Abstract
This essay considers the impact of digital networks in organizations on worker autonomy. Worker autonomy, the control that workers have over their own work situation, is claimed in this essay to be a key determinant for the quality of work, as well as an important moral goal. Digital networks pose significant threats to worker autonomy as well as opportunities for its enhancement. In this essay, the notion of worker autonomy is analyzed and evaluated for its importance and moral relevance. It is then considered how digital networks both threaten worker autonomy and offer opportunities for its enhancement. Three major opportunities (enhanced communicative powers, increased informedness, teleworking) and threats (electronic monitoring, task prestructuring, and dependency creation) are discussed and analyzed. Finally, the dynamics that determine the impact on worker autonomy of the introduction of a digital network in organizations are investigated. A particular model for analyzing these dynamics and their impacts, Bryan Pfaffenberger's model of a technological drama. It will be illustrated how this model illuminates these dynamics by analyzing them as a dialectic of strategies of technological regularization by design constituencies and technological adjustment by impact constituencies. It will also be assessed what role network design has in this process.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Baase, S.: 1997, A Gift of Fire. Social, Legal, and Ethical Issues in Computing (Prentice Hall, Upper Saddle River, NJ).
Barker, J. and C. Downing: 1985, ‘Word Processing and the Transformation of Patriarchal Relations of Control in the Office’, in D. MacKenzie and J. Wajcman (eds.), The Social Shaping of Technology: How the Refrigerator Got Its Hum (Open University Press, Philadelphia).
Breaugh, J.: 1985, ‘The Measurement of Work Autonomy’, Human Relations 38, 551–570.
Brey, P.: 1998, ‘The Politics of Computer Systems and the Ethics of Design’, in M. van den Hoven (ed.), Computer Ethics: Philosophical Enquiry, Proceedings of CEPE97, Erasmus University Rotterdam 11–13 June 1997, An ACM/SIGCAS Conference (Rotterdam University Press, Rotterdam), pp. 64–75.
De Jonge, J.: 1995, Job Autonomy, Well-being, and Health: A Study Among Dutch Health Care Workers (Universitaire Pers Maastricht, Maastricht).
Dworkin, G.: 1988, The Theory and Practice of Autonomy (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge).
Garson, G. D.: 1995, Computing Technology and Social Issues (Idea Group Publishing, Harrisburg, PA).
George, J. and J. King: 1991, ‘Examining the Computing and Centralization Debate’, Communications of the ACM 34(7), 62–72.
Grant, R., C. Higgins and R. Irving: 1988, ‘Computerized Performance Monitors: Are They Costing You Customers?’, Sloan Management Review (Spring), 39–45.
Hackman, J. and auG. Oldham: 1975, ‘Development of the Job Diagnostic Survey’, Journal of Applied Psychology 60, 159–170.
Hackman, J. and G. Oldham: 1980, Work Redesign (Addison-Wesley, Reading, MA).
Hill, T.: 1991, Autonomy and Self-Respect (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge).
Hofmann, J.: 1995, ‘Writers, Texts and Writing Acts – Constructed Realities in Word Processing Software’, Paper presented at The Mutual Shaping of Gender and Technology, International Workshop, Twente University, October 6–8.
Hoven, M. van den: 1995, Information Technology and Moral Philosophy, Dissertation Erasmus University, Rotterdam, The Netherlands.
Jay, S. and J. Anderson: 1982, ‘Computerized Hospital Information Systems: Their Future Role in Medicine’, Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine 75, 303–305.
Johansson, G. and G. Aronsson: 1991, ‘Psychosocial Factors in the Workplace’, in G. Green and F. Baker (eds.), Work, Health, and Productivity (Oxford University Press, Oxford).
Johnson, D.: 1994, Computer Ethics, 2nd ed. (Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs, NJ).
Kahn, R. and P. Byosiere: 1994, ‘Stress in Organizations’, in M. Dunette, J. Hough and H. Triandis (eds.), Handbook of Industrial and Organizational Psychology, Vol. 4 (Consulting Psychologists Press, Palo Alto, CA).
Karasek, R. and T. Theorell: 1990, Healthy Work: Stress, Productivity, and the Reconstruction of Working Life (Basic Books, New York).
Kling, R.: 1996, ‘Computerization and Work’, in R. Kling (ed.), Computerization and Controversy: Value Conflicts and Social Choices, 2nd ed. (Academic Press, San Diego).
Norman, D.: 1993, Things that Make us Smart: Defending Human Attributes in the Age of the Machine (Addison-Wesley, Reading, MA).
Pfaffenberger, B.: 1988, ‘The Social Meaning of the Personal Computer, Or, Why the Personal Computer Revolution Was No Revolution’, Anthropological Quarterly 61, 39–47.
Pfaffenberger, B.: 1992, ‘Technological Dramas’, Science, Technology, and Human Values 17, 282–312.
Sclove, R.: 1995, Democracy and Technology (Guilford Press, New York).
Spinello, R.: 1997, Case Studies in Information and Computer Ethics (Prentice-Hall, Upper Saddle River, NJ).
Sproull, L. and S. Kiesler: 1991, Connections: New Ways of Working in the Networked Organization (MIT Press, Cambridge, MA).
Wagner, I.: 1996, ‘Boundary Confusions and Embeddings. Gender Issues in the Design of Electronic Work Spaces’, Paper presented at the 4S/EASST Conference Signatures of Knowledge Societies, Bielefeld, 10-1996.
Winner, L.: 1980, ‘Do Artifacts have Politics?’, Daedalus 109, 121–136.
Zuboff, S.: 1988, In the Age of the Smart Machine (Basic Books, New York).
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Brey, P. Worker Autonomy and the Drama of Digital Networks in Organizations. Journal of Business Ethics 22, 15–25 (1999). https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1006199816737
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1006199816737