Human Nature and Organization Theory

In Human Nature and Organization Theory, Sigmund Wagner-Tsukamoto challenges the conventional wisdom that (organizational) economics is an amoral and empirically incorrect science. He treads new ground regarding the behavioural portrayal of human nature in organization theory. The book focuses on the works of Taylor, Simon and Williamson, reconstructing methods and variables of their organization theories in non-behavioural, institutional economic terms. Implications for institutional economic theory building and practical intervention are outlined. The book suggests that the image of human nature in organizational economics has to be deduced from theoretical and practical outcomes of economic analysis rather than from methods of economic analysis. If this is considered, organizational economics can make considerable moral claims, since it can generate socially desirable interaction outcomes even in the face of pluralism.

This volume will appeal to a wide cross-section of organizational researchers, and also deserves to be widely read by economists, business ethics researchers and business historians.