Retro Book Review: The Organization Man (1956)
Tags: Book Review, creativity, mobility, retro book review, social engineering, sociology, suburbs, values
I would not want to malign planners for becoming interested in sociology—it is a common complaint in the field, indeed, that most planners aren’t interested enough. But a little sociology can be a dangerous weapon. (p. 349, The Organization Man)
The Organization Man, by William H. Whyte, is a key American sociology text of the mid-1950s. References to it still pervade current sociology and planning literature, which is what prompted me to borrow the only copy from the Vancouver Public Library.
Whyte’s subject is the generation of young white-collar men who worked for large American corporations. For Whyte, their conformity and social orientation represented such a severe break from traditional value systems like the Protestant Ethic that he feared a troubling … Continue Reading













