STUDY OF ECONOMIC ORGANIZATIONS *

I NDUSTRIAL sociology is a field of applied sociology, and has grown mainly out of interests in such issues as productivity, motivation, and unionization. In many cases, however, the theoretical relevance of the studies is evident, and often it is explicitly discussed by those who c;onducted the research. "Overcoming Resistance to Change," 1 a frequently quoted study, is a case in point: while the problem studied is how to introduce frequent changes into the system of production in a pajama factory without reducipg productivity, it is discussed from the point of view of its contributions to Kurt Lewin's field theory.2 The studies of Mayo, Roethlisberger. Whyte, Warner, and many others have a theoretical perspective. and are not predominantly focused on practical problems. The applied nature of industrial sociology is revealed not so much in a lack of theoretical implications of the various studies as in a lack of conceptual codification and of systematic delimitation of the field. The accumulation of studies in this area seems now to have reached the stage at which one may attempt to offer such a systematic delimitation and to spell out the main dimensions of the field.s