Unlikely allies: Bureaucracy as a cultural trope in a grassroots volunteer organization

Mona Florian

Scandinavian Journal of Management, 2018, vol. 34, issue 2, 151-161

Abstract: This article investigates the role of bureaucratic organizing in a grassroots volunteer organization, which emerged during the so-called refugee crisis in an emergency refugee shelter in Germany. Most research agrees that this type of organization is by definition counter-bureaucratic. In the organization I studied, however, volunteers adopted, accepted and acclaimed bureaucratic organizing as the only, natural and self-evident way of making the grassroots work. Drawing on ethnographic research, my analysis unravels how bureaucracy became a common frame of reference that allowed the volunteers to self-organize despite their different motivations, attitudes and social backgrounds. To theorize these findings, the paper draws on the concept of a cultural trope. In so doing, it offers a more nuanced understanding of bureaucracy in grassroots volunteer organizations that might stimulate scholars to rethink its role in other fluid, dynamic and value-driven organizations.

Keywords: Bureaucracy; Cultural trope; Grassroots organization; Refugee support; Volunteers (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2018
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0956522117302750
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:scaman:v:34:y:2018:i:2:p:151-161

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/journaldescription.cws_home/872/bibliographic
http://www.elsevier. ... me/872/bibliographic

DOI: 10.1016/j.scaman.2018.03.002

Access Statistics for this article

Scandinavian Journal of Management is currently edited by Janne Tienari

More articles in Scandinavian Journal of Management from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().