The Social Construction of Human-centredness

In his book from 1947, Herbert A. Simon writes that ‘... administration is not unlike play-acting’, i.e. that the effectiveness of the administrative process will vary with the effectiveness with which an organisation’s members play their parts (Simon, 1947, p. 252). Twenty years later, Simon raises a significant question: How is it possible to construct a theory of administration — and, more generally, of social systems — if such systems are systems of play-acting? The problem is that if social systems are based on play-acting they are also based on self-observation, i.e., on humans observing themselves playing as themselves. In a theoretical context the problem is that if such systems work through self-observation, this includes self-observation through the theories constructed by, and of, themselves. For Simon, the problem is, insofar as the theory becomes part of its object, the basic precondition for constructing an empirical theory will be obstructed. Any such theory will contain nothing but ‘normative rules of good acting, (Simon, 1969, p. x). Simon’s observation and conclusion can be confirmed — insofar as many administrative and organisational theories are unreflected catalogues of good practice, i.e. circular arguments of normativism. However, I cannot support Simon’s implicit conclusion that the phenomenon of self-observation should be avoided in administrative and organisational theories.