a remarkably accurate technique for measuring the circumference of the earth. He
estimated the earth was 28,700 miles around—an approximation that was only about 15
percent too high.
Hipparchus, perhaps the greatest Greek astronomer, took the next
natural step by developing a system of horizontal and vertical coordinates that permitted
location of any place on earth.
Ptolemy, best known for his erroneous astronomy, was a systematic
recorder of the advances made by the ancient Greeks. According to Arab legend, he lived
during the second century a.d., after which his work survived the Great Interruption and
served as a primary source for Christopher Columbus.
Historians do not know how or why the Great Interruption occurred.
Boorstin (1983) wrote,
It is easier to recount what happened than to explain satisfactorily
how it happened or why. After the death of Ptolemy, Christianity conquered the Roman
Empire and most of Europe. Then we observe a Europe-wide phenomenon of scholarly amnesia,
which afflicted the continent from a.d. 300 to at least 1300. During those centuries,
Christian faith and dogma suppressed the useful image of the world that had been so
slowly, so painfully, and so scrupulously drawn by ancient geographers. (p. 100)
There is no lack of records about what the medieval Christian
geographers thought. More than 600 maps of the world from this period survive, and there
is remarkable consistency among them. The maps were designed to show what orthodox
Christians were expected to believe—not to record knowledge of the physical world.
The classic defense of this view of the earth was provided by Cosmas, a sixth-century
monk, who wrote a 12-volume treatise demolishing what he called the "pagan" view
and supporting the Christian conception.
Instead of relying on carefully collected and systematically organized
facts, as the Greek scholars had done, the dogmatic Christian view replaced concrete
physical data with fantasies. As sea travel developed again during the 14th century, a
need once again arose for geography based on observable facts. Mariners needed charts on
which they could rely, and Christian geography was no help. But the mere accumulation of
new facts by mariners and cartographers was not enough (Boorstin, 1983); a better theory
also was needed.
It was to the need for a better theory that Ptolemy’s previously
suppressed work responded. Somewhat mysteriously, it was brought forth to influence
European civilization again in 1400, after being cared for by Byzantine and Arabic
scholars for 1,000 years. Because the theory worked in practice despite its numerous
defects, Ptolemy’s work regained its former favorable reputation.
The loss and recovery of the spherical theory of the earth by Western
European scholars was a remarkable phenomenon. Distinguished historian Boorstin confessed
his lack of understanding about how and why these events occurred. It was not just the
effects of Christian dogma, that is, of ideas alone, that this embarrassment to European
intellectual thought took place. It was through an organized human institution—the
Roman Catholic Church. The reigning spiritual powers of the Christian Middle Ages were
able to develop a social consensus that replaced a more valid with a less valid theory. In
this case, real priests and archetypal priests were one and the same.
Episode 2: Movement of the Earth around the Sun
On October 31, 1992, the New York Times, on page A1, carried a story
titled "After 350 Years, Vatican Says Galileo Was Right: It Moves." The story
marked the end of a 13-year investigation by the Roman Catholic Church’s Pontifical
Academy of Sciences into the condemnation of Galileo in 1633. At that time, Galileo was
forced to recant his empirical findings and his interpretation of them as "abjured,
cursed and detested." The renunciation caused him great personal anguish, according
to the Times, but it allowed him to live for eight more years under house arrest rather
than being burned at the stake. He died at age 77 in 1642. The Vatican’s announcement
acknowledged that the church had made an error, that Galileo had been wrongfully condemned
by the Inquisition, and that he had been correct in his scientific conclusions. What had
the Italian astronomer and physicist done that so disturbed the church?
Galileo built a telescope that allowed him to develop empirical
observations that favored the Copernican theory of the solar system over a literal
interpretation of the scriptures. In 1543, Nicolaus Copernicus, a Polish astronomer, had
published a theory stating that the earth revolved around the sun. The Copernican view was
declared heretical in 1616, because it refuted the biblical view that "God had fixed
the earth upon its foundation, not to be moved forever." Before the Italian
astronomer obtained the data, arguments between the two theories had been made only on
logical or theological grounds. Galileo’s telescope, however, allowed him to observe
the four largest moons of Jupiter revolving around that planet. These data refuted the
notion that all heavenly bodies must orbit the Earth, as attributed to scripture.
In 1632, Galileo published his findings as part of the Dialogue
Concerning the Two Chief World Systems. His argument presented the new data within a
framework that favored the Copernican theory over papal doctrine. For this, he was
summoned to Rome, where church authorities refused to accept his defense that Christian
faith could be separated from scientific research. Already suffering from the effects of
aging, Galileo recanted rather than endure additional torture. His book was banned by the
church until 1757.
As told in the Times and in most other places, the Galileo story is not
formulated in group relations terms (Reston, 1994). I want to reframe the Galileo story
from that perspective. The Times and other sources frame the Galileo story in terms of the
conflict between reason and religious dogma, or between science and faith.
The reason-versus-religion formulation, like any conceptualization, may
serve a defensive function. It can suggest that what happened to Galileo is a thing of the
past—a phenomenon from a time when religious prejudice ruled over scientific reason.
In the literal sense, that phenomenon clearly no longer exists today. Physicists and
astronomers do not have to contend with theologians and church leaders to conduct research
or to publish findings. What happened to Galileo, according to this line of thought, could
not happen today. Western European civilization no longer persecutes scientific leaders
for using physical concepts that challenge church doctrine.
A group relations formulation, however, may have different implications
for the present. According to this view, Galileo and Copernicus become representatives of
a new group—physicist–astronomers who believed in a revolutionary theory and who
developed a method (Galileo’s telescope) that produced data favoring the
revolutionary theory over the more established view. Moreover, these
physicist–astronomers published and taught about their preferred theory. The
physicist–astronomer group was experienced as deeply threatening by the most powerful
authorities of their day (that is, the Roman Catholic Church). With threats of torture and
death, the authorities demanded that the revolutionary thinkers recant their beliefs. More
than three centuries passed before the authorities corrected their error. Even then the
press expressed surprise at the change. The Times’ reporter observed, "The
Vatican’s formal acknowledgement of an error...is a rarity" (p. A1).
Was it an accident that the man who was pope at the time of the rare
acknowledgment was by identity group Polish and by organization group Italian—the
same groups represented by Copernicus and Galileo? This group relations
interpretation—unlike the reason-versus-faith argument—is as appropriate for
contemporary events as for happenings in 1633. A philosopher of science who understood and
believed in the group relations theory might say this conceptual system was more elegant
than the reason-versus-faith perspective because the newer theory can explain both
contemporary and historical phenomena.
Episode 3: Academic Criticism of Multiculturalism
During the summer of 1992, The Disuniting of America: Reflections on a
Multicultural Society, written by Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr., appeared on the New York
Times bestseller list. Schlesinger is one of the more respected liberal historians in the
United States today. He once was a faculty member in the Harvard University history
department and then a special advisor to President John F. Kennedy. Having written several
highly regarded books about the Kennedy brothers, he currently is a faculty member at the
City University of New York.
Schlesinger became so concerned about what he believed to be the
fragmenting effects of racial and ethnic consciousness in the United States that he wrote
a book warning the American people of the danger he believes we face. Well written and in
touch with the thoughts and feelings of our populace, the book remained on the bestseller
list for several weeks. In the text we find Schlesinger’s tacit theory of group
dynamics. Quotations that follow reveal key elements of that framework.
The eruption of ethnicity had many good consequences... shamefully
overdue recognition to the achievements of minorities...acknowledge[ment] of the great
swirling world beyond Europe...our children try[ing] to imagine the arrival of Columbus
from the point of those who met him as well as those who sent him.... (p. 15)
* * *
But pressed too far, the cult of ethnicity has had bad consequences,
too. The new ethnic gospel [note the religious metaphor] rejects the unifying vision of
individuals from all nations melted into a new race. Its underlying philosophy is that
America is not a nation of individuals at all but a nation of groups....Instead of a
transformative nation with an identity all its own, America in this new light is seen as a
preservative of diverse alien identities....The multiethnic dogma abandons historic
purposes, replacing assimilation by fragmentation, integration by separation. It belittles
unum and glorifies pluribus. (p. 16)
* * *
But the burden to unify the country does not fall exclusively on the
minorities....Not only must they want assimilation and integration; we must want
assimilation and integration, too. (p. 19)
Schlesinger’s normative view is complex. He recognizes the power
of racism in our country’s history, he accepts the distortions in American history
that currently are being corrected as a result of a greater ethnic and racial
consciousness, and he criticizes the "noble lies" of what he calls
Afrocentrists’ revisions of history and sometimes of other ethnic groups as well. In
fact, his criticisms are most severe when directed toward African and African American
writers. In taking this direction, he repeatedly uses group-level concepts in referring to
writers by their racial and ethnic group memberships. He also refers to individual writers
and cites the works of particular persons. Thus, his theory-in-use employs individual and
group concepts, whereas his espoused theory argues for individual versus group concepts.
Especially noteworthy about Schlesinger is his assertion that European
culture is superior to other forms. The key quotation states
Whatever the particular crimes of Europe, that continent is also the
source—the unique [italics his] source of those liberating ideas of individual
liberty, political democracy, the rule of law, human rights, and cultural freedom that
constitute our most precious legacy and to which most of the world today aspires. These
are European [italics his] ideas, not Asian, nor African, nor Middle Eastern ideas, except
by adoption. (p. 127)
I find this a remarkable assertion. To make it, Schlesinger must assume
that he knows all there is to know about all those cultures that he states have access to
European values only by adoption and that no new discoveries will ever occur that might
alter what he thinks he knows. Until I read those words, I might not have imagined that a
man of his political persuasion and intellectual interests would make such a statement.
His assertion of the superiority of European culture is significant, because it takes the
quest for better understanding of these matters out of the realm of a simple
liberal–conservative dichotomy. Schlesinger is a self-identified liberal whose
assertions reflect a tacit theory of group dynamics that does not differ from the
perspective of many thoughtful—and some not so thoughtful—conservatives. The
fundamental question, therefore, is not one of liberal versus conservative, but rather one
of a particular theory of group dynamics versus another.
Examining Schlesinger’s assertion about the superiority of
European culture and observing his criticisms of Afrocentric perspectives from the point
of view of depth psychology and group relations, one is led to believe that his tacit
theory of group dynamics does not include the concepts of projection and ethnocentrism
applied to himself and to members of his own groups.
Is criticizing Schlesinger’s tacit theory of group dynamics
unfair? He is, after all, a historian, who might not be expected to understand group
relations. Yet he uses group and individual concepts freely with professed authority.
Moreover, his book was a bestseller—a fact that may be interpreted to indicate that
his tacit theory was in accord with those of many Americans during the summer of 1992.
Perhaps even more telling is the fact that echoes of Schlesinger’s tacit theory of
groups and individuals can be found in the work of Nathan Glazer (1983), a Harvard
sociologist who has spent much of his life studying racial and ethnic group relations, and
in the writings of Cynthia Fuchs Epstein, whose interpretation of "gender and sex as
deceptive distinctions" was published in 1988 by Yale University Press. If criticized
for not having an adequate theory of group dynamics to use in The Disuniting of America,
Schlesinger could reply that his views were in accord with those of some of the most
prominent white female and male social scientists of our times—and he would be
correct! The difference does not turn on his disciplinary identification as a historian in
comparison with others as social scientists. Schlesinger’s concepts reflect
consensual views on matters of group dynamics in contemporary culture.
Episode 4: New York City Schools Chancellor versus the Board of Education
The fourth episode also comes from the front page of the New York
Times. The February 11, 1993, lead headline read "Board Removes Fernandez as New York
Schools Chief after Stormy 3-Year Term: Social Issues Cited: 4-to-3 Decision Points to
Painful Divisions in School System." The text of the article states, "The board
clashed with the Chancellor over AIDS education....And when Mr. Fernandez chose to suspend
a local school board because it refused to accept a controversial multicultural
curriculum, the board overturned his decision" (p. A1).
On the matter of firing Fernandez, the Times was not neutral. Their
news pages gave the matter extensive coverage, and their lead editorial of that day was
"Fire the Board of Education." The board fired the chancellor, and the Times
wanted to fire the board. Events like these give new meaning to the bumper sticker
"[Stuff] happens!" Moreover, despite the conflict over who should be fired,
there seemed to be some agreement that the firing of Fernandez was damaging to New York
City public schools and even more consensus about what should be done to prevent
repetition of that problem in the future.
The Times editorial espoused fixing the problem by giving the mayor
additional powers to control a majority of the appointments to the school board. In
subsequent statements, the Times’ view was echoed by then–New York City Mayor
David Dinkins and by former New York City school board president Robert Wagner, Jr. The
unspoken assumption in this solution seemed to be that the real conflict that led to the
firing of Fernandez was between the mayor and his political rivals. The proposed solution
seemed to imply that if the power to control the board rested more fully with the mayor,
then the dynamics set into motion around Fernandez could be prevented in the future. For
purposes of this discussion, I shall call this the "political–legal" model
and shall contrast it with a group relations perspective.
The group relations perspective raises questions about whether the
deeper problems of future chancellor–board conflict could be prevented simply by
giving the mayor greater legal authority to appoint a majority of the board. Indeed, the
political–legal model, when examined from a group relations perspective, not only may
fail to solve the problems it is designed to address but also may create additional,
equally severe difficulties. How would a group relations perspective address
board–chancellor conflict?
We might begin by asking, "What is the primary purpose of the
board–chancellor relationship?" My answer is to establish the best possible
conditions to ensure high-quality public education for New York City school children. The
work of the board is to select the chancellor, to work with the chancellor to establish
educational policy for the city’s schools, to assess competently and fairly the
chancellor’s performance in implementing that policy, and to remove the chancellor
when sound evidence indicates that doing so would better serve the educational needs of
New York City school children than would keeping the chancellor in office.
In the chancellor–board relationship, inevitable tensions exist.
The board, for example, can exceed its policy-setting role and interfere with the
chancellor’s leadership and management duties. The board can attempt to micromanage
the chancellor, and there was evidence that it had done so in the New York City case. But
the chancellor also may not follow the policy established by the board; board members
suggested that this had happened to Fernandez. In fact, a dispute may have occurred
between Fernandez and the board over exactly what was the policy.
In the Times article photography suggested that race, ethnicity, and
gender played a substantial role in the board’s action. But there was no explicit
talk about the effects of these factors. The article made explicit statements that the
chancellor’s personality and leadership style were matters of concern to some board
members. Do boards of any organizations generally deal fully and professionally with these
kinds of issues? Certainly, many examples suggest that it is by no means obvious that they
do.
After the firing and in response to a newsperson’s question,
Fernandez said he thought that the best way to prevent future problems of the kind he
faced was to be sure that the chancellor and the board were working on the same agenda. He
did not say that giving a majority of the school board appointments to the mayor was the
answer. Fernandez’s answer on how to solve the problems he faced was more in accord
with a group relations perspective than with the political–legal model.
From a group relations perspective, the key question is, Given the
nature of chief executive and board relations and the relevance of racial, ethnic, gender,
and religious group differences, what is the best way to design the relationship between
chancellor and board to maximize the likelihood of having that relationship serve the
educational needs of New York City school children? Certainly the process of determining
who will be board members is relevant. But the issues surrounding potential appointees are
less about to whom they are politically loyal—the practical answer should be to New
York City’s public school children—and more about what educational objectives
they are able and willing to support and toward what behavior are they inclined when faced
with the predictable conflicts they will encounter as board members. With those issues
clear, then the design questions become, What kind of appointing authority is most likely
to select appropriately qualified board members? and What kinds of structures and
processes might be put into place to increase the likelihood that the board will operate
effectively as a group and in the several intergroup relationships with the chancellor? To
someone with a group relations perspective, these questions suggest the use of group
consultation—with the board of education appointing authority, with the board of
education, and in the relationship between the chancellor and the board of
education—to work toward answers.
How unlikely does such an idea seem? Why do the relevant public
officials not call for group relations consultation to assist with such matters, instead
of relying on the political–legal model, which so frequently has demonstrated its
ineffectiveness for all to see? Do you know of any board of education that is not inclined
toward the sort of outbreak of irrationality that characterized the New York City group?
Do you believe that there are individuals and groups with the capabilities to take on such
a consultation assignment? What criteria do you use when you think about this question?
When, if ever, do you believe there will be a social consensus such that problems of the
kind that faced the chancellor and New York City school board will result in requests for
the services of the best of group and organizational consultants? How do you understand
the fact that a search for such services is not automatic under conditions like those
described in this case? What kinds of changes will be required in society and in the
social work profession for such a response to become more natural?
Conclusion
The four examples presented in this chapter relate directly to the
objectives stated at the outset. First, the current debate about multiculturalism is as
important for our time as the disputes about the shape and movement of the earth were in
the 14th and 15th centuries. The priests and priestesses of our times are more likely to
be found in political bodies, in corporations, and in universities than in religious
institutions. For society and its institutions to cope more effectively with how cultures
come together, the priests and priestesses must change their minds about how they conceive
of group-level events.
Second, at its core, the debate about multiculturalism is a debate
about theories. Even though parties with diverse views sometimes frame their arguments in
moral terms—an observation no less true of those who prefer change than of those who
prefer to remain the same—I do not believe the fundamental questions turn on
religious or ethical values. Indeed, the presence of religious metaphor can be interpreted
as evidence about the severity of the intergroup conflict among proponents of different
theories. Conceptual systems are in conflict, and it matters greatly whether change occurs
and around which theory a new social consensus forms. To continue to frame the debate in
moral or ethical terms rather than in intellectual terms is to maintain the status quo.
Third, group relations theory in the form I know best represents a
fundamental—even revolutionary—alternative to the view of group dynamics around
which there is currently a social consensus within established academic and professional
circles (Alderfer, 1987). On these matters, the priests and priestesses of our times have
not yet changed their minds. Glazer (1983) and Epstein (1988) represent those priests and
priestesses.
Five key components of the alternative theory are as follows:
Do not think in terms of individual versus the group, but rather
frame the relationships as about individuals and groups.
Take groups as whole entities in their own rights, that is, as
significantly different from merely the sum of their individual members.
Imply that, regardless of role, individuals do not leave behind their
identity-group affiliations—namely, that we all are influenced as individuals
intrapsychically and as group representatives by our several group memberships, including
race, ethnicity, gender, generation, and family.
Indicate that we are less objective in the traditional sense when we
ignore or deny these effects than when we accept and embrace them.
Base knowledge of group and intergroup relations in part on taking
account of unconscious processes in individuals, in groups, and between groups. People
whose actions are influenced by these theoretical assumptions behave differently than
those who hold the established view of groups.
In identifying these components, I do not mean to imply that everyone
who takes a group relations perspective agrees with all of them. Undoubtedly differences
exist among people who have group relations perspectives on which of these propositions
they accept as their own and on which ones directly affect their behavior. However, I do
believe these statements differentiate an embedded intergroup relations perspective from
the political–legal theory of group dynamics represented by the social consensus of
our times.
The group dynamics theories of sociology; of politics, law, and
journalism; and of establishment historians in our times are similar to the flat-earth and
earth-centered cosmologies of the Middle Ages. In part those theories are out of date
because they both consciously and unconsciously keep "us" and "our
group" too much at the center of how we think about human beings in the world.
Moreover, holders of these explicit and tacit theories about groups generally do not think
of themselves as being explained by the theories they hold. They thus tacitly place
themselves as outside the laws of human behavior.
Fourth, we are living at a time of significant intellectual and social
convulsion—not unlike the era following the breakup of the Roman Empire. The theory
of groups we hold—whether as a layperson or as a professional, whether explicit or
tacit—affects how we understand and act in relation to the widespread problems with
authority and multiculturalism we all face. We also live at a time in which society as a
whole largely resists and rejects what is known about the depth psychology of individuals
and groups. The resistance, however, is not total. Organizations such as the A. K. Rice
Institute and the N.T.L. Institute continue to exist outside the mainstream. There is
struggle, and signs of change coexist along with the resistance. Indeed, some believe that
the resistance is greatest just before irreversible change occurs.
For example, within the past decade, the president and the corporation
of Yale University dismissed without review an entire group of faculty because they were
believed to be contaminating the minds of professional management students by teaching
effectively a group relations perspective (Berg, 1993). Yale did not succeed in
suppressing the story in the years following the original episode, and eventually the
public became aware of the mass dismissals (Sedgwick, 1994; Steinberg, 1994).
The group dynamics of Galileo’s age are not gone. Today, however,
the agents of repression and the protesters against repression are less often
representatives of institutional religions than of corporate, political, and educational
organizations in our society (Reston, 1994). The priest and priestess archetype appears
outside of institutionalized religion.
If conceptual change about group dynamics does occur, the revolution
will be as fundamental to how we view ourselves as people and as peoples as were the
Ptolemaic and Copernican revolutions for how we view this Earth and solar system. All
disciplines that deal with the human condition—including history—will be
affected. How we think about important matters of authority and multicultural relations
will be altered.
As to whether the conceptual change will occur, I am uncertain. Signs
of the potential for another great interruption in the development of these ideas are
among us, as the events at Yale University and the popularity of the Schlesinger (1992)
book show. Yet, alternative conceptions also remain alive for those who are prepared to
consider them. Another great interruption has not yet taken a singular direction. I do not
know whether it will.
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