Poland, Hungary, the World Selected Aspects of Contemporary Economy, Culture, and Science
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Acta Academiae Modrevianae
Poland, Hungary, the World Selected Aspects of Contemporary Economy, Culture, and Science
ed by
Klemens Budzowski and Magdolna Láczay
Kraków 2014 wegry 2014.indb 3
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Editorial Council: Klemens Budzowski, Maria Kapiszewska, Zbigniew Maciąg, Jacek Majchrowski Reviewers: Csaba, Berde PhD, D. habil Gabriella, Pusztai, PhD, D, habil Éva, Kovácsné Bakosi PhD, Csilla, Juhász, PhD, habil Krisztina, Dajnoki, PhD, habil György, Szabados, PhD Troy B. Wiwczaroski, language assistant Copyright© by Andrzej Frycz Modrzewski Krakow University Krakow 2014 Cover design Joanna Sroka ISBN 978-83-7571All Rights Reserved. No part of this publication or its entirety may be reproduced, transmitted or stored in any manner that allows repeated use in any form by any means, electronic, mechanical, copying, recording or other without the express written permission of copyright owners. Commissioned by Andrzej Frycz Modrzewski Krakow University www.ka.edu.pl Publisher Krakow Society for Education: AFM Publishing House (Krakowskie Towarzystwo Edukacyjne sp. z o.o. – Oficyna Wydawnicza AFM; e-mail:
[email protected]) Kraków 2014 Print Krakow Society for Education
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Contents
Editors’ Introduction................................................................................ 7
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Contents
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Editers’ Introduction Changing Word-Changing Lifesytle-Values to save In the early morning of September 15 2008 Lehman Brothers filed for Chaper 11 Banktrupcy Protection. Most people did not pay attention at all. Many people gloated upon that and gloating hid the imminent danger from many eyes. Maybe some people still believed that this is an American problem. Those who know history shivered as the events resembled to the 1928 case of the US dollar but this was only the first symptom of the problem. It was like the fever in the early stage of the illness. Even the best doctors can’t tell chronic illness from a winter cold and flu from the early fever. Today we know that these were the first signs of a severe crisis which might seem to be a financial crisis occurring in every century but resemble to major changes that only come once or twice in millenia for America and for the rest of the World. We can feel the advantages and the disadvantages of globalization in the same time. The crisis of the leading powers of the world surfaced weaknesses of globalization. However the local values could not grow strong either. It is like we prepare for the clash of Titans and we can’t see whether we are witnesses of the birth of a new world or one of the Titans will govern our lives. Strengthening and weakening of the globalization determines the life of local groups and can be assessed through the cultural memories of each group. But what proves this theory. Among the most important signs are the transnational and global companies that try to introduce new production and consumption mechanisms. We have to think about national culture, local and global values, relations of central and peripheral through these mechanisms as we are part of this process and so is economy, international relations, international organizations. There are theoretical questions: what is the difference between global politics, large-state politics
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Editers’ Introduction
and imperial politics? Which one of these is currently governs Europe? What are the impact and national culture in global politics and what is national identity and what role does it play? What role has society and languages in the constantly changes of globalization, sciences and culture. Historical memory, however is not a matter of politics or power it is built by consecutive generations as our customs, values and even plans prove it. The present makes history from the past and it builds in the thinking and culture of the new generations. This is why the schools and within them the teachers and researchers who form the new generations and who pass on culture in this context. I think that a possible way out of the crisis is to encourage and support the self-organizing culture of micro-communities. We Europeans have seen major cultural changes and we shall not underestimate the importance of our role in the current changes. We have to think about how the Greco-Roman culture have first clashed with those values set forth by the Holy Bible and then how this was settled and how judeo-christian culture formed the life of a whole continent. The cultural and historical community of the Central and Eastern European countries reveals itself again. Our responses to the crisis are built on our traditions of our close and distant past and these are not always understood by the EU. I have recently read the news about the still strong commonages that are not eligible for EU subsidies according to the Romanian authorities so the commoners had to turn the case to the EU. Commonages come from the age of feudalism but the Szeklers have it from even older times. On the other hand nowadays the commonages could have turned a most modern kind of organization on common ownership and the internal community control of the operations. There are other examples too where the leaders of the micro-community could not only be characterized as president or chief secretary but also judge or vajda, as these roles are accepted by centuries of historical memory and with constant reform they enable the community to connect the past with the future and always rebuild communities. The title of our book refers to the fact that we can only know ourselves, articulate our problems and find our options through complex assessment methods of the social sciences. We would like to work and think together on finding common values with those who share common heritage, in this case the Polish-Hungarian friendship and brotherhood. This is why you can read works of Polish and Hungarian authors in this book. As part of our tradition you will find works of talented young colleagues taking their first steps as scholars and they are those who keep historical memory alive and will have impact on the future.
Dr. habil Láczay Magdolna
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EQUAL OPPORTUNITIES FOR GROUPS WITH SPECIAL NEEDS – PEOPLE WITH DISABILITIES – IN EDUCATION, TRAINING AND EMPLOYMENT ON THE LABOUR-MARKET Andrásné Teleki Judit1 Abstract The number of disabled people living in the EU is more than 80 million, while in Hungary; according to the census (KSH-2001) it makes 5.7% of the population. Disabled citizens in all Member States face difficulties in the access to education, training, and long-term low-level employment rate. All of these result in the social and economic exclusion of the people in concern, their poverty and heavy dependence on the social system. Anti-discrimination policies have proved successful in changing the attitudes towards disability, but the law in itself is not enough to bring about significant changes. Without social commitment, legal regulations will remain sheer formalities. In order to eliminate the existing prejudice, there is a need for change in the attitude at society level, where it has already been accepted that people with disabilities have a right to professional training, rehabilitation and social inclusion, regardless of the origin and nature of their disability. Education, participation in training is essential for a good position on the labour-market, to join the labour-market, but still we cannot talk about full equality of opportunities in education, training and employment. It is true that in recent years, acceptance or rather inclusive processes have intensified - in the case of people with disabilities as well – thus a slow yet positive change can be detected. Keywords: Anti-discrimination, disabilities, rehabilitation, laber market, education traning
Introduction One of the most effective ways to prevent disadvantaged young people with disabilities from being forced to the margins of the society is providing them with Andrásné Dr. Teleki Judit PhD főiskolai tanár, Debreceni Egyetem Gyermeknevelési és Felnőttképzési Kar 1
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education, qualification. Lack of schooling results in the lack of or limited chances on the labour-market, depriving people of the chances of living a full, independent, self-sufficient life. That is why we need to exploit the opportunities offered by the education and training system as widely as possible for people with disabilities to get higher qualification, and learn marketable skills. This is how education can serve as the basis to achieve social inclusion. Regarding labour-market participation, people with disabilities are especially disadvantaged because they are the most vulnerable groups prone to social exclusion. It is imperative that the education system be an integral part of its environment; it should pulsate together with the surrounding socio-economic reality, and should retain old values while serving the (sometimes opposite) interests of the rapidly changing environment. Because the education system, beside its old science-intermediary function, is given an increasing role in helping people with disabilities to find their way around in the world, help them to enter the world of work, and stay there, so that more and more of them be given a chance to fulfil their potentials, and live a full life. One of the features that characterises the development of a society is its ability to provide equal opportunities for its members to live quality life, including those, who - for a variety of reasons such as disability - require assistance. In order for a citizen of a democratic state to succeed in their private life as well as in the ‘working world’, it is inevitable to be armed with proper knowledge. Participation in the education system and training is essential for access to get in good position on the labour- market, to enter the labour-market. The failure of people with disabilities on the labour-market brings about a serious economic disadvantage, and therefore it is necessary to aim at results similar to the indicators valid for the EU. The study intends to answer the question whether the community of a given society treats the disabled and vulnerable members as equals, and if they have equal opportunities for a start in all areas of life. Understanding Disability Probably there is no other field or concept that has undergone such major change in recent decades in terms of its content and attached values as the concept of disability. Disability is a long-term state of impairment either from birth or a result of injury at some later point in life. It is characterised by the loss or limitation of various functions with little chance for improvement. These impairments are visible and are more or less evident to the untrained eye and the physical signs are difficult to disguise.
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There is a wide range of expressions used to denote the state of people with disabilities. One of them is people „living with a form of impediment”. According to experts, this expression is the least discriminative; yet it is far too general and inaccurate. Perhaps in terms of content the expression „impaired person” (people living with impairment) is the best choice as this is the least discriminative, however it is not even liked by those concerned. This expression is most widely used by experts. Unfortunately, colloquially the expression „handicapped person” is still widely used, even though the concerned people find it discriminative and demeaning. In recent years, demeaning and discriminating expressions are being sidelined at least in the language of the law, and the more subtle expression of „people living with disabilities” has become more commonplace. When used in context, the expression refers to a dynamic interaction between physical deficiencies and the social and physical environment. This means (Bánfalvy 2008) that the degree and impact of disability may greatly vary not only with respect to the physical condition and the possibilities for treatment but also as a result of social support and the possibilities provided. This relationship can change not only across various locations but also over time, during the lifetime of the concerned person even though the person’s mental and physical abilities remain unchanged. Figure 1: Distribution of disability groups 2008
autista 1%
diszlexia, egyéb részképességzavar 16,6%
halmozottan sérült 2% beszédfogyatékos 3,5% testi, érzékszervi fogyatékos 4,8% középsúlyosan értelmi fogyatékos 8,4%
súlyos magatartási, tanulási zavar 4%
enyhén értelmi fogyatékos 60%
Source: 2008 statistical figures of the Ministry of Education and Culture; self-edited figure
According to medicine, relevant literature, and the established institutional system, people with disabilities include people with visual or hearing impairment, the mentally handicapped and people fundamentally impaired in their communication skills (speech impediment, dyslexia, dysgraphia, dyscalculia).
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Legal provisions to ensure equal opportunities EU Member States, including Hungary, are striving hard to achieve equal opportunities for people living with disabilities. In the struggle for equal opportunities, legal regulations and specific measures have been adopted in Hungary to improve the lives of people living with disabilities. According to the Act on the rights and equal opportunities of people with disabilities all people living with disabilities have a right to an accessible, perceivable and safe environment, which is not to be limited to buildings but to be understood in a much wider context. In 2003, the Act on Equal Treatment and Promotion of Equal Opportunities was adopted, which stipulates the prohibition of discrimination. In the autumn of 2005, the Equal Treatment Authority was set up. In order to regulate education, the Act on Public Education came into effect on 1993 - which was many times amended thereafter -, then in 2005, the Act on Higher Education, and Gov. Decree on the execution of certain provisions were adopted and they already contained certain provisions on students living with disabilities. Chance for equality - education-training One of the most successful ways to prevent disadvantaged young people with disabilities from being excluded and pushed to the periphery of society is through education by giving them vocational qualifications. Education is seen as the basis for social integration. Based on the 2001 census, nearly 32% of people with disabilities have practically no academic qualifications whatsoever, and only 5% of them have tertiary qualifications. The lack of specific education is well illustrated by the fact that only 11.2% of children with disabilities finished their elementary schooling in some special elementary. Education is tasked with the mitigation of social differences and the improvement of the quality of living. In Hungary all children/students living with disabilities and with special educational needs is part of the public education system, which allows for segregated, inclusive, or integrated education. Each form of education has its advantages and disadvantages alike therefore the decision on the form of education that is best for any individual must be based on the specific skills and interests of the individual. According to Illyés (2001), „the development of differentiating procedures of the mainstream pedagogic profession will presumably result in children with disabilities receiving specific, personally-tailored services together with all other children in real co-educational situations. There will always be a need for segregated individual development, but probably to a smaller extent than today. The legal acts on public education also aim to establish and offer inclusive, integrated education to students simply because this is what they will be exposed to either in the course of their further education or in their future careers. The
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study by Kőpatakiné (2004) confirms that the „school system is not entirely ready to suddenly receive soaring numbers of students with special educational needs under the umbrella of integrated education”. The introduction of the analysis exploring the practices of integrating educational institutions (Kőpatakiné 2004) defines the concepts of integration and inclusion, i.e. the idea of receptive education. The impact study of the education integration programme of disadvantaged students was conducted between 2005 and 2007 (Kézdi G.–Surányi É. 2008) and published along with the experiences of a successful school integration programme; they identified a need for the educational conditions (in terms of personnel and materials), for the development of factors that promote the equalisation of opportunities (extracurricular activities, after-school activities, certain forms of social supply, development of teaching competencies) in the integrating schools. Teachers are not suitably prepared to treat students having various disabilities. In higher education these deficiencies are only more emphatic. Given the above, schools are unable to exert an impact on mitigating the difference in opportunity dividing students. This could be the reason why so many „drop out” and abandon their studies, why so few with disabilities manage to complete their secondary schools. This sad fact, however, may have a host of other causes. Many young people are prevented from the opportunity to make individual advances in life through education by the social status of their families, or by their own physical disabilities. Statistical figures indicate that people living with disabilities have a significantly lower level of education than the average population. School-age children with special educational needs complete their elementary training in segregated or specialised institutions that have the methodology and tools to cater for special educational needs therefore most of them can satisfy the academic requirements. However, only very few of those completing elementary school advance to the next level of educational achievement. One of the reasons is that the number of secondary schools that have specialised in the teaching of students with different disabilities is low. Most students do not select secondary schools on the basis of what they would like to learn, but simply select the institution that has the most appropriate infrastructure to cater for their needs. (Accessibility ramp, computers with screen readers for the visually impaired, or infocommunication for the people with hearing impediments). There are young people who insist on their visions and start their secondary education under integrated academic frameworks. Secondary school students from secondary schools that keep an eye on their special educational needs and can also provide the right training conditions are better prepared to start their higher education programmes.
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Figure 2: Forms of education-training in public education Higher education: integrated Secondary school: full integration Secondary school: partial integration Vocational school: full integration Vocational school: partial integration Elementary school: segregated/integrated/inclusive Source: Self-edited figure
One of the consequences of undereducation is that the labour market narrows down for people with disabilities who are, in return, further distanced and removed from the reality of leading a full life of self-sustenance. That is also one of the reasons why it is important to exploit the opportunities in the education and training system to enable people living with disabilities to obtain higher school qualifications and marketable professional skills. Intellectual work or participation in higher education may be a better alternative for talented young people with disabilities instead of physical work. Owing to the legal regulatory framework, more and more young people living with disabilities finish school with a secondary school-leaving certificate, which is their possible entry ticket to university or college studies. Exceptions include the group of mentally handicapped who cannot participate in higher education. According to the figures of 2008, 1658 students were engaged in higher education. Figure 3: Distribution of students by type of disability 2008
Source: 2008 statistical figures of the Ministry of Education and Culture; self-edited figure
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Education being the most appropriate means in the promotion of human rights Everyone has a basic and fundamental right to choose to continue learning in further education. This requires not only effective help from society, but the availability of a circle of well-trained secondary-school teachers. For individually-tailored, receptive, and specialised education-training complete with assistance is already essential in secondary schools as it can provide the proper basis for further education in higher education institutions. Candidates may be exempted from certain subjects already in their secondary school years, or be imposed alternative study requirements, perhaps be allowed to use some permitted means of assistance and give account of their knowledge under personally-tailored conditions in view of their impediment. This practice must also be pursued further in higher education. During their studies and exams, they must be allowed to avail of their rights, to request the institution to give them partial or full exemption from exams, be allowed to exchange certain subjects, or be given permissive assistance in exams; all this, however, cannot mean that the prescribed requirements are not to be met. All this requires assistance and guidance from the families, peers, teachers, administrators, and friends to enable students with disabilities to successfully complete all the tasks relating to the academic studies they had voluntarily undertaken. Figure 4: Increase in the number of students with disabilities in higher education
2002/2003 271
2007/2008 1176
2008/2009 1658
2010/20 2134
Source: KSH - NEFMI data (2011)
The increase in the number of students is a much welcomed fact, but (taking the positive legal regulatory framework) the aim should not only be to enrol as many people living with disabilities in higher education, but also to give them competitive knowledge and skills. The satisfaction indexes of students with disabilities according to a study Although the appropriate provisions of the regulatory framework ensure equal access to learning, there are deficiencies in practical implementation. In order to explore deficiencies, the Ministry of Education and Culture launched a questionnaire study in cooperation with the Association of Hearing-Impaired Intellectuals in
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the field of education, training, and employment market. The aim of the survey is to explore the experiences and opinions of people living with disabilities about education and the labour market. Survey results indicate that students with disabilities were extremely happy to have their problems listened to and in 2005 their enrolment in higher education was guaranteed by law, i.e. no person can be denied access to higher education on the grounds of disability. They also agreed that if they cannot fulfil the requirements of their chosen faculty because of their disability, the institution may recommend concerned people to change their chosen study faculty. They accept and hope that this will not prevent them from being admitted. As regards the chances of getting into higher education, they expressed that students who have the best chances of getting into higher education are ones that completed their secondary studies in a fully integrated institution, possess appropriate level of knowledge and have a supportive family. Respondents emphasised that they were seeking no sympathy from the environment for having a disability, but were rather in need of assistance. As regards accessibility of buildings, they are of the opinion that improvement is constant. Entry points are usually accessible but there is a need for greater level of accessibility within the buildings. Sometimes this may even restrict the scope of available subjects to choose from. Infocommunication technology is also showing signs of improvement. In certain institutions, digital books are already available, while in others, access even to basic learning materials (coursebooks, supplementary materials) is limited. Higher education institutions are not sufficiently prepared to receive people living with disabilities even when the candidates have been given the green light by the expert and rehabilitation committee or the educational counsellor - a permission they attach to their applications (in compliance with the stipulations of the legal provisions). Having this information available to the institutions should enable them to prepare for the reception of students with disabilities. The room for improvement in terms of accessibility is reinforced and confirmed by the statistics of the Ministry of Education and Culture. Only 20% of public institutions satisfied the accessibility criteria imposed (previously) by the law before 1 January 2005 (MEC 2006). The next deadline was set for 1 January 2010. Although the results were better, and access to the main building of public institutions is usually ensured, accessibility criteria inside the buildings are not always satisfied. Their recurring excuse for the violation of the law is scarcity of resources. It must also be known that accessibility and equal opportunities can also be achieved by means other than changing the material and objective environment; the inclusive (receptive) attitude of mainstream society is also very important. Students have expressed a need for more advice and assistance from the teaching staff. Students have little information on the type of activities they will be allowed to perform after the acquisition of their diplomas in consideration of their
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particular individual possibilities and needs. It was also a recurring complaint that the teachers, students and all parties who were involved with students living with disabilities through their activities generally tended to be misinformed of the group they were dealing with. Having a lack of correct and sufficient information, the majority of teachers are aversive to students with disabilities as they have no idea how to relate to them. It is a positive sign though that more and more students with disabilities seek the institutional coordinator - a new post stipulated by the law - who, beside personal assistance, can arrange for the students to receive a whole range of support. Students also find it comforting to know that the coordinator is now also asked to participate in the work of the committee that judges the applications for exemption from exam submitted by the students with disabilities. Students have also expressed a need for preference to be given in the coordinator selection process to the person who can display some experience in their educational careers or studies with people living with disabilities. The survey also helped confirm that in order for any young person with a disability to become a university or college student, it requires exceptional self-determination from the student, and tremendous help and organisational capacities from others. In this, intellectual parents with secondary or tertiary education have proved most effective. In the interest of successful future social integration, equal vindication of rights and attainment of goals, it is necessary to make adult education more accessible and also to expand the range of special knowledge on disabilities in higher education - particularly in teacher training. However, it will no longer suffice to focus attention only on students enrolled in higher education. It is important to provide information to to-be students on the opportunities available at the training institutions, such as: • the conditions of accessible environment, • the availability of special personnel and equipment to counteract the disadvantages inherent in the disability. It is surprising that despite all this, the enrolment of students living with disabilities in university/college is showing a rising trend (figure 4); however, the result against the academic qualifications of the entire population is still considerably poorer. Equal level of knowledge - equal chances? The situation of students in higher education with disabilities is not an easy one. The majority of higher education students with disabilities manage to acquire their pre-degree certificate stating that all courses have been covered, but - lacking foreign language skills - they often cannot get their final degrees for years thereafter. There are some, who - despite their disabilities and endowed with perseverance, will, and
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knowledge - manage to succeed. They are our pride and joy; they, who have managed to make a nice career despite their handicap. They include legal professionals living with disabilities; one of them is an EU MP, the other one is a national MP; but there are also young university graduates working as IT engineers, government officers, recognised teachers, or acclaimed public servants. They have succeeded; they are the fortunate selected few. Nevertheless, the employment figures indicate that people with disabilities are not given the chance to engage in higher ranked jobs even if they posses the right qualifications; i.e. the principle of equal opportunities is not upheld in employment. Opportunities on the labour market Participation in the labour market by people with disabilities is exceptionally and extremely difficult because they are the most susceptible group to social exclusion. The labour market opportunities of people with disabilities are much affected and limited by the extent and type of disability they suffer from. Further determinant factors are: economic situation, the supply and demand sides of the labour market, the rate of unemployment and employment, and the shortcomings of the education system. Access to integrated education is insufficient, accessibility is not always achieved. The number of professions is limited; the majority of them do not meet market expectations and employer needs. In addition to this, prejudice against people with disabilities is still evident both on the labour market and all areas of life. Dissecting the labour market disadvantages, Őry (2005) came to the conclusion that lacking appropriate computer skills, people with lower qualifications can hardly find themselves jobs today. This is due to the fact that at the lower levels of the education system, computer skills are scarcely taught even though having computing skills is virtually a must for all modern men. It would therefore be important to introduce - at least basic - computing courses and to retrain employees disadvantaged by a disability. It may be true that integration is secured by the laws on equal opportunities and the rights of people living with disabilities; nevertheless, their presence on the labour market is only marginal except in the protected professions. Today participation on the labour market usually requires higher qualifications, at least a school-leaving examination. Employees with elementary-school education or less are much worse off. It is a fact that the school qualifications of people with disabilities is much lower than the average (Csereklei-File 2007), therefore in most cases they can only afford to get badly paid, low status and unstable jobs. The larger share of active earners are engaged in physical work, skilled or unskilled labour. One of the most severe problems of modern market economy (Őry 2005) is unemployment. When coupled with inflation, it presents an exponential problem
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– particularly at a time of economic crisis – for employers and all parties with an interest in reducing unemployment. The number of employers that are willing to employ people with disabilities is also low even when the candidates for the job have completed their studies with excellent results. Unfortunately, stemming from deeply embedded prejudice, they think people with disabilities cannot perform to the same extent as someone who is not disabled. We must ensure that the education system we offer be an integral part of their environment, ensure that it can throb in harmony with the social and economic world around them, and which preserves old values while also serving the fast changing (and often contradictory) interests of the environment. Beside having its old function of imparting scientific knowledge, the education system is increasingly tasked with channelling people with disabilities into the realm of labour and keep them there long-term; i.e. with giving as many people as possible a chance to use their acquired skills and make a decent living. It is common knowledge that the employment of people with disabilities or altered work ability and the vindication of equal opportunities is much stronger in the European Union than in Hungary. Hungary’s EP MP with a hearing impediment, Ádám Kósa, highlighted in his speech on the mobility and social inclusion of European people with disabilities that in the treatment of employment policy challenges the employment market integration of the more than 80 million disabled people will be an issue requiring urgent attention in an ageing Europe. For a citizen of a democratic state to be successful in his private life and the realm of labour, he needs to have appropriate knowledge. One of the fundamental preconditions of getting into or having a good position on the labour market is participation in education and training. The exclusion of people living with disabilities fro the labour market has severe economic disadvantages, for this very reason, Hungary must also aim to achieve employment figures similar to that of the EU. Bibliography 1. 2. 3. 4.
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A jövő útja – Távmunka (2002): MEOSZ OTTI publication, Bp. Andrásné-Jászi, É. (2006): Segítsünk közösen, Fogyatékossággal élő hallgatók a felsőoktatásban, OKM Informative Publication Andrásné Teleki, Judit (2008): Fogyatékossággal élők társadalmi beilleszkedésének lehetőségei, oktatás, képzés, munkaerő-piaci foglalkoztatás kérdésköreinek vizsgálata, (OKM professional material) Bánfalvy, Csaba (2008): Az integrációs cunami, Tanulmányok a fogyatékos emberek iskolai és társadalmi integrációjáról, ELTE-EÖTVÖS Publisher/Children and disability in transition in CEE/CIS and Baltic states (UNICEF, 2005).
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20 5. 6. 7. 8.
9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15. 16. 17. 18.
Andrásné Teleki Judit Bernáth, Gábor (2008): Esélyegyenlőség, deszegregáció, integráló pedagógia: egy stratégia elemei, Budapest, Educatio Társadalmi Szolgáltató Kht., p.110. Chikán, Csaba (2001): Esélyegyenlőség fogyatékosság. MEOSZ, Bp. Csereklei, G.- File, Sz. (2007): Egyenlő jogok, egyenlőtlen esélyek, Gyorsjelentés a fogyatékosok helyzetéről, Mozgóvilág, Vol. XXXIII. Issue 5. p.17-21. Mayer, József (2003): Esélyt teremtő iskolák, Iskolai törekvések a hátrányos helyzetűek tanulási kudarcainak leküzdésére, Országos Közoktatási Intézet Felnőttoktatási és Kisebbségi Központ, Bp. Gábor, Kálmán (2000): Társadalmi átalakulás és ifjúság – A szabadság, mint esély? BELVEDERE, Szeged Györgyi, Zoltán (2009): Képzés és munkaerőpiac, (manuscript) Ignácz, Beáta (2003): A fogyatékos emberek Európába mennek MEOSZ HUNGARY Bp. p.128. Erdősi, Sándor (2001): Az eszmény, a törvény, a tradíció és a feltételek a közoktatás megújulásában – Különös tekintettel az ép és a fogyatékos gyermekek együttnevelésére. In: New Pedagogical Review Vol. 54. Issue 7-8. p.3-7. Kanyik, Cs. - Némethy, Sz. - Sziklai, I. (2000): A munka biztonsága a rehabilitációs foglalkoztatásban: A fogyatékos személyek foglalkoztatási körülményeiről, Új Mandátum Magyarországi Krízis Intervenciós Központ Egyesület, Bp. Kálmán, Zs.–Könczei, Gy. (2002): A Taigetosztól az esélyegyenlőségig. Osiris, Bp. Kézdi, G.–Surányi, É. (2008): Egy sikeres iskolai integrációs program tapasztalatai: a hátrányos helyzetű tanulók oktatási integrációs programjának hatásvizsgálata 2005 – 2007. Bp. Educatio p. 130. (Padtárs) Kőpatakiné Mészáros, Mária (2004): Közben felnő egy elfogadó nemzedék, New Pedagogical Review, Vol. 54. Issue 2. p.38-48. Németh, György (2001): Utak és lehetőségek az egyenlő esélyek megteremtésére, Szociális párbeszéd az ezredforduló Magyarországán. SzCsM Bp. OKM 2005-2008. statistical data Őry, Mária (2005): Hátrányos helyzetű csoportok helyzete a munkaerő-piacon, Felnőttképzési Kutatási Füzetek 2. Bp. NFI, 2005. Study, p.48. Internet resources
http://www.ksh.hu Date of download: 03/10/2011 http://www.fogyatekos.lap.hu Date of download: 14/10/2011 http://www.nefmi.gov.hu Date of download: 17/10/2011
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LEISURE TIME AT CAMPUSES – EDIFICATION OF A FOCUS GROUP EXAMINATION Bocsi Veronika1 Abstract University as an organizational unit is an extremely complicated system, which tries to organize and frame several elements of students’ way of life or just creates the opportunities to pursue different forms of activities. And although the primary field of campuses’ operation is not directed towards the sphere of leisure time, based on the interviews it seems that in students’ way of life, while experiencing their identities, informal activities are at least as emphatic as duties and tasks related to studies. Our qualitative analysis, however, points out the fact that integration into the medium of university reaches the depth we presumed in advance neither in the field of leisure time, nor in other dimensions. Among the interviewees of the four focus groups organized by us there were hardly any students who said that university as lifestyle organizing and contact medium would play an exclusive role in their life. Several factors may influence the degree of integration into the organization and the impact of organizational existence on students’ way of life and its degree might be individually different – at the same time certain relations can be drafted based on the edifications of the interview research. Characteristic features of the sending and receiving media (e.g. number of students, location of faculties) may account for it, but it is very strongly connected to the quality and sustainability (e.g. geographic distances) of student relationship network brought from earlier, beyond the borders of the university. Nevertheless, the most important edification of our analysis is probably the following: in Ziller’s interpretation university these days can be defined rather as an open organization, where in several cases students have only ‘one foot’ inside – the majority of their activities stretches beyond the borders of the campus, and they often take part in their human relationships not with their whole personality, but merely with a section of it (even if the common activities can be interpreted rather at the level of primary groups, e.g. entertainment, sport). Students’ networks and freetime structures seem to be extremely structured, their focal point being often outside the campus, or the location of the specific thickening points seem to be diffuse. This superficial integration is connected to the fact that the organization rather provides frame-like conditions for their way of life and induces certain shifts which are necessary to fulfil the requirements, but do not show profound effects that change the whole mentality and life guide. Keywords: freetime, higher education, organisational sociology Assistant professor of University of Debrecen, Faculty of Child and Adult Education Department of Institutional Management and Leadership, Hungary 1
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Introduction Higher education as a field for research offers several themes of examination for the experts. On the other hand mapping the leisure time habits of university students is not one of the most researched fields – nevertheless, we can enumerate several arguments to support the fact why more attention should be paid to this theme. The aim of this study is also to see the broad relations in this seemingly peripheral theme of research, which lead us to the world of youth sociology, lifestyle and higher education research. One of the starting points of our train of thought is the interpretation of the university as an organizational unit, which is hoped to enrich the main line of bearing of leisure time research with a new perspective. In our writing first we will review the relevant theories and trends, and then we will describe certain characteristics of student leisure time in details. As our next step we are going to examine all the previously mentioned themes from the point of view of organizational sociology, while the empirical part of our analysis contains the first results of the processing of focus group interviews realized within the frames of ‘Campus-lét’ Research2 led by Prof. Szabó Ildikó. The focus group interviews were conducted by the author of the study in the spring of 2011 at four faculties of the University of Debrecen. They were the following: Faculty of Arts, Faculty of Child and Adult Education, Faculty of Economics and Business Administration, Faculty of Informatics. This latter faculty worked in Egyetem (University) Square when the interviews were conducted. The sampling was based on the results of earlier research (Bocsi 2008) mapping student leisure time. The results showed that these faculties have got special characteristic. We chose one departmen at every faculty. At least for students took part in a focus group. General description of student leisure time Based on the student time budget of Regional University3 research (N=952) in 2005 we can conclude that time expenditure of activities related to studying seems to be rather high, moreover if we sum up the values obtained (373 minutes) we get considerable time expenditure even compared to paid, productive labour displayed in KSH’s table of employed people. And if we add students’ work-like activities to it, the amount of fixed periods of time exceeds 400 minutes per day. Nevertheless, the length of time devoted to household chores (on average 43 minutes) is far behind Hungarian society’s total and the data of KSH’s student group. The block of activities pursued freely (relaxing, reading, social life, hobby, watching TV – on average 329 minutes per day) might as well appear here to fill this hiatus. Compared to the Campus-lét a Debreceni Egyetemen: Csoportok és csoportkultúrák Hungarian Scientific Research Fund (K 81858), 2010-2012. 3 NKFP-26-0060/2002. 2
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values of Hungarian society the estimated length of time of reading (49 minutes) can be regarded as high, while the length of hours-minutes (77 minutes) spent with watching TV can be regarded as low. Following the turn of the millenium the length of time spent in front of the computer appears as a separate unit – it amounted to 104 minutes per day in 20054 (Bocsi 2008). Research results concerning leisure time point out that activities related to the Internet (sending e-mails, surfing the net, etc.) are among the most frequently pursued daily activities, while elements related to the classical, university student’s lifestyle are either in the middle region of the list (e.g. reading literary works, reading specialized literature) or at the end of it (e.g. other high cultural forms of activities). Therefore we can obviously experience a shift that has launched the sphere of leisure time towards a much ‘lighter’ and more modern direction (Bocsi 2011). Kovács’s survey, which was conducted on the database of Campus-lét Research, also refers to the change of classical student image, and among the different leisure time types only one could be corresponded to the ‘traditional’ university student’s lifestyle (going to parties, preferring elite culture, sociable, going to pubs, fitness-wellness oriented) (Kovács 2011). Issues raised by organizational sociology If we examine the above mentioned issues from the point of view of organizational sociology, we are going to focus on three groups of problems when analysing the interviews. So first we are going to focus on the following issue: what organizational form can campus as a field of life be identified with. A formal organization is given in advance, although this means a field cut up by different settlements and buildings, and by structures of faculties and subjects. The system of informal social networks, which can break these fault lines, must also be kept in view. The number of students at the University of Debrecen, which exceeds 30 000 people, may also refer to the fact that the system itself will be diffuse and will have a fragmented construction. Ziller distinguishes two types of groups: he writes about open and closed groups. Open groups are characterised by changing membership, short time perspective, changing norms and a smaller authority lying on members, while closed groups can be characterised as their opposite (Váriné 1987). We reckon that university as a whole functions as an open group, among the units of which students will move more or less freely. The other issue which is raised by our research, and which is related to the connection between organizational sociology and student leisure time, starts from group development models. The formation of common values and norms that can be experienced in groups leads through several steps from the initial chaos to these spheres appearing to be organized. If we project it on leisure time, Based on the questionnaire data collection of Campus-lét Research from 2010 (N=2384) the estimated time expenditure of students using the Internet was 196 minutes per day on average.
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we presume that elements related to leisure time also appear in the field of norms and values, so in the period of ‘norming’ they are formed and in the last stage of the development we must handle them as rooted elements. Group norms related to leisure time may affect freetime activity forms which are to be favoured, the scene of freetime activities and also the cultural contents. Norm formation related to leisure time and taking place within the campuses is presumed to be mostly of explicit character, that is putting down rules the mass of which have not been put in writing and cannot be sanctioned (Málovics 2006), and on the other hand it is the starting point of students’ sphere of life, and this is where the peculiar organizational sociological quality of the world of campuses lies. If student socialization exists (Pusztai 2010), it has to be a leisure time projection. Our third issue to be raised examines how big the set of leisure time is that students spend within the organizational frames of the campus. If university is defined as an open institution, it is also presumed that strands of freetime activities often exceed its limits and the inner fault lines of the organization. It is also questionable what activities are placed beyond the limits of the organization and why. We would also like to pay extra attention to the following question: what it depends on which factors shift the specific groups (major, grade) and specific students within or beyond the limits of the campuses in relation to freetime activities. The result of analysing focus group interviews Like integrating into all organizational frames, integration into university campuses may pose challenges to the individual. The more challenges there are, the bigger the difference is between the characteristics of the sending medium and the world of university (shift between secondary school and university, familiarization with a new settlement or possibly a new country, leaving the parental home). Of course the process of integration does not happen in the sphere of leisure time, as the first steps are the formal organizational frames and familiarizing with the campus as a field of life. In general we can say that integration was considerably easier for those students who used to live in a dormitory or for whom taking care of themselves was not a big challenge (managing money, meals, etc.). ‘For me university was a completely new thing, and it is a different country as well … It is a completely different town with zero acquaintance. At the beginning it was unusual for me and I can say that I needed two or three months to learn the important things.’ (Faculty of Informatics) ‘Well, I felt really awful at the freshers’ camp, I didn’t know anyone and I nearly always cried. It was very bad, I constantly wanted to go home. The first semester
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was difficult, because I didn’t know what to do.’ (Faculty of Econonics and Business Administration) Students get over the first period of integration, which is practically similar to culture shock, in a few weeks, but real integration when a sense of convenience is developed needs some months. Certain persons and events make the process more easily performable for students – some of the students mentioned the freshers’ camp and the students, senior acquaintances, roommates and flatmates they got to know there. The most important information related to studies, life guide and lifestyle-entertainment comes from them in many cases. University as a formal organization with its own information flow, rules and the opportunities provided by it is only slowly becoming a ‘livable’ field for the students, however, even around the middle and the end of BA studies, its transparency is still problematic in certain cases. ‘The information flow is different. Because at the high school they drummed everything into our head, that now you should do it in this way, you should hand in that one … And now we have been informed rather late in connection with the internship and every lecturer shifts the responsibility. I go down to the Registrar’s Office, then they say I should go up to this person, so I go up, but then I’m sent down to the Registrar’s Office again.’ (Faculty of Econonics and Business Administration) One of the fundamental factors influencing integration is the location of the faculty within the campus, and the number of students and the possible way of dividing the groups at the specific majors. Concerning location we can state that the Faculty of Arts and the Faculty of Informatics are in central position (in the main building of the university or close to it), while the Faculty of Economics and Business Administration in the Kassai Street campus of the university forms a separate unit together with the Faculty of Law. The Faculty of Child and Adult Education, however, is in a completely special situation, as it is located in Hajdúböszörmény, and in many respects it is a far cry from the main line of bearing of the university (it is true concerning both the organizational frames and the possible loss of the opportunities provided by the ‘big university’).5 At the same time because of the distance and the fact that the majority of students commute to the faculty from Debrecen travelling also provides opportunities to strengthen personal relationships. On the whole, in spite of the territorial dismemberment human relationships often cross the dividing lines between faculties, it is true, however, that these ties are mostly friendships originated from the secondary In the course of the interview the students of the faculty mentioned definite examples that in theory offer the opportunity for each student to play a sport or drive a car for instance, at the same time due to the faculty being separated students did not manage to take advantage of these possibilities or they would have required too much trouble.
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school and family relationships constructing along roommates (in the dormitory) and flatmates (in a rented flat) and they only sometimes mean spontaneously created and newly formed, strong ties.6 The number of students at the specific majors also leaves its mark on group formation – a major starting with 180-200 students in the first year, which is made even more diffuse by the introduction of credit system, cannot be compared to a group of 15 students. Based on the focus group interviews the process of norm formation seems to be a linear process in smaller majors, while in majors with a large number of students we may face the tendencies of possibly changing group divisons starting again and again. In other cases the smaller number of students did not guarantee group cohesion (in this research the focus group organized at the Faculty of Arts was like this). In the students’ words, ‘We have not been one company from the beginning. There are just 15 of us, but still not.’ ‘At our faculty the group formed in the freshers’ camp has completely split up based on the different specializations. I’m really in good terms with people I haven’t even talked earlier but I hardly meet those I have had a good relationship with, we have no common lessons… We are included in more than one set at the same time, and this small circle changes every semester.’ (Faculty of Econonics and Business Administration) ‘You may know everybody, but it is not sure that a deeper relationship is created. If you know someone, that person also knows someone and in this way you can get from one side of the lecture room to the other, based on acquaintance. Of course, there are smaller groups that stick together more.’ (Faculty of Informatics) So the process of integration depends on quite a lot of factors, and the formal frames of the university may account only for a section of them. The strength of ties to the sending medium, and in the case of smaller majors students’ personality and the possibility to harmonize them are essential.7 So that we will be able to take sides about our hypothesis concerning Ziller’s establishment, the university’s role of structuring lifestyle and relationships The different worlds of life created by faculties are also perceived by students and they occasionally draft their statements in a way that inclines to stereotypes: ‘Students with haversack (referring to students attending the Faculty of Arts) don’t come here.’ ‘Info students (referring to students attending the Faculty of Informatics) go square (in their freetime). Do you know any info students? No.’ (Faculty of Econonics and Business Administration) 7 One of the students who arrived from a major/faculty with a larger number of students to a smaller group drafted this in the following way: ‘I fundamentally don’t like this mass educational form. You say that students inside the ‘big university’ don’t know each other, but they do, that’s why I love to come here. I also knew who entered building ‘C’ at nine o’clock in the morning, and I could also say if a particular person was here or there at that time. Because education inside is not humane, to say the least. It can make you really nervous after a while.’ 6
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is an essential consideration for us. It is a general opinion about the constraints at university that they are much less demanding than the secondary school years, even if the lifestyle formed in this way is hectic, and has completely different characteristics during the term-time and the examination period. In majors with a large number of students they have the possibility to create their own timetable, even if students cannot take advantage of this instrument sometimes, due to the system being overloaded (or because there is no more place to fill in the most popular groups). Most students have only one major, the intensity of their attending the lessons is changing – in most cases receiving the diploma is also possible if we significantly reduce the time within the formal organization. Some of the students have so-called ‘days off’ during the week, when they avoid even going to the university in most cases. Students decide on the timeframe beyond their constraints and subsitence, which can be regarded as the sphere of leisure time – the length of which is on average 4-5 hours a day based on the estimations mentioned during the interviews. Nevertheless, its quantity is hectic: on certain days there are lessons from 8 o’clock in the morning till late in the evening, and on other days there are no lessons at all. This relative freedom is considerably changed by examination periods and the weeks before the examination session. On the whole we can say that university provides students with a certain framework for their way of life, but students are given some degree of latitude within this framework. ‘We manage our own time. So we decide what we want to do and when. This is no more the same life full of restrictions, but it’s me who organize it, the way things should happen and then if I don’t do it well, I’ll have to pay the price.’ (Faculty of Informatics) ‘I’ve just told my girlfriend the other day that I can’t even imagine to sit there every day from half past seven in the morning to two o’clock in the afternoon. It seems awful if I think back to it. Compared to that now I have a really lax timetable, concentrating everything in just a few days. Now my life is better, I’m not so overloaded.’ (Faculty of Arts and Humanities) ‘For me night and day completely change in the examination session. Especially if that day is right before the exam or I have more than one exam a week. At that time night and day completely change, and then night and coffee, night, night, studying, coffee. And in this way there is no sleep.’ (Faculty of Informatics) In the field of human relationships we can see the following picture drafting in front of us: a significant part of students’ friendly relationships originates from their secondary school years, so they establish their system of relationships at the university beside this, parallel with it. They maintain certain forms of entertainment and activities unanimously for their old friends – these are the
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strands leading very often beyond the borders of other faculties. Cultivating old friendships intensively (even if during the years a certain degree of erosion can be experienced in this field) is especially typical of faculties having less strong group cohesion, but even at the faculty in Hajdúböszörmény, which has a significant group cohesion, only a few students said that their relationships mostly connect them to the university.8 All things considered we can say that the world of campuses can be defined rather as an open group, where students often seem to be taking part in the life of formal-informal groups not with their complete personalities. ‘The majority, around 60 per cent (the proportion of human relationships outside the campus). I have a female friend who studies in Pest. If she comes home I spend my time with her. I go to a handball match with another person, I go to eat a piece of cake with somebody else and I play a sport again with some other people.’ (Faculty of Econonics and Business Administration) ‘People’s style is different. Everyone likes something else. If I went to a party I would take completely different people with me. You can do different things with the different people.’ (Faculty of Econonics and Business Administration) Students’ leisure time structure happens parallel with organizational integration – the so-called student socialization can be grasped also in this field, as the system of frequently visited places of entertainment is formed in a few months and a certain level of arrangement can be experienced in some other fields as well. (Not in every case, but in the case of a few faculties it is demonstrative that they prefer specific places of entertainment in Debrecen and the system of department evenings and weeks is also typical.) The world of modern leisure time is a favoured field of this arrangement, which is mostly realized in media consuming habits approaching each other (in most cases it means downloading and watching series) and in the spread of online games in the Faculty of Informatics. It is also frequent that earlier cultural and freetime demands are removed inside the university if the infrastructure required is given – e.g. using the university sports grounds, film clubs, exhibitions. Anyway, it is worth emphasizing that these fields mostly mean popular culture, entertainment and sport, while it is less typical of highcultural activity. The fact that campuses provide only the frames of student leisure time can be interpreted as a characteristic of the open group, but it is yet the result of individual decision whether students take advantage of it or not – the possible norm formation definitely points in the direction of explicit nature. The starting point of shifts happening in the leisure time structure is mostly the network of informal relationships inside the organiThese students typically come from other settlements/regions or their integration into the sending medium was not fortunate.
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zations (mostly inside the majors), students also choose from the opportunities offered by the organizaton crucially based on it – while in most cases they only adjust them to the earlier elements of their lifestyle brought from home and from the secondary school years. Due to this diffuse system of leisure time we cannot talk about a peculiar leisure time structure which is typical of majors and which also provides integration – its elements could be discovered mostly at the faculty in Hajdúböszörmény (which is the most closed unit of the four focus groups). This may probably account for the phenomenon that establishing their own norms was the strongest in this focus group, thus that students do not build their freetime habits on organizational frames within the specific majors, but they themselves construct them. A significant section of students’ structure of activities is outside the faculty in harmony with human relationships exceeding the limits of the campuses. A certain part of the sphere of entertainment, family programs and hobby-like activities typically happen in ‘the outside world’, emphases are placed within the organizational limits of the university in more closed communities (which rarely appear on campuses) or in the case of students living in a dormitory. In the case of this latter group the place of residence is also the territory of the campus, thus the ties should be even stronger. The location of freetime activities is implicitly in agreement with the degree of integration. Spontaneity is also a typical characteristic of student leisure time, which we can see studying the text of the interviews – especially in the case of those students who spend the ‘idle time’ of their structure of activities inside the limits of the campuses. Events that belong to the sphere of leisure time sometimes just happen, occasionally drifting away the students themselves, as well. ‘I have certain weeks when there are parties in the dormitory and we spend our time outside if the weather is good, wandering around all the time and sometimes there is complete chaos for a whole week and then we spend the following week pulling ourselves together, getting up to speed at school.’ (Faculty of Child and Adult Education) Bibliography 1. 2.
3.
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Bocsi, V. 2008. Az idő a campusokon. Felsőfokú tanulmányokat folytató hallgatók időszociológiai vizsgálata [Time on campuses. A time sociological survey of students in higher education]. PhD thesis. University of Debrecen: PhD. Programme of Educational Studies. Bocsi, V. 2011. A szabadidő értékszociológiai meghatározottsága a campusok világában [Value sociological determination of leisure time in the world of campuses]. In: Láczay, M. – Bocsi, V. (eds.), Multikulturális Műhely Tanulmányok I. Hajdúböszörmény: Debreceni Egyetem Gyermeknevelési és Felnőttképzési Kar, 30-40. Kovács, K. 2011. Szabadidő és sport a Debreceni Egyetemen [Leisure time and sport at the University of Debrecen]. Iskolakultúra, 21(10-11) 147-162.
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Málovics, É. 2006. Szervezeti viselkedés II.[Organizational behaviour II.]. Szeged: SZTE Juhász Gyula Press. 5. Pusztai, G. 2010. Hallgatói szocializáció a szerkezetváltó felsőoktatásban [Student socialization in higher education changing its structure]. Thematic presentation. National Conference of Educational Studies. Hotel Benczúr, Budapest, 4-6 November, 2010 6. Váriné, Sz. I. 1987. Az ember, a világ, és az értékek világa [People, the World and the World of Values]. Budapest: Gondolat Press.
4.
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HR research as a reflection of an international study Réka Csutkai1 Abstract At the beginning of 2012 József Poór and his colleagues published their research and defined the change directions of the HR tasks and functions in Hungary. There is a big distance between the scientific knowledge, the researches and the business practices and methods, so the investigation of the University of Pécs links up this distance and I also would like to give some contributions to it. I examine the effect of the political, economical, social and technological changes in the light of the dimensions of strategic, organizational and operation management of the companies and also in dimensions of style, staff, skills and community values. The decisions of the leaders of business organizations during the change management through the work processes, systems, written and unwritten rules and corporate culture influence not only economic events, but also the current and former employees. The change of the tasks and functions of the HR departments in their role undertaken in corporate communication are important factors in the development of the effectiveness, efficiency, human relations and working environment. The responses, given to the effect of the economic crisis and the legislative changes of 2012 year related to the human resource area by the three companies known to me may also point the way forward. Keywords: human resource management, multinationalization, HR departments, research
The research in Hungary - Beginning At the beginning of 2012 József Poór and his colleagues published their research and defined the change directions of the HR tasks and functions in Hungary. The survey made in 74 Hungarian affiliates of multinational companies examined the operating conditions and framework of the human resource ma1 HR manager, Electrolux Lehel Kft. Combi Bottom Factory, Nyíregyháza
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nagement, it is trying to make general conclusions with exploring the new HR trends and to show its future steps. In connection with the Hungarian “multinationalization” we must say that before the political system change in 1988 almost two dozen international enterprises settled in our country, while for the period of 2008, 28 994 companies were registered with the above conditions and their employee stock were around 670700 000 people. This number is the 1/5 of the currently active population, and it is more than 30% of the workers of the competitive sector. Based on the data of the study from 2008 to 2010 period the 74 examined companies according to the owners and the management centre are divided to the following: OWNERSHIP (Countries) Germany USA France Austria Japan Netherlands 12 other countries
% 26 % 24 % 10 % 8% 6% 4% 20 %
The basic question of the research is whether it is possible to globalize the HR, what opportunities and risks carry the transposing of the international, foreign systems without adaptation? While the foreign units with long history HR practices provide the development of their informational and communication technologies, their centralization efforts of the management centers during their operation and the HR consulting / service companies global portfolio offers which help the good mutual cooperation, we also should not forget about the factors that inhibit globalization. A good example for it is the legislation system which is different in each and every country and which is almost impossible to follow, observe and enforce from the foreign centralized centers. The cultural differences which can be seen not only at the negotiating tables but also in the day to day operational work of the workers coming from different countries which is usual in the multi-companies near the characteristics symbolizing the entire company as well.
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Centralisation or Authonomy? According to one of the hypothesis of the research the multinational companies manage their subsidiaries in different ways, so there is no strong HR centralization. According to the research we can not establish a uniform trend, from HR point of view the way of management centralization is different, but in Hungary it is not common that HR decisions would be exclusively in the hands of the Hungarian HR managers. It is closely related to this issue and seeing the results we can say that among the studied the companies it is true the assumption that the local leaders of the affiliates are open for the HR decisions, for the personnel development and in most cases the decisions are made together with the HR manager and the HR team. The HR-information technology and the labor relations areas are the exception and it can be observed a new trend from the service side: it is appeared in the form of outsource and rental companies which offer freelance workforce and in the same time ensure flexibility and cost-effectiveness. On the basis of my previous professional and practical experiences I also started to compare the operation and the characteristics of the Hungarian units of the well-known multinational companies and their HR departments with the investigation and its results made by the researchers of the University of Pécs. I would like to describe the practical realizations of the József Poór and his colleagues research by the control investigation of a Dutch-owned, established by an acquisition, food company, of an Italian driving, renowned fashion company operating as a Brownfield investment textile and plastics factory and a Swedish-owned, in terms of the unit is a Greenfield investment factory by observing their operation, data analysis, making assumptions, rejecting or confirming them. The decisions of the leaders of business organizations during the change management through the work processes, systems, written and unwritten rules and corporate culture influence not only economic events, but also the current and former employees. I examine the effect of the political, economical, social and technological changes in the light of the dimensions of strategic, organizational and operation management of the companies and also in dimensions of style, staff, skills and community values. The life path of the organizations, the effect and the reflection of changes of the management attitude can greatly influence the organization itself and the individual from one side and the efficiency, the results orientation from the other side and all of these are strongly influenced by the management style.
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The change of the organizational culture affects the overall functioning of the organization, because if any component of a system changes, then it results changes in the whole system. The overall aim of the theoretical approach and of my own study in this topic is to seize the changes of the HR functions and of the new organizational culture formed in the period after the economic changes due to the rationalization steps of the transformed or established business organizations. Examples of the real life Dutch, Italian, Swedish. Acquisition, Brown field investment, Green field investment. There are Hungarian production facilities of three multinational companies. What is common: they all undertake production work they are operating in the industry not in the service market. It is carried on the production activity in the most traditional sense of this expression including all basic and service activities. In my work I reflect on the research of József Poór and his colleagues made for years on the Faculty of Economics at the University of Pécs and especially on their interview-based survey analysis made between April and November 2010 by comparing the examined companies with their hypotheses. The target group of the analysis is the affiliates doing production activities in Hungary I wish to present in details three of such units by examination of the rationalization, the aspects of the crisis management in leadership, culture and HR. József Poór and his colleagues conducted research in 74 companies by interviews and questionnaire, on benchmarking basis. The research ended in 2010 focused on 9 concrete fields, besides the respondent’s and the organisation’s data the questions touched the HR area as well, which were the following: • the importance of its functions and the result indicators • central (the management center of the multinational companies) and local (the affiliate) HR roles • the competences of the HR managers • expats in the affiliates • external HR resources • knowledge management in HR • the future tasks of HR. The empirical studies extended to five major themes, besides the earlier mentioned organizational description which is the basis of all investigations, also the key indicators of the HR work, its main characteristics, the future of the HR and the personal information about the respondent (colleagues, tasks and competences).
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In this article I would like to emphasize only some elements of the research which could be important in terms of future orientation. The histories of the companies provide the answer for the foreign capital investments, the Dutch investors came in the first wave after the political changes, while the Italian light industrial multinational company taking the advantage of the strong government support started its operation in the second wave between 1996 and 2000. From the strategic and competitiveness aspects the 54% of respondents defined their strategy along the stability and efficiency while the growth as the goal were typical for the 40% in the study of Poór and his colleagues. 32% of respondents are planning staff reduction and rationalization. Among the examined companies, the unit working in the field of clothing and plastics is trying to increase significantly the production turned to the specified market of the Far East and in the machine construction is also aimed at the enlargement by innovation, new products introduction and focusing more on the market needs. As many companies in the FMCG sector, the dairy industry also decide to make reductions and racionalizations with market reduction. During the analysis of the competitive factors it can be observed that in case of the whole sample the financial resources (55%) and the labor (49%) give the strongest basis for the operation of the company, while 32% originates its success from the leaders of the organisation and the knowledge of the management and 27% from the used technology. The market-leading products or other categories appeared in significantly less cases. If in case of the food company the market leader product represents the competitive edge that keeps the company on the Hungarian market, than for the company working in the machine construction the capital and the financial security give the background for crisis management. The plastic manufacturing unit sees its competitive advantage in the workforce because besides their proven with serveral years of experience colleagues, the Hungarian labor market offered contract work or the network of the subcontractors though they are not the company’s own employees but play in high-torque. The operation of the HR department Among the interviewed by the University of Pécs 74 companies the responsibilities of the central HR area of the mother company ranges on a very wide palette, but at the 74% it is also the responsibility of the mother company’s professionals not only the auditing and the supervisory role but the definition of
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the general guidelines, the core values of the company culture and the used HR devices. At 40% also in case of adaptation, the free margin between the frame systems and the procedural arrangements came from the senior management and from the company center. Studying the two extreme cases we can speak about total centralization at the 10% while at the 25% about decentralization, the usage of the systems, tools and indicators implemented on the local level. In the Italian company though the decisions affected the entire organisation were defined among the Italian leaders, in terms of the HR, taking into account the frameworks set by production and costs, in a consultative with the local leaders, but they could freely design the elements and assets of the system. The Dutch company – taking care of the solutions rooted in the traditions – based on the western human resource models, made possible the introduction and usage of the systems adopted to the local needs, we can say they gave the so-called free hand to the professionals dealing with staff questions. Thus was established the benchmark, the cafeteria or the employee’s feedback request system, and in this way remained the keeping of the family and sports days as well. The Swedish-owned unit kept a part of the systems used by the predecessor – in case of the blue-collar colleagues – but the centralized control infiltrated on the all HR areas with its systems, tools and databases or replaces step by step the elements with old traditions. After the 2008 crises in case of many functions we can see a complete centralization, with creation a shared service center the processes are started to be consistent across Europe. The aim of the change was to reduce the administrative tasks on the management level and took advantage of the synergies arising from professional conducting of special activities with elimination of the geographical distances. Thus we have arrived to the function change where we can summarise, after the initial creation and compliance of the administrative discipline and its enforcement, the most important task became the development and operation of the systems. The main areas of the work of HR according to the basic pattern, in order of importance are the following (POÓR et al, 2012.): 1. Communication with the employees 2. Remuneration and allowances 3. Human resource planning 4. Talent management 5. Benchmarking 6. Education, training and development 7. Recruitment and selection 8. Labor relations. Observing the operation of the company, its periodicity, the analysts have observed the corporate life cycle models which are similar to the product life cyc-
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le, natural cycle or to the human life cycle. For example, ADIZES (1992) wrote that these cycles are predictable and the management, if diagnoses them in time and precisely determines the current position of the organization, could take protective measures or change the strategy to avoid or mitigate the problems. Since the businesses are not constantly developing but under the influence of the external and internal circumstances they can prosper or stagnate or sometimes even fall back, so based on this cyclicality we should plan step by step our planning, strategy or operation. (JÁVOR, 1993) As the organisations’ path of life is changing, has changed, the HR’s path of life is also changing and according to its support function for the management of the relevant life cycle of the company it should give the most appropriate answers, help and services. In the period before the economic crises, in the phases of growth and stabilization, there were formed new benefit systems on the remains of the old systems which also appropriately used the ecomonic factors that developed the remuneration according to the achieved objectives and the individual performance. For example, in Hungary after the abolition of the 13th month wage, used for a long time, but using this budget it was created the bonus system of the physical workers and the performance appraisal system for the intellectual colleagues. Due to the economic potencial or just to the pressure, the cafeteria or other fringe systems started to develop in the Swedish and Italian units in the pre-crisis period. The introduction, like the market launches, meant bigger tasks, interesting analytical work in the preparatory stage, and it needed a persuasive communication during the introduction itself and later at each organisation we can see the communication system was only needed for the preservation and the administrative background and in case of the new entrants for the description of the system usage. So, in the phase of development, the remuneration issues were in focus like the 2012th minimum wage and the guaranteed minimum wage increase and also the expected wage increase and its compensation, all of these turned the attention to the remuneration questions not only the HR departments and the medium management but the senior management as well. The dispositions of the economical and tax changes, such as, the legislative changes in the vocational training, can also alter the focus points: the contribution to the vocational training will be a mandatory payment and the possibility for the companies to do the training of their employees by involving the training institutions of their choice will be elimitated. Thus the HR professionals and the management will loose such a source by which they could provide an opprtunity for development to their employees and to the company itself besides better skilled, more committed colleagues, also the possibility for innovation.
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And with the 2012th change of the Labour Code besides the communication the question of the labor relations goes forward in the importance ranking as in the majority of the multinational companies, either as the remainder of the earlier acquisition or because of the number of the staff Beside the Work Councils there are also trade unions, that’s why it should happen the revision of the concluded collective agreements, their law harmonization, and also the translation of the economic issues both to the employee and employer sides. In case of the analyzed companies the question of communication and remuneration affects all the areas due to the economic changes ongoing from 2008. The changes in the incomes and fringe benefits have a significant impact on the economy of the companies and of the employees as well. So the required competences in relation to the HR staff is going to change. Dave Ulrich’s two dimensions (the operational-strategic and human-process focuses) role-matrix has also been designed based on the observations of this area. (ULRICH 1997). The current conditions in the multi-companies do not require at all the HR competencies like „Administrative experts” or being in the role of just system operators. The changes need active players who move more cozy in the change management as well. The role of the representative of interests in its relation to the administrative area also declines, in the corporate hierarchies it is shifting towards local levels and groups and towards solving of the everyday human problems, troubles and demands. For example, in the refrigerator factory, those colleagues who carried out besides the Timesheets, also the daily, periodic or special operational, reporting, statistical, system maintenance or contractual issues, were transferred from the HR organization to the operational units. The same trend can be observed in the dairy industry: the strictly administrative activities, the data providers towards the wage department or the administrative issues of the managers and employees are concentrated in the hands of the local contacts. In the Italian company remained the workers performing only these tasks, the traditional, real HR activities were given into the hands of the senior management. In the roles of the change manager and the strategic partner the aspects of the competitiveness maintaining and the steps according to the business criterias came to the fore, so the next period of the HR is characterized by the assertion of the competencies associated with these roles, but the HR manager in all his/her roles has to help his/her staff and organization to achieve efficiency and effectiveness. The issue of the decision-making has also changed in the light of the roles and competencies.
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Although the research data of Poór and his colleagues prop at that the own decision-making responsibility of the HR departments is shifting towards decisions made jointly with the local management taking into account the local interests. The multinational corporations as a response for the second wave of the crisis in many places, like also in the units described by me, in order to keep positions together with strong cost-restrictive measures take centralizing (globalizing-centralizing) steps which affect the company’s local „free hand”, the decision-making powers of the local area managers and the power of the HR, its space for free movement but with keeping in mind the global knowledge sharing and innovation. Conclusions We must be aware of the fact that the economic and social changes which affect the companies and which result changes in the organizational units such as in the human resource departments, also have impact on the lives of individuals. As the employee is a member of an organization the impacts received there spill over to his family as well. His successes, failures, results or disappointments imprinted on his family relations as well. The generation of today plays an important role in the socialization of its children, their attitude to work, in development of the individual, family and organizational culture. As the corporate Santa Claus celebrations have incorporated into the children’s minds of our generation, so the purchase vouchers is coming into the children’s lives today. The generation of today can hear their parents to complain about the minimum wage, the increasing workloads, changing jobs or because of the redundancies. And unfortunately, there is also a generation who has grown up, and did not even see their parents to go to work. That’s why it is important what we will perpetuate, how we treat our colleagues, what we expect, what we offer, how we mark the boundaries. The clear, communicated target system, the regular feedback about the performance and relations can ensure the establishment of the more optimal operation.
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1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15. 16. 17. 18. 19.
Bakacsi, Gy. (2004): Szervezeti magatartás és vezetés, Aula Kiadó, Budapest pp. Bakacsi – Bokor – Császár – Gelei – Kováts – Takács (1999): Stratégiai emberi erőforrás menedzsment. Közgazdasági és Jogi Könyvkiadó, Budapest pp. 239. Chikán A.- Czakó E. (2009): Versenyben a világgal, Akadémiai Kiadó Budapest. Csepeli Gy. (2001): A szervezkedő ember, Osiris Kiadó, Budapest pp. 226-287. De Bono E. (2007): A Hat Gondolkodó Kalap ® A párhuzamos gondolkodás szakaszai, Manager Könyvkiadó, Budapest. Dobák M. (2006): Szervezeti formák és vezetés, Akadémiai Kiadó, Budapest. Dobrai K. (2008): Knowledge-Related Issues in Human Resource Management. Proceedings of the international Conference: „New Trends and Tendencies in Human Resource Management – East Meets West”, Pécs. Farkas F. – Karolinyi M-né – Farkas F. – Poór J. (2009): Az emberierőforrás-menedzsment magyar és közép-kelet európai sajátosságai a Cranet-kutatás alapján in Vezetéstudomány, 2009. 7-8. sz 3-11. Farkas F. – Poór J. (1999): Személyzeti, emberi erőforrás menedzsment, Közgazdasági és Jogi Könyvkiadó, Budapest. Ferge Zs. (2002): A társadalom, amelyben élünk: Mindentudás Egyeteme, előadás ideje: 2002. dec. 09. Gray H.P. (1996): Culture and Economic performance: Policy as an intervening variable, Journal of Comparative Economic 23. Hofstede G. (1997): Cultures and Organisations (revised edition) New Yourk McGraw Hill. Jávor I. – Rozgonyi T. (2005): Hatalom, Konfliktus, Kultúra, KJK Kerszöv, Budapest. Klein S. (1988): Munkapszichológia, SHL Könyvek, Budapest. Klein S. (2004): Vezetés- és szervezetpszichológia. Edge 2000 Kft, Budapest. Kolosi Tamás (2000): A terhes babapiskóta. A rendszerváltás társadalomszerkezete, Budapest, Osiris Könyvkiadó. Losey M. – Meisinger S. – Ulrich D. (2006): A HR jövője Az emberierőforrás-menedzsment perspektivái, HVG Press Kft, Budapest. Poór J. – Farkas F. – Dobrai K. – Karolinyi M-né (2012): Átalakuló emberierőforrás-menedzsment a multinacionális vállalatok magyarországi leányvállalatainál 2008-2009 in Vezetéstudomány 2012. 2. sz. 18-28. Szemes L. – Világi L. (2001): Személyügyi feladatok rendszere, Pécsi Tudományegyetem FEEFI, Pécs.
20. Wheatley M.J. (2001): Vezetés és a modern természettudomány, SHL Hungary Kiadó, Budapest.
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The communicational relations of the adjustment at the workplace Dr. Móré Mariann1 Abstract In our modern age of faster life, the ceaselessly increasing economic environment has changed the culture of work and it has become more acceptable to change jobs more often. According to American surveys the employees between the ages of 18 and 37 change their jobs 10 times. This repeating change of workplace has introduced new tasks to the human managers, to the directors and to the employees as well. An increasing number of new employees are seen at workplaces, who significantly differ concerning their age, their workplace, their education, their social background and their behaviour. To these new employees the change of their workplace is more and more natural, they can also acquire the culture of adjustment during the actual change and they can apply this to their new workplace. The literature discusses the adjustment from various points of view, and I would like to add a further aspect to the current study. Keywords: workplace, validation, adjustments, training
The social aspects of the adjustment The science of management has applied the results of social psychology studying the relationship between the individual and its social environment, it has studied the adjustment at the workplace and the phenomenon of the socialisation. During socialisation the behaviour of the individual modifies in such a way that it sould meet the required expectations. The organisational structure of the socialisation of the workplace means the individual’s adjustment to the organisation. The literature discusses in this respect the adjustment to the expectations of and the operation of the organiassociate professor, Faculty of Child and Adult Education of Debrecen University, Hungary
1
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sation, the establishment of the social relationships within the organisation, the application of the communicational channels and the adjustment to the group at the workplace. The adjustment is regarded as such an interactive process, where the new employee can obtain an overall view of the organisation and becomes the organic part of the structural processes. The introduction to the organisation takes place in three stages: pre-socialisation, adjustment, fulfilling a role and stabilisation. The introduction is realised in the phases of adjustment and fulfilling a role. The critical phase of the introduction is the fulfilling a role, as an individual first has to recognise the role expected from him, and he also has to cope with the task of identifying with this role. The successful adjusment can be assisted by those psychological trainings, which focus on the self-knowledge of the individual, which develop the communicational abilities and help to overcome the psychological burden of the adjustment. At each point of the socialisational process the information plays a pivotal role. The new employees require the following information: task: information on special work requirement role: information on the interpersonal network, on the communicational channels group: information on the direct workgroup, on the atmosphere organisation: information on the organisational structure These pieces of information can only be assured to the new employee if the directors and the HR managers of the organisation are themselves aware of them. Six social techniques regarding the socialisation of the new employees are known, which can influence the organisational results: collective-individual, formal-informal, accidental-sequential, continuous-interrupting, initiating-depriving. The successful adjustment increases the efficiency of the organisation, its stability and it contributes to the balanced social relationships. Following the review of the socialisational approach of the adjustment it can be stated that both the organisational and the social psychology emphasises the interaction of the adjustment, puts the information to the centre but at the same time it does not deal with the communicational relations. The management aspects of the adjustment The reference literature defines the most important activities of the HR management the following way: planning human resources; establishing and studying jobs; recruitment and choosing; development and education of workforce; evaluation of the performance; salary and motivation. The literature dealing with the theoretical questions mentions the adjustment only superficially, or it defines it in connection with the tasks of the management. The special literature dealing with the HR activities, with regard to the practical tasks of the HR, it defines the procedure of the adjust-
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ment in connection with recruitment- employment. The HR organisation appoints the preparation and the coordination of the adjustment as a task. The general phase of the adjustment programme relates to every new employee and focuses on obtaining the following information: introducing the working hours- regulations; introducing the organisational hierarchy; introducing the work safety regulations; meeting the directors; introducing the culture of the workplace. The individual phase of the adjustment puts the emphasis on obtaining the information in connection with the position to be taken on. This phase is realised along with the help of the support of the mentor, whose task is to introduce the new employee to the colleagues and to assist the professional adjustment. The HR literature does not require specific conditions when selecting a mentor, mostly it defines the more experienced and older requirement. We only sometimes come across instructions, which defines what kind of abilities the appointed colleague must have to be able to help the adjustment of the new employee in the most effective and the fastest way. The authors dealing with the topic of HR do not consider the communicational process between the mentor and the new employee and its advantages and disadvantages highly important. The issue of the communicational competencies in connection with the adjustment, and their practical application is discussed in detail by Dajnoki (2009) in the case of the individuals of altered working abilities. In contrast with the reference literature, in Hungary the issue of adjustment appears often as the topic of various HR professional meetings and on professional websites, where the HR directors of the various organisations share their experiences and advice with each other. The professionals believe that the process of adjustment already begins when the job advertisement appears. It is more and more accepted that not only the workplace chooses an employee, but an employee chooses a workplace as well. Certain representatives of the professionals consider the psychological contract highly important, with which the employee describes the behaviour of the managers, the colleagues and that of the whole organisation. The psychological contract is established through interpersonal transactions and it comes before the actual employment contract. Some of the professionals refer to the fact that concerning the adjustment it is essential that the new employee and his direct boss interpret the contracts and descriptions the same way, moreover they make their mutual requirements obvious, thus they acknowledge that the process of the communication, coding-decoding plays a pivotal role during adjustment. As a result, the adjustment programme enables the most educational possibilities, written
material is prepared, and they prepare to meet the infomation-demand. The advisers sum up their practical experiences that the integration of the new
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employees should be assisted from three directions: • • •
assisting social relationships supporting work helping to familiarize with the organisation The assisntance concerning the social relationships means the introduction of the new employee in a fomal or informal way. It creates a possibility to get to know the workplace physically and to clear the roles at the workplace. Formally it can be added with a lunch at the workplace. The support regarding the workplace includes the introduction to the IT system, to the security and workplace safety regulations. The help to get to know the organisation means the introduction of the documentation. According to the practical professionals in the process of the adjustment the direct boss is the most important factor, while the HR people play the role of the internal service. A new method has copped up in Hungary as well in the field of adjustment, namely the coaching. The adjustment coaching unifies the ’on the job’ and ’off the job’ methods. It focuses on the conscious channelling of the internal processes. The coaches believe that spending on the adjustment of the new employee benefits a lot. According to the HR management the theoretical researchers do not consider the adjustment highly important. However, the practical tasks of the organisational HR management already include the adjustment, and the reference books discuss the content and the forms of the adjustment prgrammes. They point out as a speicific task the mentoring, however they judge a mentor from a professional point of view and they do not discuss the communicational relationships during mentoring. The practising HR professionals approach the adjustment with extended methods, however the prevailing method is the educational-theoretical approach. Recently the emphasis on the importance of the social relationships has appeared in the approach and mentality of the counselling companies, moreover they tend to concentrate on the personality of the new employee. The management aspects of adjustment There is plenty of reference literature discussing management, however the various authors define the meaning differently. Recently there has been a debate about management and direction, but despite the opposing approaches it has been agreed upon that management is an activity which aims at influencing the behaviour of the individuals and the groups. The management activities have always included the development of the organisation and the assurance of the long-term operation. Today the human resources have become a more significant and efficient competitive factor, thus when defining the company’s values the importance of the manager dealing with the issue inreases. From the point of view of the adjustment we can consider that
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approach of the management psychology which aims to find an answer to the function in the organisation changes. The requirement towards the manager can be pointed out here, which is called motivting for an enhanced performance. The required manager’s role when forming the work attitude already begins with the employment of the new employee. According to the practising HR professionals and the counsellors the direct manager plays an important role in the process of the adjustment, as he is in a daily relationship with the new employee, he knows the most the tasks of the job and the expectations, he formulates the requirements and influences the members of the group in the interest of the new employee. It can be formulated as an individual purpose that during the process of the adjustment he can express his own management qualities. The modern management theories discuss the increasingly important communication in the life of the managers in great detail. The managers influence the types of communication network in the organisation, the role of the formal and informal communication. There is specific reference literature discussing how to communicate as a manager. Moreover, a company declaring itself counselling or adult-educational type will surely advertise communication training for managers. Adjustment from the individual’s point of view In Hungary before the political changes and many years later as well the new employee was young, freshly graduate and started work in autumn. They were employed on the basis of reference or personal connections, a relative or a friend had already been working there. The HR department at the time did not work out a specific adjustment programme: the new employee received the work-safety regulations from a colleague, who also made them sign the neccesary documents, accompanied them to their working place and trusted them to a more experienced employee. For months nothing was expected from them, with observation they acquired the important elements of the organisational culture and for weeks they did not meet their boss, In the past 10-15 yeras this kind of adjustment system completely disappeared from the structure of companies. The new employees are completely different today. They can arrive at a comapny at any time of the year, not neccesarily freshly graduate, moreover they can have work experience already. They obtain the job via application and they have previously changed workplace several times. Following their signature on the contract, they are not accompanied by anyone, and during the adjustment time they are expected to be able to understand plenty of documents, to be able to communicate with their mentors and to provide results fast. The information needed for adjustment must be obtained by them quickly
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(from written materials, from oral information of more experienced colleagues, from social network), because if they lack these pieces of information they cannot join in the widespread work processes. The employee of the 21st century changes worklpace a lot and belongs to a mixed group concerning sex, age, education and experience. The new employee can be middle-aged or even older, could have spent years without work, can come from a differing cultural background, and their qualifications do not match their would-be job. They can be described by professional knowledge, learning abilities and the need to self-development. Due to the several changes of their workplace they have experienced various adjustment programmes, thus their natural desire is to adjust quickly. If they are left alone in the process of adjustment, they aimt to establish their social network in order to be able to prove their performance and abilities. The adjustment from an individual aspect is realised during the communiation process, the information is delivered in a written (the adjustment handbook might as well be 50 pages, the new employees might as well take an exam in it) or oral way. Their appointed mentor can be of lower qualifications, even a significantly older colleague. They are expected to prove openness, adequate communication skills during the process of adjusment. The communication aspect of the adjustment Following an overall discussion of the various approaches of the adjustment it can be concluded that information plays a pivotal role in the process of adjustment, and this appears in the delivery form and need. The new employee demands information on the work conditions, on the interpersonal network, on the direct workgroup and on the organisational structure. The organisation wants to deliver information in order to adjust the new employee as soon as possible, and for this that working communitiy can be applied, where the new employee will be positioned. This kind of need links together adjustment with the social communication, which involves every relation that exists between a man and their social network. The communication place of the adjusment is the organisation where the specific communication takes place. Dajnoki (2004) refers to the term of the organisational communication as the communicational and informational system between companies, and also within organisations. According to its special form and content. Its characteristics is the great number of written documents and the net of power relations. The communication of the company has become the method of the value-establishment, its classic functions are: informative, motivating, controlling, emotional and integrating. These functions are all related to adjustment. The organisational communication takes place in a social environment, its precision and content are defined by the organisational structure, by the power relations and the organisational network. Noises taking place at this level of communicational processes can be of behavioral and structural origin. Disrupting factor- or
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noise can be considered: the upwards and downwards directed communicational rules, the obligating effect of the lack of work and time and the size of an organisation. The bigger a company is the more time and information is needed for adjustment, thus simplifications and injured content can appear. On the basis of all this, the approach to the adjustment must be added beyond the present discussions. I believe that this kind of mentality can become the basis of the modern methodology of adjustment. Only that type of HR group that takes the individual aspects and communicational approaches into consideration can create such a practice which enables the most effective integration of the employees. It is the decision of the management of the organisation, the choice of HR work group that emphasis is placed on the organisation/position, or on the new employee as an individual in the process of adjustment. The position-based systems the focus is on the organisational/position values, thus the adjustment concentrates on the delivery of the information in connection with the company and the job, a huge number of written documents is typical. The individual-based adjustment programme puts the emphasis on the integration of the new employee. Here the new employee’s adjustment to the organisational culture is highly important. Personal meeting, mentor helps the new employee. Due to the development of the organisational structures the matrix-system, the project groups are more and more significant, where the knowledge of the company’s culture and the social network are important. Those working together do not neccesarily work in the same building, city or country. In a system like this the fast establishment of a soical network plays a pivotal role. In an ideal case, both the organisation based and the individual based approaches form the adjustment programme. The communication has various disrupting factors: generation differences, differences in qualification, cultural problems, lack of time etc. The HR profession should be able to provie answers to the problems of the individuals: • the average employee reads novel-length literary works rarely. Would they be able to be informed from a big written manual? • how much is social web network used at the workplace to inform colleagues? • how does the different cultural environment effect adjustment? • did the multinational companies use the adjustment progarmme of the mother company? • do the generation gap between the new employee and their mentor affect communication? • does the mentor have adequate communication skills? • what expectations does the organisation from the mentor have? informative, counselling, professional? • is the problem of returning to work following a longer period of unemployment obvious?
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• •
how does the increasing speed of work influence the relationships? IT, the various mail-systems can help obtaining information, but is it not too much? • Can e-mail be used effectively to establish relations? However finding the answers cannot be the independent work of the organisational management, as its professional knowledge does not include the search and study. I believe that this issue provides a study field to the reserachers of the organisational activities. There have not been any foreign researches yet. The communicational problems of the generation gap in a family has an extensive reference literature, however a detailed study concerning the differences between the various agegroups has not been written yet. The management problems of the different generations have been discussed by Hamrnill (2005), Lancester and Stillmann (2010), but even these do not discuss adjustment. Lancester and Stillmann (2010) try to reveal the generation gap with regard to expectations and loyalty. The Hungarian publications include the preliminary study of Moré-Kozák (2010) with regard to the different communication habits and demands of the verious generations of the employees. The study of the communication relations of adjustment and the organisational application of the results remain the task of the following years. Bibliography 1.
2. 3. 4. 5.
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Dajnoki (2004): Esélyegyenlőségi emberi erőforrás menedzsment tevékenysége, területei In: Esélyegyenlőségi kommunikációs ismeretek a munka világában - HR. (Szerk.: Székelyné K. E. - Szabó G.), Fogyatékos Személyek Esélyegyenlőségéért Közalapítvány, AduPrint Kiadó és Nyomda Kft., Budapest, 71-114 pp. Dajnoki K. (2009): Esélyegyenlőségi kommunikációs ismeretek a gyakorlatban. In: Esélyegyenlőségi kommunikációs ismeretek a munka világában. FSZEK Budapest. Hamrnill G. (2005): Mixing and Magaging Four Generations of Employees. FDUMagazine 2005 winter/spring, USA. Lancester C.L. and Stillmann D. (2010): The M-factor - How the millennial generation is rocking the workplace. Harper Collins Publishers, New York. Móré M. - Kozák A. (2010): The difficulty of integration at work in different AGE groups of employees. In: VIKEK Közleményei III. évf. 1-2. szám, 9-16 pp.
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REPRESENTATION OF MEN AND WOMEN IN HUNGARIAN EDUCATION Dr. Éva Kovácsné Bakosi PHD1 Abstract During the period of modern education’s development teaching has changed a lot. Both training and the field of work differentiated. The present essay analyzes the time passed since the change of regime from another aspect. This period means not only political era but can also be examined by the change of lifestyle, profession reputation and the development of demography. It is turned out that the emasculation of teaching career is significant. According to the mean of OECD the number of female teachers is the highest in Hungary. The structure of male and female teachers varies depending on where they teach. The number of female teachers is higher in lower education while the opposite is true in higher education and in doctor training. Studying the consequences of this fact we also have to examine the differences and results of male and female career, the motivations of profession and first of all the way how the ratio of sexes could be developed, changed. Keywords: research of genders, higher education, the emasculation of teaching career in Hungary
Features of women’s employability and emancipation International statistics show that a century after the first women started their education at universities, there was a significant increase in the number of highly qualified female university graduates. According to the 2009 year data of the European Union,2 60% of higher education graduates are women, which shows not only equal chances of the two genders but it also means their incredibly quick recognition. In reality it is not that simple, though, as for several reasons there are still great diffeCollege Professor, dean of Faculty of Child and Adult Education University of Debrecen, Hungary Report of the Comission of European Communities to the Council, the Parliament, etc..: Equality between Men and Women – 2009, Brussels, 2009.2.27. COM (2009), 77. 1 2
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rences between the opportunities of the two genders. The most obvious indicators are in the job sector, in their income and in keeping their traditional role or the lack of it. Gender stereotypes heavily interfere with the professional career of men and women, their employment, and it preserves segregation in the labour market. We intend to shed light on the two features of the latter phenomenon. One of them is the increasing feminization of certain job sectors and professions, and the second is in close connection with it, namely the low number of female leaders, managers as an opposing tendency. These two phenomena can be subject to a joint examination not only in Hungary but also in the European Union, as the ratio of women employed in jobs with higher social prestige, i.e. in economics and politics is still low in the EU, too. It also applies for the number of female public office holders or ministers, but in this there might be differences among the countries. In Hungary it has never been common to have a female minister either before or after the change of regime. Although there have been a few female cabinet members in the government, still the number of women in Parliament and among the leaders of other decision making organisations is very low. It is well presented in the survey on the Hungarian female elite,3 where even in the number of gender samples taken we can clearly see ill proportion which we already referred to before. In the statistical database the ratio of men is 83% while women’s representation is 17%. At the same time, by the complexity of the topic, this survey points out several features that reinforce and frame the facts experienced in education. Discussing the interpretations of ‘elite’ is not in the scope of this paper but mention has to be made of the fact that the basis of the sociological aspects of sample selection was holding a degree. In this respect the findings of this analysis can also be true for teachers, since among the indicators we find several ones concerning this sector. It differentiates three elite groups, namely economic, political and cultural ones, and within these groups it examines the position, ratio and range of female educators. Table 1. Elite analysis of women across age and elite group Age Economic elite – % Under 40 18,2 40-49 36,4 50-59 34,8 Above 59 10,6 Total 100 Source: Czibere, 2011.4
Cultural elite – % 12,8 13,8 33,4 50,0 100
Political elite – % 17,5 15,9 39,7 27,0 100
The survey was carried out Ibolya Czibere based on the statistical appendice of EUROSTAT, 2007,and SEC 2009, completed with own research findings. 4 Czibere, Ibolya (2011): Nők a kulturális, gazdasági és politikai elit tagjai között, (Women among the Members of Cultural, Economic and Political Elite Groups) In: Kovách, Imre (ed.): Elitek a válság korában (Elites in the Time of Crisis / Magyarországi elitek, kisebbségi magyar elitek, Bp. 3
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The division by age and elite area shows nothing of special interest in the case of the political group; it only proves our earlier assumption. The odd thing is in the relatively high proportion of younger generation in the group of economic elite. Based on information on the history of the change of regime in Hungary it is clear that in the course of the past two decades the demand on people with economic degree has significantly increased. A number of women have earned their degree in colleges, and fewer ones in universities in the field of economics. At present, many of them run their own enterprise or work as middle managers for a big company. The other surprising and warning finding of the analysis is to be seen in the age build-up of the cultural elite, which teachers also belong to. Here, the proportion of those above 59 years of age is 50% and if we add this number to that of the previous age group, it can be concluded that with 73.4% we are facing a generation problem. Facts of feminization in Hungary Hungarian and international researchers have been dealing more intensively with feminization of education since the 90s. Seeking employment in education is the natural ‘conquest domain’ of women just entering the labour market5. In fact it can be interpreted as a natural process since the traditional gender-based division of labour continues at different levels not only in child education in the family but also in institutional education. Yet, this issue is not that simple as the gender ratio in the whole scope of the labour market and women’s representation in the management is not always that favourable. There are several questions to be answered here: What are the differences between female and male life careers? What is the position of women working in education? What is young people’s career motivation like? Finally, perhaps the most important question, does feminization have any unfavourable consequences? If so, how could negative tendencies be prevented? Gender proportion of those working in education should be examined across the type of educational institution which requires investigation in the professionals’ qualification, title and position. In Hungary feminization of the teaching career is not a new phenomenon, as notice of it was taken already in 1990, but some researchers looking for causes and explanations for the changes find that it goes back to the years following World War II. In international comparison, the number of women at all education levels in Hungary is higher than the OECD average; in developed countries there are more men working in education. In Hungarian kindergartens the ratio of male teachers is only 1%, in lower primary school 88% of professionals are women, in 2011.337-390 5 János Setényi: Nők helyzete az oktatásügyben Women’s situation in Education. In: Educatio 1996/3. 507-514.
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upper primary that is 80%, while in secondary education it is 75%. Only vocational training schools are different, as the number of male professionals is higher there. Typically, the higher the education level, the more male educators there are, consequently the majority of male educators are employed in higher education. At the highest level of education, i.e. at colleges and universities the ratio of male professionals is 83%. The representation of women with academic title is much lower than that of men in the same field: academian 2.7%, academic doctor 9.5%, candidate 22.7%. It can be concluded that in the same field men and women have highly different career paths: there are more men in leader’s positions, and only a few women are employed at the highest levels. The ratio in private and religious educational institutions show a slightly better picture, where male educators have better income offers and also for traditional reasons they seek mostly men. In international comparison there is no country where the ratio of female employees in education has decreased in the past decade. If we examine Hungarian educators across their age, statistics show that the ratio of men is higher in the older generation of educational professionals. While male representation in the group of those between 50-59 years of age is 26%, this is 14% among the younger (under 30) educators. If we examine the group of people working in public education across their age and gender, we can see that the ratio of young male professionals (under 30 years) is very low (2.5%) and that of male employees between 30-39 years of age is nearly the double of it (4.6%). Consequently, teachers’ society is aging and if men of the older generation retire, the proportion of the two genders gets even worse. There is also another negative factor, i.e. among young people in general, - and especially among boys - the number of those interested in teaching as a career choice is getting lower. Thus, young male educators are missing in this sector. What is behind the above facts? Searching causes and consequences is inevitable in order to assess or change this situation. • Some seem to find the causes in the decrease in the social prestige of teaching career,6 claiming that the teachers’ training colleges opened after 1945 allowed and attracted masses of young people coming from working class or peasant families. This theory may be debated as feminization of the teaching profession is not a typically Hungarian process because – even if in lower percentage - it has taken place all over the world. Nevertheless, especially in the beginning, the accelerated process of training, perhaps part-time training courses, too and the over-simplified curriculum may have resulted in the decrease in the quality of Éva Hamvas: Gyógypedagógusok és pedagógusok önértékelésének társadalmi meghatározói. (Social Indicators of Ortho-pedagogues’ and Pedagogues’ Self-esteem ) http://mek.oszk. hu/01800/01818/html/kozokt12.htm
6
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graduates. As the former six-class school system was replaced by the eight-class system, it instantly brought about a massive, ten-fold increase in the demand on teachers. Indeed, a number of them had working class and peasant background, which was very rare before. At the same time, sociologists claim that highly qualified parents can more successfully position their children in a new environment, and provide them with more cultural foundation and social ties to help the new generation to be successful, which confirms Éva Hamvas’ statement. For this same phenomenon De Maggió (1998) gives a different explanation. In his opinion school does not deal with passing down advantageous positions (more precisely not only with it) rather it provides better opportunities for children with lower social standing to compensate their disadvantages and enabling them to reach higher social status. From this aspect, feminization prevailing in the 1990s possibly had other social, economic and political reasons. No doubt there was a decrease in the social prestige of teaching profession, which may have several different explanations. According to one of the most well-known Hungarian psychologists there is a paradox tendency nowadays, i.e. the traditional role types still dominate despite the fact that contemporary role models are different.7 In this field there have been significant changes going on in the world as well as in Hungary in the past century. Yet, the most important change would be if women were not judged by their sex, marital status or age and there were no different arguments in discussing if women should stay at home after starting a family and concentrate only on household and child rearing, or they should pursue a career and also do household chores to their best.8 In the choice of profession it is an important factor whether the job is regarded ‘feminine’ or ‘masculine’. This aspect is especially powerful in the case of teaching career. This marginalisation is getting even worse as today’s society finds it strange or unusual for a boy to become a kindergarten or a primary school teacher. In the 20th century there was a significant expansion of the emancipation of women, which led to social and lifestyle changes.9 In former socialist countries during the past two decades mainly men took the risk to work in the private sector (which was not allowed before) rather than women. Women tried to look for safer, socially approved careers, thus the interest in professions in education and health care increased. Feminization of the teaching profession did not do much good to its social recognition. According to the still existing negative stereotype about female jobs,
Jenő Ranschburg: A nő és a férfi. (Man and Woman) Pszichológia és pedagógia nevelőknek. (Psychology and Pedagogy for Educators) Budapest, Nemzeti Tankönyvkiadó, 1996. 8 Oláh, Judit (2012): A női munkanélküliség alakulása Hajdú-Bihar megyében, (Women’s Unemployment in Hajdú-Bihar County) In. Multikulturális Műhely Tanulmányok 2. (Multicultural Workshop Studies 2) (in process) 9 Láczay, Magdolna (2012): A vezetési tradíciók kutatásának hazai lehetőségei, Vezetés és hatékonyság. (Research Opportunities of Leadership Traditions in Hungary, Leadership and Efficiency)) Taylor után 101 évvel konferencia, Szeged, 10 April. 7
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•
•
•
•
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teaching is less appreciated than other male jobs. Causes and consequences are not clear here, as some people think that social appreciation of a job is in line with the salary. It should be noted that before the war teachers did not belong to less preferred people, although those working at lower levels of education (primary and kindergarten teachers) had quite different salaries. By the same token we can as well claim that feminization is the reason for the incline in the prestige. It is not about the evaluation of the actual professional work, but about the norms of the division of labour in society which we inherited in the course of history. One of its manifestations started to appear before the change of regime - and it still exists - that in some communities in the countryside men are wealthy contractors or mayors who choose their wives from their own social standing, mainly the ones with teaching qualification, but for whom salary is not a priority. That explains why boys refuse to choose teaching as a profession since low salary and the lack of social-economic recognition are not at all motivating. (Teaching profession is not ranked among the top ten in boys’ choice of career. Ten years ago teachers named their profession as the most popular one, and they ranked kindergarten and primary school teachers fifth. Now teachers’ profession is ranked third in the list of not preferred jobs, while primary school and kindergarten teachers are in the sixth place. Parents named teaching profession as the fifth less attractive job). Because of the lack of interest in teaching profession there will be no young male teachers to replace the retired ones, thus the percentage of women can further increase. Knowing the demographic data - decrease in childbirth – a fear of difficulties to find a teaching job is also a decisive factor for boys to choose other professions. The prospects of a stable, safe job is important for the man who plans to start a family. Of course, there are still male students who are interested in subjects and go to teacher training institutions to get a degree in P.E., qualify as a sports organizer, or earlier they chose languages or information technology but after graduation they do not primarily choose to work as teachers. Furthermore, men have better chances to land in a leader’s position. While women in this field have poor chances to advance, the ratio of male leaders is very high. There are educational institutions where the headmasters are traditionally women, in kindergartens, for example. It happens in several schools that even female employees choose male directors. Nevertheless, this career path is not attractive enough for men to be affected by in their career choice before other aspects. Another factor contributing to feminization might have been a further decline in girls’ interest in science subjects. It also orientated them towards teaching profession especially to work in schools at the lower level of education where higher knowledge of Maths, Chemistry, Biology or Physics is not required. The fact that even boys do not show interest in teaching in the field of technical stu-
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dies or engineering, does not seem to contradict to this statement. Supposedly, during their secondary education only those can prepare for the most popular courses whose family and financial background allows it. The problem is that nowadays there is no or little respect and recognition towards excellence, and talented students get little or no help, especially in primary education. Even if some boys choose this profession, typically they are not the best students, and that is a vicious circle. If the prestige of this profession was higher, boys, and more talented students would also apply. As the social recognition of this profession is very low, boys and gifted students in general avoid this job. There are more and more job leavers among male graduates. There are two main reasons we will mention here. The first reason is the brain drain of teachers from underpaid schools to big companies offering competitive income. A teacher’s salary, for example is 40% lower than that of an economist’s. A male teacher holding a university degree with ten years experience earns half of the income of his counterpart who changed his career path to work in the competitive sector (Magyar Hírlap). The other reason involves educators in general. In terms of professional requirements a teacher’s job is more complex today: students’ population is more diverse, there are a lot of disturbing and distracting factors which make the teacher’s job more difficult (drug, alcohol, social disadvantages, truancy, troublemakers disturbing the lesson, bad language, verbal and physical bullying of students and teachers, abuse, etc.) There are no professionals available to help tackle these problems, not enough proper technical equipment, either, and teachers’ preparation to handle the problem has much to be desired. The risk factors of professional success, achievement have significantly increased. All of these facts together leave the teachers under great pressure, overtasked and stressful. Looking for ways out, solutions and suggestions to control the process
The process of feminization is not the problem of just one institution, educational level or teaching material, rather it involves a complex circle of social issues. The real problem beside feminization is the decrease in the profession’s social prestige. Time after time women could also perform outstanding and successful professional and management work if the percentage of genders was more favourable. For women and also for educated men social approval, recognition, appreciation and financial conditions of their chosen profession is very important. Instead of their underestimated job they will choose a different career even if that will not completely suit their abilities. Male self-esteem and social pressure will result in men not choosing teaching, an unfairly undervalued profession as their future career. Beside the above mentioned problems there is a new phenomenon today which
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can be observed among female leaders and employees alike. In the case of female employees’ integration there is a so called psychological agreement bearing special significance,10 which contains the real expectations towards them. This unwritten contract is established during interpersonal transactions. The opportunities hiding in the agreement or disagreement over their interpretation will determine the employees’ opportunities and their integration. In other words, the job expectations in the case of the headmaster of an educational institution, for instance, or even those of a day-care teacher may not be the ones that they learnt at school or understood after reading the documents. Nowadays we are witnesses to lifestyle changes behind which there are series of social problems to be tackled, and it is already in many ways different from the ideal of a feminine profession. Nearly all analysts write about the dangers of the feminization of teaching profession and their assumption is that the shortage in male educators has real disadvantages. For healthy personality development the presence of both genders would be preferable both in the family and in educational institutions. It is becoming more common that the necessary role model for the children is not present in the family (‘Society without father’!) therefore boys are at risk. Institutional education may compensate in this field, thus for preventive reasons this matter deserves more attention. We can read about observations claiming that it is easier for boys to learn how to read if they are taught by a male teacher. A British research provides evidence that boys’ academic achievements are higher if taught by male teachers. Psychoanalyst Alexander Mitscherlich states that men radiate the feeling of reality, chip off egocentrism and prepare students for the real challenges of life better than female teachers. Female teachers have different standards. They have difficulties coping with the boys’ aggressive behaviour, and can hardly handle problems with their special stress management techniques.11 To avoid these problems or to take the edge of it there is an urgent need to take measures and raise the number of male teachers in schools. We would suggest the following changes to make teaching profession more attractive: 1. It is necessary to develop a career model. Educational experts in the ministry claim that it is already in progress (professional career path, support). 2. Financial recognition: raise in salaries is planned. 3. Revision of the financial support system of in-service training. 4. Bonuses, fringe benefits such as longer holiday, fare compensation for teachers’ Móré, Mariann (2012): Te csak beszélj én könnyen beilleszkedem. ( Just Keep Talking, I Will Easily Settle In) In: VIKEK Közleményei, 2012/IV. 2. (No.8.) 43-51.
10
Az iskolai nevelés elnőiesedése. (Feminization of School Education) http://pedellus.blog. hu/2010/09/17/
11
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employed in disadvantaged settlements, extra support for those dealing with children who need specialised treatment, etc. Emphasis on the advantages of the career (holiday when their own children have their break from school, spending fewer than 8 hours at the workplace, job safety with employment in public sector). Improvement in the physical and social environment of education. Comprehensive mentor system for career starters to help settle in. It can encourage and inspire mentors to improve their own work. Extra money and acknowledgement of mentors’ activity. Innovative ways to carry out educational tasks • Further modernization of training and in-service training in higher education – takes more money! • Preparation for the world of labour. • Practice orientated organisation and activity forms, skills-development in a number of ‘self-experience’ situations. • Updating and improving young people’s knowledge in information technology in order to better their learning process, ‘infopedagogy’, ‘infocommunication’. • Methodological innovation, increase in interactivity, student involvement
Basically we know what we should do, but in the time of economic crisis and lack of resources we encounter several hurdles and obstacles. The lack of harmonisation and coordination of constant reforms in education, the still unclear plans of the maintenance and professional authority for tackling problems make the older generation of educators feel apprehensive at the threshold of the generation change heavy with threats of a serious crisis in education. Bibliography Az iskolai nevelés elnőiesedése. (Feminization of School Education) http://pedellus.blog. hu/2010/09/17/. 2. Czibere I. (2011): Nők a kulturális, gazdasági és politikai elit tagjai között, (Women among the Members of Cultural, Economic and Political Elite Groups) In: Kovách, Imre (ed.): Elitek a válság korában (Elites in the Time of Crisis / Magyarországi elitek, kisebbségi magyar elitek, Bp. 2011.337-390. 3. Di Maggió P. (1998): Kulturális tőke és iskolai siker, (Cultural Capital and School Success) in.: Róbert Peter (ed.) Társadalmi mobilitás, (Social Mobilty) Bp. 198-220. 4. Hamvas É.: Gyógypedagógusok és pedagógusok önértékelésének társadalmi meghatározói. (Social Indicators of Ortho-pedagogues’ and Teachers’ Self-Esteem) http://mek.oszk. hu/01800/01818/html/kozokt12.htm. 5. Láczay M. (2012): A vezetési tradíciók kutatásának hazai lehetőségei, Vezetés és hatékonyság. (Research Opportunities of Leadership Traditions in Hungary, Leadership and Efficiency)) 1.
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58 6. 7. 8. 9.
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Éva Kovácsné Bakosi Taylor után 101 évvel konferencia, Szeged, 10 April. Móré M. (2012): Te csak beszélj én könnyen beilleszkedem. ( Just Keep Talking, I Will Easily Settle In) In: VIKEK Közleményei, 2012/IV. 2. (No.8.) 43-51. Oláh J. (2012): A női munkanélküliség alakulása Hajdú-Bihar megyében, (Women’s Unemployment in Hajdú-Bihar County) In. Multikulturális Műhely Tanulmányok 2. (Multicultural Workshop Studies 2) (in process). Ranschburg J. (1996): A nő és a férfi. (Man and Woman) Pszichológia és pedagógia nevelőknek. (Psychology and Pedagogy for Educators) Budapest, Nemzeti Tankönyvkiadó. Setényi, János: Nők helyzete az oktatásügyben. (Women’s Situation in Education) In: Educatio 1996/3. 507-514.
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NEW TENDENCIES CONNECTING TO THE NATIONAL SYSTEM OF PUBLIC EMPLOYMENT Borsi Csaba1 Abstract The basic consideration underlying the recent educational reforms is the question of who is in charge of training the work force suitable for meeting the requirements of the economy, as well as, on which level and in what quantity it should be achieved. Despite the crisis, or on the contrary, for that very reason, similar problems can be traced in our country, witnessing decades of debates over matching adult training and vocational training with a constant need for reforming the training of the labour force, which occasionally ends up in controversial situations concerning the responsibility determined by the regulations, leaving the participants of education at a disadvantage. Since the regime change the related laws, the framework and financing of education have been changing following the actual results of this debate, while the opening up of the European labour market has made it necessary to create an integrated system of framework, in which the system of qualifications shows uniformity. The question is to what extent public education should assume responsibility in this process and in what ways the human resource managements of enterprises are accountable for the internal trainings, further education and the system of financing these processes. In this lecture the above mentioned issues are to be treated on the basis of the results of a local survey. Keywords: labour market, education, special training, employment policy, public policy
1. The present article intents to provide an overview of the national devices of employment policy, focusing on the recent conditions of public employment, touching upon the situation of the trainings in the national labour force markets. Concentrating on public employment among the devices of employment policy, the difficulties of the labour force market is to be presented with the help of time series analyses and pointing out regional differences, while reaching a conclusion with regard to the limited efficiency of different methods of possible solutions. It has to be mentioned 1 Lecturer, University of Debrecen Faculty of Child and Adult Education Social Sciences Department
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that the change of governments in 2010 has lead to a significant shift in emphasis concerning public employment, which also appears in statistical data. Besides the national tendencies, the regional differences in employment facilities are remarkable and thought-provoking (hopefully not only for the unconcerned), handling this issue by adapting public employment reaches beyond the question of labour force market devices, assigning a social dimension to it. At the end of the article the issue of work-force trainings, including vocational training, is to be treated, as it constitutes a close and relevant connection with the recent difficulties of employment policy. This article is part of a research on a larger scale, which explores the effects of the training system on the employment facilities. Considering the operation of the labour force market in Hungary, essential problems prove to be persistent for decades. The employment rate, which is unprecedentedly low among the 27 EU member states, means not only a problem of employment policy but also the source of diverse economic and social tensions. Diagram 1
(The economic activity rate among 15-64-year-old population)
The fact that the country disposes of such inferior indices (within the EU) with regard to the economic activity cannot be explained as a fault of the European Union. The problem can be traced back to the period of the regime change in the country. Between 1989 and 1993 one and a half million jobs were cut, the unemployment rate culminating at a figure of approximately 700 thousand in the last year of the above mentioned period. In many respects, this “transformational shock” has an influence on the national labour market even these days. Following the consolidation ending at the beginning of the 21st century stagnation can be observed, while the economic crisis brought another deterioration of economic indicators. Closely related to this phenomenon employment rates has turned to negative.
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Diagram 2 The proportion of the unemployed and the employed among the population aged 15-64 in Hungary
(The proportion of unemployed people The proportion of employed people) (Source: www.ksh.hu; own editing)
The above presented chart provides nothing new for the majority. Following the outbreak of the crisis (in this country from 2009) the employment rate has decreased, and closely connected to it, the unemployment rate exceeded the figure of 10% and seems to be steady. Taking all these into account, active and passive devices of employment policy are supposed to play a remarkable role in reversing the unfavourable phenomena, in case of adequate conditions, or at least in cutting back its amplitude. 2. In economics it is a commonplace that within the framework of market economy the extent of demand and supply of labour are usually not in accordance with each other, which definitely implies the appearance of unemployment. Governments try to handle this problem with the help of measures pertaining to employment policy. Employment policy aims at matching the demand and supply of labour, improving employment facilities, and maintaining them at a high level, facilitating the access to work of employee groups with disadvantage, as well as improving the employment conditions (income) of the already employed groups. The system of employment policy devices can be divided into two larger groups: active and passive devices. The active devices of employment policy facilitate job seekers’ access to work by means of training job-seekers, increasing the employers’ employment abilities and facilities, while passive devices of employment policy mean the supply of job seekers (unemployed) during the period of search. These devices complement each other: the achievement of the objectives of employment policy is carried out directly by the active devices, while the passive ones help to endure the period of search for work providing a supplementary income. Besides the passive devices of employment policy (availability allowance (RÁT), regular social benefit (RSZS) etc.), active devices prove to be much more relevant concerning the ability to return
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to the labour market. In Hungary remarkable changes have occurred in the administration of the system of devices pertaining to the employment policy since 1st January 2012. In this field the National Public Employment Service became the main administrative organ, which comprises the institutional network of local employment offices and a new office: the National Labour Office. It has been created on the basis of the Employment Office by a change of names and by merging the National Labour Safety and Labour Affairs Supervision and the National Institute for Vocational Training and Adult Education into it. The classification of the active devices of employment policy is based on the division of the National Public Employment Service. The following groups has been made: • Labour force market trainings • Supporting entrepreneurship • Wage benefits • Public employment • Other benefits Labour force market trainings include trainings both for the employed and the unemployed (job-seekers). Besides supporting young entrepreneurs, the support of the self-employed is also an essential element. Among the wage benefits Start Plusz and Start Extra cards (Start Bónusz from 1st January 2012) have to be mentioned, as well as different types of partial exemption from contributions for employers, and the support of remote working. Within the new public employment program, started in September 2011, the previous categories of public jobs, community work and public work were brought together to the unified system of public employment. Other benefits mean supporting job creation, job preservation and mobility. Diagram 3 The number of participants in the devices of employment policy. 2008-2011
(Labour force market trainings Supporting entrepreneurship Wage benefits Public employment Other benefits) (Source: www.afsz.hu ; own editing)
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2008 was chosen as the starting point of the chart, mainly for the reason of the country’s being seriously affected by the economic crisis only in the following year, thus it seemed to be suitable for comparison, on the other hand, it was also in 2009 when such programs of employment policy were launched (e.g.: “Pathways to Work”) which restructured the proportion of active devices, this way indicating a new approach in employment policy. 3. The first thing that is obvious from the figures is the dynamic expansion of public employment among the participants of this form of benefits. It means that more and more people find jobs within public employment. In case of this system of conditions and devices remain unchanged, it necessarily entails the set-back of other employment policy devices and results inevitably in an overwhelming number of participants in public employment. Furthermore, it seems probable that decision-makers take measures also from other considerations than employment policy (e.g.: social factors) when swelling the number of participants to such a large extent. According to experts, public work programs are incapable of fulfilling so many expectations, and can only be considered as temporary, symptomatic treatments. There is one more, not the least exhilarating effect of public employment on the national labour market. The following diagram presents the number of employed people and the figure without the participants in public employment. Although the chart is simple, containing only two sets of data, it shows conspicuously that the national labour market has not recovered from the shock caused by the global economic crisis. Diagram 4 The number of employed people between 2008-2011
(The number of employed people The number of employed people without the participants in public employment) (Source: www.ksh.hu and www.afsz.hu ; own editing)
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There is a deceiving statement, stressed by the government’s communication several times, which claims an improvement, though slender in its extent, in respect to the employment rate since 2010: the slight improvement is mainly due to the artificially increased public employment and not to healthy labour market processes. Without the large-scale public work programs a significant decrease, quantifiable in several percentage points, can be observed in the case of employment rates. In addition, no details are revealed in connection with the distribution according to professional competences or the period of employment. By taking these two factors into consideration in the improvement of human resources, the sustainability of employment could be planned and stabilised, as well as matched to the requirements of the labour market. Diagram 5 The regional distribution of participants in public employment in 2011
(Central Hungary Western Transdanubia Northern Hungary Southern Great Plain
Central Transdanubia Southern Transdanubia Northern Great Plain Source: www.kormany.hu; own editing)
The figure shown above presents even more conspicuously the distorting effect of public employment programs. More than half of the participants (55%) in the program were employed in two regions of the country: Northern Hungary Region (ÉMR) and Northern Great Plain Region (ÉAR). On the one hand it is reasonable, as the above mentioned regions are considered the most underdeveloped areas of the country, disposing of the lowest employment rates (42,9% (ÉMR) and 45,1%(ÉAR)). However, it can be surprising that in the regions of Southern Great Plain and Southern Transdanubia, featuring not much higher employment rates, the proportion of the participants in public employment is relatively lower. There can only be speculations about the reasons, but supposing the existence of
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the above mentioned social considerations in the background one cannot be too far from the truth. It would mean that the government’s real objectives behind the employment policy is buying a quasi “social peace” by spending hundreds of millions on it in the regions suffering the most from social conflicts. Adding the following diagram to the issue, the distorting effect of the public employment on the labour market becomes even more salient. Diagram 6 Regional employment rates and the proportion of publicly employed people within it in 2011
(the proportion of employed people the proportion of publicly employed people within) (Source: www.ksh.hu and www.afsz.hu ; own editing)
The diagram above shows the regional employment rates, and next to it the proportion of the publicly employed people within the whole group of employed people. On the basis of this a rather depressing conclusion can be drawn from the point of view of the labour market: in the two already mentioned regions every 5th employed person is publicly employed (72.001 people (ÉMR) and 92.750 people (ÉAR)). Adding the regional number of public employees to it (60.167 people (ÉMR), 73.948 people (ÉAR)), nearly 1/3 of the employees in the two regions are state employed. This disappointing image of the situation foreshadows a widening gap between the north-eastern parts and the rest, as this type of labour market cannot be considered healthy. It also entails the migration of skilled work-force from the region and the deterioration of labour market conditions. Thus, it seems obvious that the convergence regions cannot be regarded as a homogeneous unity, and it requires the elaboration of individual programs, in regional breakdowns if necessary. The problem seems to be familiar even on administrative
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levels: the Prime Minister’s statement about initiatives on venture zones with tax exemption in the regions the most seriously affected by unemployment seems to support this idea.3 There are other problems with public employment apart from the regional differences. Although in the government’s communication this active device of employment policy is considered the main area promoting the return to the labour market, researches of this field tend to object to it. The study of Judit Csoba and Éva Nagy in 2010 - in connection with a previous research - reported on the proportion of people finding unsubsidized employments among those using the devices of employment policy. Diagram 7 The proportion of those succeeding in finding jobs within 6 months, on the basis of two researches (%)
(Labour force market trainings Wage benefits Public employment Control group) (Source: own editing on the basis of the researches of Csoba-Nagy
The analyses cover part of the active devices of employment policy, also creating a control group, the members of which did not benefit from any form of support. The diagram reveals that among the examined devices the least efficient one from the point of view of the reintegration to the labour market is public employment (25 and 23%), while the most efficient device of this kind is the group of wage benefits. This research also discredits the efficiency of the amount spent on public employment (according to the plans more than 130 billion in 2012), that is, public employment does not mean a straight way back to the world of work.
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Based on the analysis, it can be stated that the efficiency of labour force trainings is getting lower. In 1997 the proportion of successful job-finders was still 45%, which fell to 33% by 2010. As a form of admitting this tendency on the part of the government, a decreasing role of trainings in employment policy can be expected, and at the same time it means a decreasing number of participants in this form of support. Diagram 8
(The number of participants in subsidized training by regions between 2008-2010 (Source: www.afsz.hu)
The diagram reveals that the number of participants in the labour force trainings fell back remarkably after 2008. It is undoubtedly related to the rising of the economic crisis, but on the other hand it also illustrates the shift in emphasis in the set of devices observable from that time, as part of this “Pathways to work” program is launched in 2009, replaced by the public employment program from September 2011, setting back the training facilities among the devices of the employment policy. It can be considered as admitting indirectly the inefficiency of this device of employment policy. 4. It is hard to challenge the observation according to which the trainings of labour force market (in accordance with the connected vocational training) are less and less capable of meeting the requirements and expectations of a transforming economy on the way of globalization, showing an accelerated technological development. The training system proves to be incapable of providing (at least on the national level) an adequate quantity and more importantly an adequate quality of work force for the labour market. For this reason the educational system, in particular the vocational training system, as well as the trainings of the labour market are addressed a number of criticism. However the situation seems much more sophisticated and requires a more elaborate analysis concerning the source of the problems: whether
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it is the education in itself or the system to be blamed. As, according to systems theory, the performance of a system is basically determined by the quality of the input side entering the system (the educational system), it determines the process (that is the performance of the system), and in many cases the performance of the output side. Where should we search the problem within the training system. On the input side? Inside the process? On the output side? Or possibly in all the three? The research tries to find answers to this question. References Rab, Henriett. ”A foglalkoztatáspolitikai eszközök szabályozásának változása napjainkban”. Available at: http://www.debrecenijogimuhely.hu/archivum/2_2006/a_foglalkoztataspolitikai_eszkozok_szabalyozasanak_valtozasa_napjainkban/ ”Munkaerő-piaci helyzetkép a Nemzeti Foglalkoztatási Szolgálat adatai alapján 2011”. Nemzeti Munkaügyi Hivatal, Budapest, 2012. május. Available at: http://www.afsz.hu/engine.aspx?page=showcontent&cID=20620&rID=238&sw=munkaer%C5%91-piaci helyzetk%C3%A9p 2011&content=full_afsz_eves_2011 http://www.ado.hu/rovatok/ado/orban-adomentes-vallalkozasi-zonak-johetnek Works cited 1.
Csoba, Judit, and Zita Éva Nagy. ”A magyarországi képzési, bértámogatási és közfoglalkoztatási programok hatásvizsgálata”. In: Munkaerőpiaci tükör 2011. Közelkép: Foglalkoztatáspolitikai programok hatásvizsgálata. Ed. Fazekas Gábor, Kézdi Károly. Budapest: MTA Közgazdaságtudományi Intézet Országos Foglalkoztatási Közalapítvány, 2011. 2. Frey, Mária. ”A foglalkoztatási törvényben rögzített és az ÁFSZ által működtetett, továbbá az ezeken kívül szabályozott és bonyolított aktív munkaerő-piaci eszközök értékelése a 20042009. közötti időszakban”. Budapest: Foglalkoztatási és Szociális Hivatal, July 2010. 3. Oláh, Judit. ”A közfoglalkoztatottság javításának lehetőségei Hajdúdorogon”. In: A Virtuális Intézet Közép-Európa Kutatására közleményei. Ed. Gulyás László. Volume IV. Issue 2 (No. 8), A-series 1. Gazdálkodás- és szervezéstudományi tematikus szám. Szeged, 2012: 9-16.
Rab, Henriett. ”A foglalkoztatáspolitikai eszközök szabályozásának változása napjainkban”. Available at: http://www.debrecenijogimuhely.hu/archivum/2_2006/a_foglalkoztataspolitikai_eszkozok_szabalyozasanak_valtozasa_napjainkban/ Vántus, András, Miklós Pakurár, and Judit Oláh. ”A foglalkoztatottság helyzete és kitörési pontjai a karcagi munkaerőpiac területén”. In: A Virtuális Intézet Közép-Európa Kutatására közleményei. Ed.. Gulyás László. IV.2 (No. 8), A-series 1. Gazdálkodás- és szervezéstudományi tematikus szám. Szeged, 2012: 17-24. ”A foglalkoztatáspolitikai eszközök működése 2008-ban”. Budapest: Foglalkoztatási és Szociális Hivatal, 2009. ”Az aktív foglalkoztatáspolitikai eszközök fontosabb létszámadatai 2010-ben”. Budapest: Foglalkoztatási és Szociális Hivatal, 2011. A Nemzeti Foglalkoztatási Szolgálat munkaerő-piaci évkönyve 2010. Ed. Munkácsy Ferenc. Budapest: Foglalkoztatási Hivatal, 2011. ”Munkaerő-piaci helyzetkép a Nemzeti Foglalkoztatási Szolgálat adatai alapján”. Budapest: Nemzeti Munkaügyi Hivatal, May 2012.
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Regional inequalities of human development in Hungary Gyula Szabó1 Abstract Although arguments for the influence of human factors on inequality are concerned with the impacts of social capital on well-being, in practice researchers usually focus on the relationship between human development and trends in GDP. Nevertheless there are some drawbacks of using GDP per capita as an indicator of wellbeing, that is why a number of alternative methods were developed. Probably the best-known alternative is the Human Development Index (HDI), which combines GDP per capita with two other indicators – literacy and average life expectancy. In this paper we compare GDP and HDI data in Hungary, focusing upon differences between Budapest and the other Hungarian regions. After comparing the two indicators we verified that human factors of the index (life expectancy and education) do have effect on the whole index, which means that HDI can be a more precise indicator of well-being than GDP per capita. Keywords: regional inequalities, Human Development Index (HDI), GDP, development
Introduction Most of the economists, who are interested in inequality issues agree that the purpose of economic activity can be described as promotion of human development and well-being and not growth itself. On the other hand these researchers also agree that we still do not have effective measures to evaluate progress toward these objectives. Of course we already possess a measure, which is extensively used by scientists – this is GDP. Gross domestic product (GDP) is used to measure the market value of all goods and services produced in a country during a given year. But the changes we experience both in society and the global economy, many researchers doubt 1 Dr. Gyula Szabó, PhD, assistant professor, University of Debrecen, Faculty of Child and Adult Education
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whether GDP is an adequate indicator of the well-being of countries and their citizens (Eisler 2007, Stiglitz 2009). Authors often refer to the events in 1980 when Ronald Reagen asked the American people a simple question: “Are you better off today than you were four years ago?” In spite of the fact that between 1976 and 1980 per capita disposable real income in the United States increased by 7,6%, his audiences answered “No!” A similar event happened in Canada in 1998. Canadians were asked in 1998 how the overall financial situation of their generation compared to that of their parents at the same stage of life, less than half thought that there had been an improvement – despite an increase of approximately 60% in real GDP per capita (Osberg and Sharpe 2005). To better understand the real nature of economic development requires a multi-disciplinary approach which includes a more detailed view of the society and its members – the examination of societal well being is a step toward this goal. In the first place this paper collects the most important doubts concerning the applicability of GDP, which were remarked by researchers in the past few years. We also study one possible way to identify, better understand and evaluate societal well-being – the Human Development Index of the United Nation. This composite index is widely used by many international organizations to evaluate countries in terms of three main indicators of well-being – GDP, health and education attainments. Finally we take a short look at the situation in Hungary and examine if these theoretical findings can help us to better understand roots and characteristics of social economic and social inequalities. The doubtful role of GDP in measuring societal well-being In the 1930s GDP was developed to be an indicator of various market activities, in a period when the primary objective of government was to stimulate industrial production (Cobb et al. 1997). After the war, it became an official instrument of US economic policy and it was intended to measure industrial growth. GDP shortly became synonymous with an improvement in a nation’s economic health and the welfare of its people. However Simon Kuznets, the creator of the method warned the US Congress himself that a single index surely cannot be the satisfactory way to evaluate the welfare of a nation. In the 1960s he also emphasized the need to make distinction between quantity and quality of growth. Already in the In the early 1970s economists started to criticize the way GDP was used to measure welfare or well-being. GDP is considered to be a very useful tool to monitor short term changes in industrial activity over the course of a few years, but proved to be are inadequate to reflect the complex structural changes during the process of social development. The deficiencies of GDP as a measure are well documented by
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leading economists but decision-making still remains largely based on GDP. The challenge is to derive a more appropriate indicator to reflect real, sustainable economic welfare, social development and human wellbeing. The idea to value various economic activities with a single but easily accessible indicator, price, was a good idea but in the past few decades misconceptions and policy distortions were to be perceived, partially because of the use of GDP. Although money is one of the most powerful instruments of social progress and price can be a tools to measure, the possibility to measure all value in terms of price was too tempting (Jacobs and Šlaus 2010). The controversial role of GDP as an indicator of the state of a society and its members was criticized by a numbers of scientists, organizations and agencies. By now this issue has become one of the most popular topics of publications in this field. Here we mention only two authors to clarify the main doubts concerning GDP. Riane Eisler (2007), acknowledges the value of GDP as an economic indicator but he also pointed out that it does not give an accurate estimation of a country’s economic production and condition. Among others he emphasizes the need to measure the status of women and children as fundamental indicators of the well-being and economic strength of societies. In addition Eisler also emphasizes that GDP does not fully account for all economic activities, especially those that exist outside the realm of monetary exchange. As he wrote GDP does not take into consideration the monetary value of “the caring economy”, the unpaid care of households, children, the elderly, and the disabled by family members. On the other hand GDP includes many items that do not actually improve societal wellbeing. Reconstruction efforts after a natural disaster are counted as a boost to GDP – even if it only contributes to the reconstruction of former condition. In general the measurement of government output is particularly challenging, because public services are often provided to direct users for free, or at a subsidised price, so it cannot be valued using market prices, that means that the assessment of public services output is based on the value of inputs. Quite recently a group of reputed scientist had the opportunity to thoroughly examine this issue when President Sarkozy requested them to participate in a special commission. In 2008 he asked, Joseph Stiglitz (President of the Commission), Amartya Sen (Advisor) and Jean Paul Fitoussi (Coordinator) to create “The Commission on the Measurement of Economic Performance and Social Progress” (CMEPSP). The members of this commission, three respected professors were supposed to formulate a report on not only the problems of GDP but also the possible new methods of measuring well-being (Stiglitz et al. 2009). The Commission’s aim has been to identify the limits of GDP as an indicator of economic performance and social progress and to consider what additional information might be required for the production of new indicators. The fact that one of Europe’s leading politician thinks reasonable to establish a commission like that shows that this is not an issue of a few experts. This way the development of
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new, methods became a goal of decision makers as well. To find a way to properly measure human development, first we have to define what well-being actually means for an economist. A multidimensional definition was used by the Stiglitz commission and based on research and several concrete initiatives they identified key dimension that should be taken into account. The above mentioned report of the commission listed seven main aspects (Stiglitz et al. 2009): Material living standards (income, consumption and wealth); • Health; • Education; • Personal activities including work • Political voice and governance; • Social connections and relationships; • Environment (present and future conditions); • Insecurity, of an economic as well as a physical nature. By now a wide range of indicators has been developed, which intend to reflect economic and social processes in the world. The OECD is one of the main actors in this field, among others they collect data relating to fertility rates, migration, marriage and divorce, education, unemployment, income inequality, gender wage gaps, social spending, old age replacement rates, poverty, life expectancy, health expenditure, etc. Besides there were several attempts recently to create composite indices of progress to supplement or supplant GDP. In the literature of economic and societal well being there are a number of composite indices, which differ in terms of the indicators and aggregation methods used. In case of Index of Sustainable Economic Welfare (ISEW) for example sustainable economic welfare implies the welfare a nation enjoys at a particular point in time given the impact of past and present activities. The Legatum Prosperity Index (LPI) consists of seventy-nine indicators, grouped into nine equally weighted domains, like economic fundamentals, democratic institutions, health, governance, social capital, etc (see http://www.prosperity.com). The Happy Planet Index (HPI) measures a country’s average “happy life years” per unit of ecological resources consumed. This index combines environmental impact with human well-being (see http://www.happyplanetindex.org). The Genuine Progress Indicator (GPI), which begins with standard personal consumption data and adjusts it to account for a number of factors, including income distribution, unpaid work, the costs of crime and pollution, changes in leisure time. Human Development Index (HDI) is probably the best-known alternative, which combines GDP per capita with two other indicators –literacy and average life expectancy – into a single index (Harviel et al. 2009).
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The Human Development Index (HDI) Technically the Human Development Index is a summary measure of human development, which measures the average achievements in a country in three basic dimensions of human development: a long and healthy life, access to knowledge and a decent standard of living. The HDI is the geometric mean of normalized indices measuring achievements in each dimension (UNDP 2010). HDI is a composite statistic widely used by international organizations to evaluate and rank countries utilizing relatively easily accessible data. As already mentioned above, it consists of three main components (see Figure 1). The income component adjusts per capita GDP as measured in constant international dollars at purchasing power parity (PPP) for inequality by discounting the income of countries that exceed the world average. Life expectancy at birth is used as an index of health. Educational attainments are measured by a weighted sum of literacy and gross enrollment rates at the primary, secondary and tertiary level, assigning two-thirds weight to the literacy subcomponent. Figure 1. The components of Human Development Index
Source: Lipták (2009)
HDI is a relatively simple composite index with an obvious structure that makes it almost ideal for comprehension and analysis. It is primarily suitable as a normative tool for international comparisons, especially those at the lower end of the scale, rather than as an aid to policy-formation and evaluation. It consists of three main sub-indices designed to measure per capita income, education and life expectancy, each on a scale from 0 to 1,0. Scores on the three sub-indices are averaged to arrive at an overall score for HDI.23 Since it is based on GDP data, HDI is subject to the same limitations as GDP. The use of an abstract, arbitrary rating scale (0-100) makes it very difficult for the general public to relate to HDI’s sco-
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res as a measure of welfare. The substantial weightage given to literacy (22,2%) seems inordinate considering that literacy is determined in many countries by the ability to read and write one’s own name, while 11,1% is given to primary, secondary and tertiary school enrolment rates. The Human Development approach, in general, is broader than the GDP analysis and it is a more appropriate tool in comparison to GDP, because it allows us to characterise differences in non-income dimensions, such as longevity, health, education, accessibility to important goods, etc., which are very important for people’s well-being Moreover, in some countries, where regional differences are very substantial, it is much more important to describe the non-income dimension of human life. Especially in transition economies an HDRI will help to understand better the socio-economic change occurring during transformation from a planned economy towards a market economy. The same could apply to other countries where socioeconomic differences are very important, such as India and China, but also to other smaller countries, such as Poland, where differences between West and East are very important and very similar to the Italian case (Tridico 2007). A detailed description of the calculation of the index can be found in the technical notes published by the (UNDP 2010), that is why I deliver a short summary only. The three main components of Human Development Index: • GDP per capita as a measure of income and living standard • Average life expectancy at birth as an index of health and longevity, • Knowledge gained in education as a measure of the individuals’ knowledge, These components have to be converted to a percentage form. Figure 1 shows the composition of HDI. Both the index of life expectancy at birth and GDP per capita consist of one measure, but the education index is the average of two measures (Lipták 2009). In the calculation of this index, a general formula is used, which is also applicable for each component of HDI:
where yi is the actual value, ymax is the fixed highest value ymin is the fixed lowest value The only exception is the calculation of the modified GDP. In this case logarithmic transformation is necessary to maintain the differences in the order of size, so the formula is the following:
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UN experts and international literature has determined the lowest and highest values for the calculation: • life expectancy at birth: 25 and 85 years, • adult literacy rate: 0% and 100%, • combined gross enrolment ratio: 0% and 100%, • GDP per capita (PPP): 100 USD and 40,000 USD. Adult literacy rate and gross enrolment ratio need to be combined to create the education index, with two-thirds weight given to adult literacy and one-third weight to combined gross enrolment. As soon as we have all three subindices we can calculate Human Development Index by using the following simple formula:
As we calculate HDI at NUTS 2 level in Hungary, these measures are slightly modified. Adult literacy rates are in most of the developed countries are about 97-99% (even if there is an unknown percentage of the population, who actually cannot read and write), moreover the statistical system in many of these countries does not provide up to date information regarding literacy. That is why in this paper we used the method of Ildikó Husz (Husz 2002) and estimated that 99% as adult literacy rate for the calculation of the education index. For crosscountry comparison it is inevitable to use the above presented method to calculate economic performance (GDP per capita (PPP), with the minimum and maximum values of 100 and 40,000 USD) but for the evaluation of the Hungarian regions a different method is suitable: we used HUF per capita values and the minimum and maximum were set according to actual statistical data from Hungary. Human development in Hungarian regions We chose Human Development Index as an example to present in this paper in detail not because we consider it as the best possible index of well-being but because it can be used to present the past and present of well-being research in Hungary. As we mentioned above it is probably the most acknowledged index in this field in the world and in Hungary as well. Studies that were published on the measurement of economic and social well-being in Hungary generally used HDI. Several authors have used HDI in to compare Hungarian human development index with international data and there are also papers, which try to use HDI to compare development
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level of different regions inside the country. The following summary is not meant to be comprehensive, we just highlight a few papers from the past years. We have to mention the name of József Nemes Nagy who used county data for his analysis (Fóti 2000). Although their methodology was different from that of UNDP and international literature in a way that lowest and highest values are national minimums and maximums and not predefined international level values, the work of Obádovics and Kulcsár is an important milestone in the short history of Hungarian well-being research (Obádovics and Kulcsár 2003). Figure 2. GDP per capita in the Hungarian regions 2001-2009 (thousand HUF)
Source: Own compilation based on the data of Hungarian Central Statistical Office
Most of these papers studied the data from the 1990s, that is they used the Human Development Index as an indicator of how the transformation of from a planned economy towards a market economy affected the well being of Hungarian people. In this paper we focus on the years between 2001 and 2009, as we intended to study the years after the last census until the last year where GDP data is available at regional level.
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We calculated Human Development Index for the seven Hungarian regions. In a country where regional differences are significant, it is important to describe the income and non-income dimensions of human life. Regional differences between the eastern and the western parts in terms of GDP per capita are evident. Figures 2 and 3 show the GDP per capita and HDI values in the seven Hungarian NUTS 2 regions between 2001 and 2009. Probably the most conspicuous and absolutely not surprising result is the special role that Budapest and the Central Hungary region plays, both GDP and HDI values of this region are high above the values of other regions. However HDI data can help us to draw a more accurate picture of regional equalities. While GDP values show that difference between the central region and the other regions significantly increased, HDI values show that the difference is not so expressive. Although GDP data show growth in all regions until 2008, the differences between the regions (more precisely between 3 groups of regions) did not decrease in this period. Beside the central region two North-Western Hungarian regions are above the national average of GDP per capita, while the four other regions (in East and South-West Hungary) showed relatively slow growth. Figure 3. HDI in the Hungarian regions 2001-2009
Source: Own compilation based on the data of Hungarian Central Statistical Office
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HDI calculations do not change this picture fundamentally, but we can realize a moderate level of inequalities. The order of the regions is not different, the leading position of the central region is unchanged, but the distance between the regions is smaller. Figure 4. Change of GDP and HDI in the Hungarian regions 2001-2009 (%)
Source: Own compilation based on the data of Hungarian Central Statistical Office
Finally Figure 4 gives a comparison of the differences between the increase rates of GDP per capita and the Human Development index in the Hungarian regions after 2001. This bar chart clearly presents that HDI and GDP per capita did not increase in the same extent in every region. As the figures above already stated, in Budapest and the Central Hungary region the rate of increase of both HDI and GDP per capita reached the highest level. In the other regions, especially in the Northern Great Plain, Southern Transdanubia and Western Transdanubia regions the rate of increase of HDI was significantly higher than the rate of increase of GDP. While outside the central region GDP per capita increased almost at the same rate (the values of 5 regions vary between 58.2 and 61.8%, the only exception is Western Transdanubia, which was and still is the region with second highest GDP per capita) HDI values of the Eastern, less developed regions approached the values of the Western regions.
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Several scientist criticized HDI proposing that GDP and economic performance in general have a strong effect on its value, while human components slightly affect this measure. In the case of Hungarian regions we can see that human factors of the index (life expectancy and education) do have effect on the whole index. As an effect of human factors regional differences of human development slightly decreased in the period between 2001 and 2009 – at least in comparison with the differences measured solely by GDP per capita. Bibliography 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6.
7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13.
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Cobb C. – Halstead T. – Rowe J. (1997): If the GDP is Up, Why is America Down? Atlantic Monthly, October 1995. Eisler R. (2007): Real Wealth of Nations. San Francisco, CA: Berrett-Koehler Publishers. Fóti K. (2000): Az emberi erőforrások jellemzői Magyarországon 1999. (A Human Development Report, Hungary, 1999 magyar nyelvű változata). MTA Világgazdasági Kutató Intézet, Budapest. de Leon E. – Boris E (2010): The State of Society – Measuring Economic Success and Human Well-Being. The Urban Institute. p. 81. Harvie1 D. – Slater G. – Philp B. –Wheatley D. (2009): Economic Well-being and British Regions: The Problem with GDP Per Capita. Taylor and Francis Journals, vol. 67(4), pp. 483505. Husz I. (2002): Regionális különbségek Magyarországon, kísérlet a területi különbségek bemutatására az emberi fejlődés indexe alapján. In: Lengyel György (ed.): Indikátorok és elemzések. Műhelytanulmányok a társadalmi jelzőszámok témaköréből. BKÁE, Budapest, 2002. pp. 77-86. Jacobs G. – Šlaus I. (2010): Indicators of Economics Progress: The Power of Measurement and Human Welfare. CADMUS, Volume 1, pp. 53-113. Lipták K.: Development or decline? Determination of human development at subregional level with the estimation of HDI. http://elib.kkf.hu/ewp_09/2009_4_06.pdf Accessed: 30th October, 2011 Obádovics Cs. – Kulcsár L. (2003): A vidéki népesség humánindexének alakulása Magyarországon, Területi Statisztika, 43. évfolyam, 4. szám pp. 303–322. Osberg L. – Sharpe A. (2005): “How Should We Measure the “Economic” Aspects of Well-being,” Review of Income and Wealth, 51 (2) June, pp. 311-336. Stiglitz J.E. – Sen A. – Fitoussi J.P. (2009): “Report by the Commission on the Measurement of Economic Performance and Social Progress.” Paris: Commission on the Measurement of Economic Performance and Social Progress. Tridico P. (2007): Regional Human Development in transition economics: the role of institutions. Departmental Working Papers of Economics - University ‘Roma Tre’ 0070, p. 36. UNDP (2010) Human Development Report, Technical notes.
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Generational differences as sources of conflict within the workplace Kozák Anita1 ABSTRACT In this paper the generational differences and the interpersonal conflicts at the workplace are analysed. I suggest that the age of an employee could be crucial for the considerations of interpersonal conflicts within the workplace. Although American management literature started dealing with generational issues at the workplace, it pays little attention to the differences between generations during the process of conflict handling. This paper seeks to examine the difficulties of conflict handling concerning different generations of employees. It also examines the most important differences between generations as sources of workplace conflicts. Personal and work-related factors of generational differences have been collected and the importance of the age in the interpersonal workplace conflicts will be analyzed. Quantitative data from an empirical analysis is used for the research. Questionnaires were completed by 80 employees in the United States of America and in Hungary. Keywords: generatoins, labermarket, workplace conflicts, USA, Hungary
Introduction There has been a proliferation of literature in management science about the interpersonal workplace conflicts at the international level showing the actuality and significance of the topic. Moreover, research in social science has been all the more engaged with generational differences; in addition American management literature started dealing with the difficulties of managing different generations at the workplace. My primary objective with this essay is to create a connection in these fields and analyze the generational differences as sources of conflict within the workplace.
In the first part of this essay the literature review analyzes the personal 1 Kozák Anita – Assistant Lecturer, Department of Institutional Management and Leadership, Faculty of Child and Adult Education of the University of Debrecen
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differences between generation and the type of interpersonal conflicts, then the methodology of the examination is introduced, following that the results and finally the consequences. Literature review and Hypotheses The online Latin-English dictionary defines conflict < noun, Latin conflictus > as a clash; a collision; an impact; a fight; an impulse; an impression and a necessity (Internet 2). Another well-known online dictionary describes the conflict as “a psychic struggle, often unconscious, resulting from the opposition or simultaneous functioning of mutually exclusive impulses, desires, or tendencies” (Internet 3). The approach of the latter definition is more psychological and more focused on the sources of the conflict. There are many ways to sort and classify conflict (Brendt – Wolfgang [2009] 67-73. o.); considering the methodology of the examination the approach of the sources of conflict is highlighted. By evaluating the conflicts there are five categories: relationship, data, interest, structural and value. “Relationship conflicts occur because of the presence of strong negative emotions, misperceptions or stereotypes, poor communication or miscommunication, or repetitive negative behaviors (…) Data conflicts occur when people lack information necessary to make wise decisions, are misinformed, disagree on which data is relevant, interpret information differently, or have competing assessment procedures. (…) Interest conflicts are caused by competition over perceived incompatible needs. (…) Structural conflicts are caused by forces external to the people in dispute. (…) Value conflicts are caused by perceived or actual incompatible belief systems. Values are beliefs that people use to give meaning to their lives” (Internet 4). One of the sources of relationship and data conflicts is the not proper communication between people; value conflicts occur because of the differences in value systems. It means, most of the conflicts are caused by personal and/or communicational differences. Loden created a figure which describes the personal differences at the workplace (Figure 1).
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Figure 1. Dimensions of diversity – The Loden Model Geographic location
Age
Race
Marital status
Education Communic ation style
Ethnicity
Work experience Physical abilities and characteristic
Sexuality
Work style
Military experience
Gender
Religious beliefs First language Organization role and level
Source: Loden [1996, 92. p.]
The inner circle holds nine primary dimensions of difference: Age, Race, Gender, Physical Abilities and Characteristics, Sexuality, and Ethnicity. Loden describes these as the “core of an individual’s diverse identity.” Secondary dimensions include political beliefs, organizational role and level, military experience, first language, marital status, work style, education, work experience, communication style, religious beliefs and geographic location (Internet 1). The highlighted factors (9 from 16 factors) are strongly depends on the age of employee: communication style, work style, ethnicity, religious beliefs, age, race, physical abilities and characteristic, work experience and military experience. Considering these number of age-related factors, it can be pointed out that the age of employee is crucial at the workplace and because of these differences conflicts can be created between different generations. Hammill (2005) created a table (Table 1) which summarizes the differences among each generation at the workplace. Table 1. Workplace characteristics
Work ethic and values
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Baby Boomers
Generation X
Generation Y
Workaholics Work efficiently Personal fulfillment Desire quality Question authority
Eliminate the task Self-reliance Want structure and direction Skeptical
What’s next Multitasking Tenacity Tolerant Goal oriented
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Work is…
An exciting adventure
A difficult challenge A contract
A means to an end Fulfillment
Leadership style
Consensual Collegial
Everyone is the same Challenge others Ask why
TBD*
Interactive style
Team player Loves to have meetings
Entrepreneur
Participate
Communications
In person
Direct Immediate
E-mail Voice mail
Feedback and rewards
Don’t appreciate it Money Title recognition
Sorry to interrupt, but how am I doing? Freedom is the best reward
Whenever I want it Meaningful work
Message that motivate
You are valued You are needed
Do it your way You will Forget the work with rules other bright, creative people
Work and family life
No balance Work to live
Balance
Balance
*As this group has not spent much time in the workplace, this characteristic has yet to be determined. Source: Hammill [2005, 3. p.]
As we can see on the Table 1, there are strongly differences among each generation at the workplace. Growing up in different time, having different economical, political and social circumstances creates different values, attitudes and approaches. Of course, these characteristics are not typical for everyone, but we can use it as a base to understand the causes of intergenerational conflicts at the workplace.
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Hypothesis 1: Employees value high important the various general factors that facilitates the intergenerational conflicts at the workplace: (a) differences is ethics (b) different interpretation of the rules of behavior (c) differences in religions (d) different ideology (e) different communication (e.g. words) (f) self-evaluation (ego) and (g) different priorities. The work habits and the approaches of work are strongly influenced by the differences in personality. HYPOTHESIS 2: Employees value high important various work-related factors that facilitate the intergenerational conflicts at the workplace: (a) different physical activities (b) differences in motivation and (c) different knowledge in up-to-date technologies. Methodology I have developed a questionnaire in order to examine the differences between generations at workplace. This questionnaire consists of 13 questions; each question includes 10 sub-questions. Respondents evaluated each sub-questions with the help of the following scale: 1: not important, 2: somewhat important, 3: important, 4: fairly important, 5: crucial. One of the 13 questions was about the sources of conflict within the workplace. I have differentiated the general and the work-related factors of the sources of conflict. Differences in ethics, different interpretation of the rules of behavior, differences in religions, different ideology, different communication (e.g. words), self-evaluation (ego) and different priorities were general factors. Different physical activities, differences in motivation, different knowledge in up-to-date technologies were work-related factors. Questionnaires were distributed to 80 employees in the United States of America and in Hungary. Respondents in Hungary work for an agricultural company; employees in the United States work for a distributor company. Almost two-thirds (59%) of the employees were male, 50% had academic education, all of the respondents worked full time and 41% were in managerial position. The generational distribution of employees was the following: 24% belong to the Y generation (between 18 and 29 years old), 41% belong to the X generation (between 30 and 47 years old) and 35% were Baby Boomers (between 48 and 65 years old). I employed the methods of descriptive statistics for the demographic variables and I used the one-way analysis of variance and weighted average in order to survey the differences between generations.
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Results Table 2 shows the results concerning the of the importance of personal factors that facilitate the intergenerational conflicts at the workplace, which examine the Hypotheses 1 (a), 1 (b), 1 (c), 1 (d) 1 (e) 1 (f) 1 (g) of the study; while Table 3 displays the results concerning the importance of work-related factors that facilitate the intergenerational conflicts at the workplace which analyses the Hypotheses 2 (a), 2 (b), 2 (c) and 2 (d) of the essay. Table 2. Results of the importance of personal factors that facilitate the intergenerational conflicts at the workplace Differences in ethics
Σ 3,34
Different interpretation of the rules of behavior
Σ 3,78
Differences in religions
Σ 2,28
Different ideology
Σ 3,16
Different communication (e.g. words)
Σ 3,55
Self-evaluation, ego
Σ 3,5
Different priorities
Σ 3,78
Source: Own research, 2010
First, as we can see on Table 2, employees gave a relative high score for most of the personal factors, especially for the different interpretation of the rules of behavior and different priorities. Probably these are the most conspicuous factors in a daily basis. The ethics, the religion and the ideology are more privately. The results of the importance of different communication confirm the findings of one of our earlier researches. We had examined the significance of organizational communicational channels in different groups of age employees before [Kozák 2011]. Table 3. Results of the importance of work-related factors that facilitate the intergenerational conflicts at the workplace Different physical activity
Σ 2,47
Differences in motivation
Σ 3,63
Different knowledge in up-to-date technologies
Σ 3,67
Source: Own research, 2010
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Secondary, work-related factors were valued also relatively high by the employees. Literature emphasizes the importance of differences in motivation among each generation, which was confirmed by this examination, too. The significance of physical activity depends on the type of work and the scope of activities, questionnaire were distributed mostly to clerical workers. The different knowledge in up-to-date technologies was the highly evaluated among work-related factors. Probably because the technology develops so fast, and while younger generation was born in this ‘technical revolution’, for older generation it is more difficult to keep abreast of the times. As we can see, it influences on the work and also it can create intergenerational conflicts at the workplace. The results did not verify every part of my hypotheses. Hypothesis 1: Employees value high important the various personal factors that facilitates the intergenerational conflicts at the workplace: (a) differences is ethics: not highly evaluated by employees. (b) different interpretation of the rules of behavior: employees found this factor very important. (c) differences in religions: not highly evaluated by employees. (d) different ideology: not highly evaluated by employees. (e) d ifferent communication (e.g. words): considered important, but the most important. (f) self-evaluation (ego): also considered important, but the most important. (g) different priorities: employees found this factor very important. Hypothesis 2: Employees value high important various work-related factors that facilitate the intergenerational conflicts at the workplace: (a) different physical activities: not highly evaluated by employees. (b) differences in motivation: employees found this factor very important. (c) d ifferent knowledge in up-to-date technologies: the most important among work-related factors. Summary The goal of this study was to examine the factors of sources of intergenerational conflicts at the workplace. The review of the literature shows that there is an extensive literature of generational differences, but we are yet to find works about the differences between generations focused on interpersonal conflicts. The analysis of sources of conflicts has its own practical merits, and this study reveales that generational differences are important during the daily basis. Therefore, we should consider the age of employees in order to handle conflicts
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successfully between different generations. There are personal and work-related factors which were highly evaluated as sources of intergenerational conflicts at the workplace. In order to sophisticate our research a bigger sample is needed in the future. To further our research we plan to examine the importance of communicational forms and the differences in problem-solving and conflict-handling techniques among each generations. Bibliography 1. 2. 3. 4.
Brendt Z. – Wolfgang T. (2009): Mindennapjaink konfliktushelyzetei –Hogyan kezeljük a konfliktusokat munkahelyünkön és családunkban? Medicina Könyvkiadó Zrt, Budapest 67-73, p. Hammill G. (2005): Mixing and Magaging Four Generations of Employees FDUMagazine, winter/sping, USA 3, p. Kozák A. (2011): A generációk közötti munkahelyi kommunikáció vizsgálata amerikai és magyar munkavállalók egy-egy csoportján, In: Multikulturális Műhely Tanulmányok I, Debreceni Egyetem Gyermeknevelési és Felnőttképzési Kar, 42-53, p. Hajdúböszörmény. Loden M. (1996): Implementing Diversity, Mc-Graw Hill Publishing, New York, 92. p.
Internet http://mowgli.org.uk/knowledge-centre/skills-centre/leadership-skills/dimensions-of-differences (10.03.2012). http://www.latin-dictionary.org/Latin-English-Dictionary/conflictus (12.05.2012). http://www.thefreedictionary.com/conflict (12.05.2012). http://www.internetmediator.com/medres/pg18.cfm (06.05.2012).
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THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN ORGANIZATIONAL DEVELOPMENT AND ORGANIZATIONAL CULTURE Magdolna Láczay1 Abstract The vision of Fordlandia seems to be a considerable lesson for today’s experts. The outstanding figure of management sciences and production attempted to carry out a fairy-tale-like experiment in the rainforest of South America. At his time the plan failed. However, the economy of the 20th century reflected both Taylor’s organization of work and Ford’s production system. They were accompanied by the development of mass production, mass consumption and also by the emergence of a globalized economy. It was also the period of serious recessions. Are there any more reasons of management or cultural kind that go beyond the economic structure? The globalization of organizational culture opposed to the localization of the culture of every day life can be observed in today’s society. The researchers are forced to carry out work in these opposing forces of space. Globalization and localization, in other disciplines regionalism, have raised conflicts and problems of planning and development in all fields of life but have also led to spectacular results. The differentiated approaches to the topic affect the cultural dimensions that can be investigated in a variety of disciplines and which can be experienced in every day life and also in the world of work. Key words: globalization, deglobalization, organizational culture, new challenges of managment
Introduction The analysis of Fordlandia draws attention to the deficiencies of today’s postfordist policy. The globalized organizational culture cannot be developed on the one hand because the consumption market has become saturated. Products of mass consumption are likely to spread. However, more diversified, more generation- or culture-sensitive forms of production have also appeared. On the other hand, the Prof. H.C. dr. habil Magdolna Láczay, CSc College Professor, Head of Institutional and Leadership Department in Faculty of Child and Adult Education University of Debrecen.
1
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companies’ outsourcing for the sake of a continuous and cheap workforce has declined. There is a growing demand for more educated and talented workers instead of cheap, semi-skilled labourers. This requires not only organizational, but also general intelligence. The researches of organizational culture and of the interactions with social scientists have not yet evolved complex methods of research. However, the relationship of land, humans and life is more and more often considered to be essential not only for the understanding of the past but also for the management of the present crisis and for the foundation of the future. It is assumable that the complex knowledge of the interpretations of various disciplinary and of organisational cultures opens up new horizons for management sciences. The Vision of Fordlandia The American classics of management have furnished the basis of the science by publishing their results on the development, organization and direction of modern mass production and of the system of the division of labour. Their success and also the films of Hollywood, turning it into an imaginable land, made America the most desired place in the world. The spread of new consumer goods promised a wealth misleading even for their creators. The vision of Fordlandia, as presented in Greg Grandin’s recent article (In Le Monde Diplomatique 10th October, 2011.), proves it. According to his article the name-giving owner of the present-day successful car brand, Henry Ford, purchased a state-sized piece of land in the Amazon rainforest. After destroying the rich fauna and flora of the jungle, a rubber plantation was built as well as a city full of the comfort of America with nurseries, schools and places of entertainment so as to pass on the American way of life. The contemporary press believed that Ford took “the magic of the white men” into the wild and it was also stated that he wanted to become Christ of the New World. Scientists and leading politicians believed that he had taken development into the remote parts of the world, for the natives of the jungle. However, reality led to depressing results. White employees applied the old methods of the Wild West. The opportunities seemed to attract a great number of people who replaced the shingle-roofed prefabricated town with refuse dumps, bordellos, gambling-dens or temporary lodgings. To make matters even worse, poor weather conditions and the disastrous plantation methods resulted in the fall of the enterprise. The rainforest started to take back its territory and, for the greatest disappointment, the employees were unable to be won over, the town became corrupted and Fordlandia fell prey to decay. Half a century later, however, the principles and methods of Henry Ford conquested the whole world. This single case serves as the archetype of the Fordist Capitalism. The economy of the 20th century was characterized by the labour organization of Taylor and the production system of Ford, namely the
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drastic increase of production, the division of labour, the employees by the assembly line, either skilled or unskilled, who contributed to low-cost mass production and mass goods. But why did the first enterprise fall? What factors did the outlaid dreamer of Fordlandia, owning the newest conditions of management and technology fail to consider? And how did his labour organization method manage to conquest the world later on? As long as all the different possible aspects are considered, not all of the economic analysis can be listed. It is only the conclusion that can be noted, namely that by today the paradigm of globalization has burdened both on the economy and the consumption accompanied by numerous processes of the world. Globalization has also provoked the followers of deglobalization which means that the settlement of the relationship between globalization and localization has urged theoretically and practically the creation of new solutions. Beneath the top of the iceberg By exporting the methods of modern organization and management Ford intended to improve his ideas. Since that time analysts have investigated the conditions of efficiency and terms and views of organizational development have been quite generally accepted. R Beckhard’s definition of 1974 has become a classical one (Barlai-Csapó, 1997). In his opinion organizational development is an upside-down planned attempt that effects the entire organization. It intends to improve the efficiency and vitality of the organization by planned interventions into the processes of the organization and by applying behavioural studies. Indeed, this latter aspect failed to be taken into account by the modern conquerors of the rainforest. Economic processes separately are unfeasible since the outsourced organizations do not only have their counterparts but also there are some internal factors which are more and more necessary to be examined these days. This employs primarily the experts of organizational culture. They are to undertake the responsibility of the disciplines of these fields of management studies. The close contact with the entire study of human sciences and culture makes the complexity of the topic and thus impedes the work of the experts. This is the reason why I am citing exclusively the elements giving direct evidences following a single line. In practice, by organizational culture you mean the realization of the methods directly connected to technological processes, management levels. In this way they close up into the world of the given organization. Nowadays, however, organizations are not exclusively outsourced companies or mixed-ethnic affiliated ones specialized in producing a specific part of the work, but they wish to become independent from the control of their states and work out the management and development of their own companies in great details. This approach can be
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considered only as the culture including the methods of management, organization, leadership and control. Due to the signs of depression in the late 60s of the 20th century multi- and supranational companies have experienced the cultural and lifestyle deviations of the employees and have been forced to change their management methods. Organizational management comes into force by the mutual values, behaviour, professional skills, communication of the members of the company and also by the beliefs, faith, habits, etc. behind them. And meanwhile, although the latter ones remain basically hidden they determine the mentality of the employees. One of the most descriptive explanations is given by Schein’s model (2004). He identifies the situations as an iceberg that has only a tiny part visible and the rest is hidden from the management and direct methods are required to explore them. The visible parts of the company/organizational culture include legends, myths, stories, brand names and logos while the systems of virtue, norms and models of behaviour, habits, religious and ethnical and linguistic relations are found in the invisible “underwater” section. Hidden values make up a much greater portion of the “iceberg” and that is why they are often referred to as central values or core values. G. Hofstede (2005) gives a similar explanation, although with a different symbol. He identifies the structure of the organizational culture with that of an onion, the leaves of which symbolize qualities which are more and more difficult to reach or get to know heading from outside in. In order that by the means of direct examinations the management should get to know and make use of more information Hofstede suggests research methods based on great representation and on the amount of data required by a globalized world. By creating and describing the relations of 5 cultural axis he intended to discover the roots of the conflicts of the modern society as well as classifying the qualities of the given societies applying this method. It proved that by the different variations taken from the meeting points of the axis the traditions, cultural roots can be characterized in spite of the globalization process. They are considered to be of vital importance by both the experts of crisis management and the followers of deglobalization. (Walden Bello, Frederic Lordon, 2011).
The Babylon Tower of globalization has shaken
The industrial-scientific-technological-information revolution seems to have taken its route by today. James Watt was to launch the change and his steam engine introduced a production process similar to the conquest of Henry Ford a few hundred years later. Ford’s goodwill is represented by his saying “Hard-working men need an armchair, a comfortable home and a pleasant environment”. However, the
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pleasant environment was the very first to be destroyed by mass production. Later on, by getting a free way, the industrial production outgrew first the borders of the countries then those of the continents while consuming the raw material reserves and drove even its followers into crisis. Nowadays globalization does not refer to the optimism a nice new age may promise, but is more and more likely to indicate the directorates of a few winning giant companies ruling the economy of the world– from a virtual tower of Babylon. In my opinion, this fistful but widely- spread group of leaders has inspired Schein to create his next policy on career orientation inventory (2009). In his view, leaders tend to detach themselves from the process and cast of production and believe that their tasks are fulfilled by maximizing their investment and globalizing their methods. On the other hand, behind their results there are crowds of the dissatisfied, depression is rising and spreading and it is to be feared that they may call for the spectre of chaos and self-destruction. To give an example for the occurrence you may think of Greg Smith, the ex-director of Goldman Sachs. In a recent interview for the New York Times2 he explained that money-making has destroyed the organizational culture that once made the company great. Today, it is purely about how they can make the most possible money off their clients. What makes this “backbiting” even more interesting is the fact that this certain bank was in the focus of a recent scandal and their real estate investment swindles have shaken not only the financial market of the USA but also that of the world. The journalist Matt Taibi commented on this moral and financial decline of the bank as “a giant vampire squid stuck onto the face of the world pumping money out of it.” Looking back upon the previous century, Fordlandia, the first symbol of the capitalized production system, seems to have both conquested and later on lost the whole world. This is the reason why the present examination of its case is essential. It also reflects some of the failures of the contemporary postfordist policy. The consumer market has been saturated, and although there will be products of global demand, signs for a more diversified, more generation- and culture-specified market have been noticed. On the other hand, the availability of a continuously cheaper workforce and the outsourcing of the companies seem to be decreasing. There is a growing demand for more educated creative labourers instead of the cheap semi-skilled ones. It requires not only organizational but also general intelligence. Global organizational culture has seemed to be entirely or party impossible to be established. It is due to the fact that human societies have gone through different stages of development and created various value systems and everyday cultures. Of course, it does not mean that they are unable to respect global values or to contribute to them, rather that it is possible only by the prevention of their own habitat, region, their country’s culture and the values of their cultural memory. History has many times experienced the effects of the survival of previous cultures. For instance, causes of ancient times are blamed Napi Gazdaság, 14 March 2012. retrieved from http://www.napi.hu/tozsdek-piacok/vallott_a_ bankvezer_zullott_hely_a_goldman_sachs.513465.html. 2
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for the diverse development of the eastern and western world. Ethnographers and sociologists have highlighted habits of the European societies born in the cultural memories centuries ago for the sake of religious division, for example.3 Deglobalization may not mean a sharp turn since no man want or can deny the achievements. The necessary reforms of the economy, however, cannot succeed without focusing on the values of the different cultural spheres. Since the age of Enlightenment attempts have been made to uniform the economy for the sake of rationalism, although the analysis of the events have revealed the importance of conventions beside that of the rationalism. Countries of the Far-East have been mentioned as an example (Márkus 2001, Jenei-Hajnal 2008). They owe their outstanding economic success to the survival of the centuries-old work culture and to the use of the habitual production and consuming culture. Apart from the economy, globalization has given more opportunities for cooperation and by the means of information technology it has set the basis of a world culture that may serve as the beginning of a new civilization. From this opportunity management sciences have inherited the greatest part in responsibility since they are to solve the problem of standardization of production culture in a way that the customs of everyday life, cultural values and the cultures of the different communities could be preserved and adapted. New challenges for management sciences in the globalized world It is obvious today that the economy and the market have expanded to such an extent that we should talk about a globalized economy and a world market and the accompanying value system of the same degree. Profit, however, is not decided about in such a wide-spread system. As a proof of Schein’s study of 2009 the objectives of the leaders of the globalized economy are determined merely as the maximizing of the profit. The crisis, reductions and environmental damages, on the contrary, are to be settled by the sovereign states or communities. The arising anomalies also require a new type of relationship between the management of the world companies and the relevant sovereignties (nation-states, alliances, cultural, scientific and religious communities, etc.). In connection with the current recession certain disciplines of science have already outlined the interests to be hurt and the formation of The divergent ways of development and the evaluation of the Eastern and Western societies have been the idea behind a great number of discussions between eminent scientists of philosophy, politics and history. Among them Ferenc Tőkei needs to be mentioned. Starting from the theses of Hegel he came to the investigation of the diversification and the effects of the Asian production methods. One of the most significant thinkers of the 20th century in Hungary was Béla Hamvas who examined the survival of the cultural space and recognised the survival of the values of the previous centuries in the society of Hungary. The statements of István Hajnal about the middle-age relation of rationality and conventionality are revived in the debates of globalization and deglobalization. 3
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the bourgeois era is more and more frequently cited for its conceptions and debates on the theories of economic, government and power. The investigation of globalization and of the connection between national sovereignty and democracy4 is making it essential to realize that we need to face or adapt the unsolvable impact of the three factors which are similar to the ones the creators of the motto “Liberty, Equality and Fraternity” had exposed the succeeding generations to. It is even more possible that they can be found in causes of the problems as the unifying market with its invisible hands is unable to settle the conflicts of economic, self-determination, those of sustainable development or any kind of human conflicts, just like at the beginning of capitalism. Meanwhile, a single governing globalization, similar to the globalization of the market, is considered necessary by the National Intelligence Council5, eg. It may not be strange that it is suggested in the papers of the self-nominated world leader American council who have discussed and elaborated the forecast with the scientists of several continents. To the present questions they have replied that global challenges require global solutions either in the field of human resources, in that of the management of international migration or, in general, in the formation of efficient management, in education, etc. The initial statement of the document, “Global governance—the collective management of common problems at the international level—is at a critical juncture” refers to the necessity of a modern management in order to be able to solve the common problems of different organizations and nations successfully. Reading the statement in the centre of Europe we must admit that it can only be successful if they serve the interests of the ones to be decided about. Management, simultaneously, needs to grow into a science with a much broader scope. Bibliography 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7.
Barlai R. – Csapó E.: Szervezetfejlesztés és stratégiai vezetés, A módszer. In: Könyvtári Figyelő 43. évf. 1997.2. sz. http://epa.oszk.hu/00100/00143/00022/barlai.html. Grandin G.: Fordlandia. in: Le Monde Diplomatique, 2011.10.10, http://magyardiplo.hu. Hajnal I. (1939): Történelem és szociológia. In: Századok 1939. 1-6; and in: Lakatos L. (Ed.): Hajnal István. Új Mandátum Kiadó, Budapest, 2001. 159-185 Hajnal G., Jenei G. (2008): Közigazgatási rendszerek, valamint közigazgatás-, illetve közmenedzsment-tudomány és képzés Európában és Magyarországon / Történelmi tendenciák és helyzetértékelés, Köz- Gazdaság Tudományos Füzetek, 4. 21-25. Hamvas B. (1985): Az öt géniusz, Európai Protestáns Magyar Szabadegyetem, München. Hofstede G., Gert J.: Kultúrák és szervezetek: Az elme szoftvere, McGraw-Hill, 2005, and Hungarian Edition: VHE Kft., Pécs, 2008. Hoós J. (2012): Globalizáció, nemzeti szuverenitás és demokrácia / Magyarország helyzete a globális világban. Köz-Gazdaság Tudományos Füzetek, 2012. 1, 37-66.
Hoós János (2012): Globalizáció, nemzeti szuverenitás és demokrácia / Magyarország helyzete a globális világban, Köz-Gazdaság Tudományos Füzetek, 2012. 1. 37-66. 5 National Intelligence Council (2010): Global Governance 2025: At a Critical Juncture, Washington. 4
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96 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14.
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Magdolna Láczay Lordon F.: A deglobalizáció és ellenségei. Le Monde Diplomatique, 2011.11.11. http://magyardiplo.hu. Márkus I.: Hajnal István igaza, Kortársak Hajnal Istvánról. In: Lakatos L. (Ed): Hajnal István. Új Mandátum Kiadó, Bp. 2001. 275-292. National Intelligence Council (2010): Global Governance 2025: At a Critical Juncture, Washington. Schein E.H. (2004): Organizational culture and leadership, San Francisco. Schein E.H. (2009): The Corporate Culture Survival Guide, New and Revised Edition and Three culture of managment: The Key to organization. Walden B.: Deglobalization: Ideas for a New World Economy, Zed Books, London, New York, 2002, In Hungarian: Deglobalizáció: elképzelések egy új világgazdaságról, Le Monde Diplomatique, 2011.11.11. http://magyardiplo.hu. Walden B.: Visszavonulóban a globalizáció, Eszmélet, 19. évf. 74. sz. 2007, www.epa. hu/01700/01739/00059/
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The Communication as Participation at the University of Vienna Márta Mohácsi PhD1 Abstract The expression, participation means such a process in which individuals and groups gather in order to communicate and interact with each other, exchange or hoard information in connection with certain topics and problems, decisions and finally take part in the decision making and problem solving phase. The effectiveness analyzation of this process proved to be a good field at the University of Vienna. It was conducted in the Institute of Comparable Language and Literature in the Finno Ugrian Department to examine the phenomenon of participation both from the Austrian and Hungarian side with special focus on the students learning Hungarian. During my research, I regard the University of Wien as the institute, the Finno Ugrian Deparment as a field, the communicators as agent, so the students. The lecture consists of three parts – trying to analyze the usage of the institution, the field and the agent which are widely accepted in the field of communication research as unavoidable notions. The research was financially supported by the Hungarian Scholarship Board Office. Keywords: communication, participation, methodes, Vien, Hungary, skills
Rudolphina Vindobonensis The second university of Central and Eastern Europe was established in Vienna in 1365 by Rudolf IV the Austrian archduke with his brother. The Alma Mater bearing the name of Rudolphina Vindobonensis began operating with three faculties (arts, law and medicine). The pope Orban V did not consent to the establishment of theology. The theological faculy was authorized in 1384 when Orban VI allowed the education of theological studies. The institution was built on the base of Parisian style. The students became member of the university after signing the register. After finishing the prescribed studies the brightest students had the possibility of 1
College Assistant Professor, College of Nyíregyháza
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acquiring scientific degree. The medieval university maintained close relationship with the church. The power of church was cut back by Josef II and Maria Theresie (Kissné, 2004). Thanks to the revolution of 1848, teaching and learning became totally free at the university. The free mediation of science was enforced in a 1867 law. In the following years , the schools of Vienna became world-famous. The institution was enriched with numerous new buildings. The main building of the university was planned as a representative renaissance mansion by Heinrich von Ferstel in the late XIX. century. From 1897, women were also allowed to study. In the 1970s the university saw an increased interest in the education and therefore many institution were reestablished. The University Law of 2002 led to the basic reshuffling of the university and consequently the institution gained greater separateness and became achievement-oriented. The educational instutions of the University of Wien are located in more than 60 places. In the main bulding, besides the management of the university and the library, some institution and administrative offices. The institutions of the Faculty of Arts were placed in the new building and the University Campus. The biggest blocks of the university are the Schmelz Sport Centre, Biology Centre I. and II., Juridicum, Administrative Centre, Campus Vienna Biocenter. Currently, there are more than 74,000 students at the university and the university has more than 180 faculties. The 6500 scholars of the university teach in the field of jurisprudence, theology, social sciences, economy, engineering, arts and natural sciences. Materials and Methods During my research - with the help of quantitative and qualitative methods - I tried to answer the following questions concerning the students: • • • • • • • • •
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What kind of communication picture do they have about the University of Wien? What kind of communication picture do they have about the field, so the Department of Finno-Ugrian? What kind of communication picture do they have about the agent, so how do they communicate? What is the communication like between teachers and students? What was the motivation of the students to apply for the Hungarian training What kind of vison for the future do they have? What kind of pedagogic methods do they use and will theach with? What does Hungarian as a foreign language mean them? How did their linguistic and communication skills evolved during learning?
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The quantitative research is such a research modell, which intends to make statistical data processing and give quantifiable results. The survey contained 6 dimensions and 20 items. The input data were presented in Excel format and processed with help of the SPSS statistical programme (Figure 1). Figure 1.: The programme of the research. The basic aim of the research
The basic aim of the research
The compilation of the means of reseach (questionaire) Sample
The Department of Finno-Ugrian
Dimenzoin
I. Phase
at the University Motivation
LanguageLearningL
Professional Expetation
Teaching-Learning
Of Wien Communication Labour Market
Statistical analysis of the questionnaire II. Phase
Evaluation of the results of research
Source: Own compilation.
In my research, beside the conventional discriptive statistics, I applied the methods of multi-variable statistics, with hypothesis tests. I made focus grups when making qualitative interviews. It means such a research method, where the data of the research emerge during the group communication of the subjects. During the research, I applied both the miniature and panel focus groups (Vicsek, 2006). In this way I got an insight into the processes of opinion-forming and could modell the phenomenon of participation between the everyday conversations, discussions and opinions. The processing of structured interviews was carried out with contents analysis and to this I qualified the dimensions. I used the Likert scale to empirically weight the dimensions. The survey was preceded by a small-sample pilot research. During the research I reviewed the materials of Österreichises Nationalbibliothek, The Library and Archives of University of
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Wien and the Collegium Hungaricum with are in connection of communication and linguistics. Some important results of the research 1. The Sample The research was conducted between August and October 2010. The sample consisted of 107 students. Primarily, those students fill the questionaries in who studied Finno-Ugrian or were Hungarian learning students and those students who chose Hungarian as an optional subject. (Table 1). Table 1.: The Number of the sample by Distribution Faculty
Number
Submitted questionaries (%)
Hungarology BA
42
39 %
Optional Subject
48
45 %
Hungarian Teacher
17
16 %
107
100 %
Total Source: Own compilation
The questionarrie was filled in by 64 women and 43 men, as for the occupation 35% work and consequently 65% do not work, full-time university student (Table 2). Table 2. : The Distribution of the Sample by gender and occupation Gender
Occupation
Men
Women
Worker
Non-worker
40%
60 %
35%
65%
Source: Own compilation
2. The phenomenon of participation During my research I took into consideration three sources. I took into consideration the tradition of the research of social communication I moved within the communication as participation notion and I even tried ot take into consideration linguistics and logics aspects. My aim was to learn more about the langua as the means of communication (Horányi, 2007).
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Most of the students mentioned the speking as the most frequent difficulty when using a foreign language. The speaking was followed by vocabulary, grammar and the open and bolder initiation was ranked to the third place (Figure 2.). Figure 2.: The problems of using Hungarian. What causes mostly trouble when using Hungarian?
Speaking, Dialects, Grammar, Vocabulary, Openness, Lack of practice, Writing, Professional Language, Other Source: Based on the empirical research SPSS.
The empirical research tried to determine those personality features which are considered to be important by the students. Based on the averages, the communication skills, the problem-solving skills and creativity are among the first (Figure 3.).
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Figure 3.: The most importand personality features during a lesson. Which are those personality features which you consider the most important during a lesson?
Communication skills, Problem-solving skills, Self-knowledge, Self-awareness, Interest in the novelties and science, Openness, Self-developing skills, Creativity, Professional theoretical preparedness, Other Source: Based on the empirical research SPSS.
I was also interested in the questionnaire in the development process of the students during the time spent at the university. Most of them mentioned the acceptance of new things, adaptability ot new things, and they would be willing to go to the University of Wien again. (Figure 4).
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Figure 4.: Skills in proportion with the time spent at the university
How did your skills evolved during the time spent at the university? I improved my skills connected to effective communication, I improved my presentation skills, I often discussed the topic of the course with other students, The discussion of the course helped me to understand the material, The communication is good between teachers and students, I am capable of summarizing information and thoughts stemming from different topics, By using my knowledge I express myself better, I accept new things better then before, I am more adaptable to change, I intend to re-enroll Source: Based on the empirical research SPSS
I coined the useful-valuable notions to learn much more about the importance of the acquired knowledge at the university. The figure shows same results in every case. The would-be Hungarian teachers feel the new skills the most useful and valuable (Figure 5).
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Figure 5. : Useful-valuable dichotomy
You are the student of which training? Hungarology BA, Hungarian teacher, Hungarian is taken up as an optional subject Source: Based on the empirical research SPSS
The qualitative interview, which is a structured interview naturally was built on planned dimensions. The processing was carried out with contents analysis and the quantification of dimensions. In the quanlitative interview the empirical weighting of dimensions was based on the 7-scale Likert scale (Table 3.). Table 3. The overall characterisation of the qualitative analysis Interviews Dimensions
No. 1.
No 2.
No 3.
No 4.
No. 5.
No. 6.
Motivation
5
4
4
5
4
5
Language learning
5
4
5
5
5
4
Communication
6
5
6
6
6
5
Professional expectation
5
5
5
6
5
5
Teaching-Learning
7
6
7
6
7
6
Labour market
6
6
5
6
5
6
Source: Own compilating based on the empirical research.
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The application of sturctures interview was justified by the fact that the ancet method requires supplementary survey. With the common application of the methods I intended to enhance the objectivity of my research. Communication as an answer Education and economy and the tertiary education and users are the most important dichotomies in the European education policy in last few years. The European universities preparing for the new challenges and the University of Wien as well are seeking their ways of unfolding communicating with the society and economy. Knowledge, qualification and innovation readiness became the equally determinant factors of economic performance and the personal career. Consequently, the need for giving marketable skills and knowledge has enormously increased. Without good communication this is simply unimaginable. Communication is not a reaction to something, nor a kind of interaction with someting but transaction in which man produces and assigns reports in order to achieve the set goals (Barnlund, 1977). The results of the research show that that the languages constitues the means and object of pedagogy. The fuction of language is very simple, but at the same time it is so basic that gives possibility to describe and evaluate the individualism and sociology of students. Learning foreign languages and its role in live-long learning and intercultural, multicultural development give completely new challeges and possibilities. It would be very interesting to make a similar survey at the Language Cetre of the University of Wien so the two samples would be comparable giving new consequences and results. The research of communication as participation was sponsored by the Hungarian Scholarship Committee. Bibliography 1. 2. 3. 4.
Barnlund Dean C. (1977): in. Kommunikáció, Bp. Earl Babbie (2003): A társadalomtudományi kutatás gyakorlata, Balassi Kiadó, Bp. Horányi Ö. (2007)(Szerk.): A kommunikáció, mint participáció, Akti-Typotex, Bp. Irving Seidman (2002): Az interjú, mint kvalitatív kutatási módszer. Műszaki Könyvkiadó, Bp. 5. Rosengren K.E. (2006): Kommunikáció, Typotex, Bp. 6. Kissné B.K. (2004): Magyarországi diákok a bécsi tanintézményekben 1526-1789, ELTE Levéltár, Bp. 7. Sandgruber R. (2005): Österreichische Geschichte, Ökonomie und Politik. Verlag Carl Ueberreuter, Wien. 8. Szögi L. - Kiss J.M. (2003): Magyarországi diákok bécsi egyetemeken és főiskolákon 18491867. In: Magyarországi diákok egyetemjárása az újkorban 7. ELTE Levéltár, Bp. 9. Ujváry G. (2010): A harmincharmadik nemzedék, Ráció Kiadó, Bp. 10. Vicsek L. (2006): Fókuszcsoport, Osiris Kiadó, Bp.
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Using the method of oral history ‒ retelling the past Anikó Nagy Varga1 Abstract Oral history is a kind of method of historical documentation, using interviews with living survivors of the time being investigated. The method tries to record the memories of many different people researching a given event. It collects information about the past from observers and participants. The method gathers data not available in written records about special events. It involves recording or transcribing eyewitness accounts of historical events. Oral historians attempt to record the memories of many different people when researching a given event. Interviewing can provide a special perspective of an event. The nature of memory – both individual and community – is part of the practice of oral investigation. Oral history can also reveal how individual values and actions shaped the past and how the past shapes present – day values and actions. Oral history can be an invaluable source of evidence for understanding individual experiences, or experiences of a group within a certain historical period. Oral testimony cannot be used as a surrogate for analysis of traditional historical written materials (e.g. official documents, letters). It can however, reveal the role of individuals in shaping the past, and how larger trends influenced the individual himself Oral history can be a way of preserving a piece of history. This paper tries to illustrate the nature of oral history as a qualitative method. It also lights its great relevance for historical documentation. Keywords: oral history, qualitative method, narrative inquiry
Qualitative research has become more valuable Lately researchers have used qualitative methods more bravely. There are several well-founded reasons why researchers prefer qualitative methods Associate professor Faculty of Child and Adult Education Debrecen University, Hungary,
[email protected]. 1
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nowadays. Firstly, the individual’s role has been in-valuable in the history of society. Secondly, the researching of historical events that happened in the last 50 years has also been in-valuable after the political changes in Hungary. The role of narrative inquiry has become important in parallel with the role of those participants who took part in the historical occasions. Those events that happened in the past 40-50 years, still have living observers. These observers could be able to divide their own experiences; they were able to tell their own stories from their point of view and not from the point of the official political communication. Until the year 1990 you were not able to have a look at written documents about events that happened in the socialist regime in Hungary, so the importance of living survivors and their spoken stories became very important for those people who want to know the plain truth without any censorship. Basically there are some essential characteristics which can be found in all sorts of qualitative methods such as ethnography, narrative inquiry, fieldwork, participant observation, interpretive survey, life story, memoirs, diaries, personal correspondence, or nowadays mail log. Qualitative research is a form of inquiry that helps us, who are living in the present, not only understand but also explain the meaning of the human’s behaviour in special circumstances. The key philosophical assumption using this research is based on the view of the participants’ interests and the way they could shape an event. Qualitative research focuses on meaning and understanding the role of participants. It tries to discover the living survivors and collect these insiders’ perspective. Using qualitative methods the researchers, as outsiders of the occasion, can get a chance to understand the phenomenon of interest from the participant’s perspective, interacting with their experiences and feelings in connection with the events. It helps the researcher to find different meanings of the same event, so it gives multiple viewpoints. Multiple viewpoints give a deep understanding of the event. It represents the historical events from the participants’ perspective, providing more than mere facts and data, where there is no human mind behind. We can say oral history is an alternative research method, as it collects information in a democratic way from participants and observers. Using this method several participants of a historical event can appear and present themselves. In this way those particular events that can be unique for us, and which we never know about from adequate written material are given a voice. The specificities of oral history Oral history is a sort of qualitative research, which can be a way of preserving a piece of history. It preserves the history with the help of its survivors. It is a kind
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of method of historical documentation, using interviews with living survivors of the time being investigated. Oral history collects information from observers and participants from the past. Through them we can reach primary sources. The picture it can transmit about the past is much more complete and rich. It records the memories of living survivors and collects useful and primary information in an authentic way from those ones who themselves were involved in the event. It is based on the average person’s everyday life. It gathers data not available in written records about events or people. Oral history can reveal how individual values and actions shaped the past and how the past shapes present-day values and actions. During recollecting the individual himself comes into the foreground. The subject is in the centre of the research. As Paul Thompson, one of the pioneers of oral history as a research methodology thinks: „Oral history gives history back to the people in their own words.”2 In his famous book The Voice of the Past,3 he says the majority of the people who are not leaders are unknown and oral history allows them to be heroes and helps them towards a future of their own making. In this way these unknown individuals’ role are revealed as shaping their own history. Oral history records eyewitness accounts of events, which have historical importance. It is a systematic collection of living people’s testimony about their own experiences. These could be historical events, specific events, transcribing of survivors, veterans of wars, minorities, underclass people, natives, all classes of society. Zsófia Eszter Tóth names this method the subculture of historiography.4 Oral history is the methodical collection of everyday memories of everyday people. Gábor Gyáni thinks oral history is a „ primer source” because by the way of it the individual experiences of the stories’ on the participants are able to be revealed.5 Beside the spoken history the missing sources not being talked about in society can become documents in some way, too. A short history of the oral - interviews method Stories are the fabric of our lives. Stories about families, stories of people or groups can bequeath by word of mouth. As oral history is a special kind of story collecting, it is able to collect all of these kinds of stories and more. In this way, the method is of the same age as humanity. The history of using it as a method goes back to the late 19th century in America when some anthropologists started collecting Native American folklore P. Thompson (1978): The Voice of the Past. Oral History. P. Thompson (1978): The Voice of the Past. Oral History. 4 E.Z. Tóth (2000): Klió és az oral history. 165-177. 5 G. Gyáni (2002): 56-os menekültek emlékező stratégiái. 140. 2 3
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on phonograph cylinders.6 Lázár Vértesi collected some facts about historical points using oral history.7 In the 1930s interviewers collected accounts from various groups, including surviving witnesses of the American Civil War, and other historical events. Some researchers recorded traditional American music and folklore. With the development of audio tape recordings, the task of oral historians became easier. In America at the end of 1940s, a historian established the first Oral History Research Office, with a mission of recording, transcribing and preserving oral history interviews. In 1967, American oral historians founded Oral History Association; in 1969, British oral historians founded the Oral History Society. There are now several national organizations and there is an International Oral History Association, which holds conferences, publishes journals devoted to oral history theory and techniques. In Hungary, the Oral History Archive of 1956 was founded in 1985. The aim of establishing the institution was to gather and archive the oral reminiscences of the occasion of the Revolution of 1956. In mid 1980’s collecting oral history interviews with connection to the revolution was against the official party-state narratives, and access to written documents was limited. Users of the method This method can be used in different fields of history, anthropology, folklore, sociology, and other disciplines that study the experiences of specific social groups. Oral history focuses on special groups such as marginalized social groups, workers, minorities, peripheral groups, women or ethnic groups. The method helps us to discover the stories silenced in society. In the field of history, researchers think they are able to understand the experiences of people in the past. Oral history can be an invaluable source of evidence for understanding individual experiences, or experiences of a group within a certain historical period. Alongside the traditional sources of history, it constructs a more democratic record of the past. In a way it is a special kind of story collecting. Oral history interviews cannot be used as a surrogate for analysis of traditional historical materials like official documents, letters, and newspapers. It can, however, reveal the role of individuals in shaping the past, making people more aware of their own history. As Lázár Vértesi thinks, the picture that oral history can transmit about the past is much more complete and rich.8 Folklorists study culture as it is expressed in everyday life, and often use oral history projects to gather materials, traditions to preserve and study for the future. Interviewing individuals is one of the primary means of accessing folklore and culture. P. Thompson: (1978): The Voice of the Past. Oral History. L. Vértesi (2004): Oral history. A szemtanúként elbeszélt történelem lehetőségei. 165. 8 Ibidem. 6 7
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Archaeologists can use oral history to learn more about the life ways of people who have been living descendants, or to locate sites for archaeological excavation. A cultural anthropologist could use this technique to be able to understand the ways that individuals think of themselves in relation to the rest of the world. This method can help anthropologists understand the ways that culture shapes individuals either consciously or unconsciously. Gábor Gyáni believes if tradition and memory (recollection) transforms into history, then individuals come into prominence, your responsibility is to define your identity, as he says: „Remember your past and you will know who you are!” 9 Sociologists and journalists can study marginalized social groups such as women, ethnics and workers. In these fields, conducting and analyzing an interview is a way of uncovering experience that may be underrepresented in mainstream culture. Dominant culture has a tendency not to notice the experiences of certain subgroups, viewing them as peripheral rather than central. Academic fields have emerged to explore the experiences of marginalized groups, and these fields tend to value experimental knowledge and oral history method can be a way of accessing this resource. As Tamás Kanyó believes oral history is „voice to the voiceless”10, the democratic method gives an opportunity to those who are judged by dumbness. Gladly film directors making documentaries about special events also use the method. Advantages and disadvantages using the method Among the advantages, we could mention several points. Oral history is a kind of method, which belongs to the qualitative research method. It is a practical method for researchers who do not like working with statistical data, but they prefer working with real people and their living memories. In this way oral history is more than just a method, it is a view conforming to the researcher’s interest. The method comes into the foreground where they consider the man himself, the individual and the stories happening with him worth researching instead of the object of the research. The focus is on individuals. During the recollecting, the individual himself comes into the foreground. Anyone can be part of historical event. The subject is in the centre of the research. The researchers are collecting their memories in their natural surroundings, so the readers are able to get a real life picture of the area. Through the individual reminiscences about the past, it can ensure an overall interpretation. With the help of reminiscences, we can conclude the language, habits, traditions, and way of thinking of the given area. We are able to reconstruct historical events and its surroundings. 9
G. Gyáni (2000): Kollektív emlékezet és nemzeti identitás, in: G. Gyáni: Emlékezés, emlékezet… T. Kanyó (2002): Beszámoló a XII. Nemzetközi Oral history Konferenciáról.
10
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In using oral history method, the stress is on verbalism as the survivors themselves are telling their experiences in oral presentation. The research records the memories of participants, in this way we can say it is spoken history. Analysing narratives, based on subjective researches, using the language could be very meaningful. The language itself can express the relation of the reminiscent person to the experienced events. The rich and skimpy use of language, the mode, the style, the intonation, the volume, mimic and gesture can all refer to how the storyteller himself was effected in the events. Barbara Sommer and Mary Kay Quinlan believes because of the narrative character of oral testimony, analysing the text constructed by the storyteller is also very important.11 Minorities, special groups and subcultures can all be studied well. The average person’s every day life and every day memory is in its focus. It serves the preservation of the unwritten, ordinary stories. Anyone is able to do the technique and collect the stories of his or her settlement. The conservation of the oral values, traditions, habits and experiences enrich the next generations. Being a valid researcher, we must mention some of its disadvantages, too. This kind of method does not rely on written documents, records or sources. It cannot provide an objective approach, as the researcher himself is part of the study. Users of the method are charged with partiality and subjectivity-says Éva Szabolcs. 12 Several researchers deal with the next questions. Does this study serve anything? What is the gathered information used for? What is the study good for? To do this method you need quite a lot of time. After making interviews, you must re-listen to them, digitize them, shape them in written form, and check them. You cannot deduct principles from its results. There is the problem of validity and reliability. Its result be cannot measured objectively. The researcher himself gets ready the information from the remembering ones, it gives a subjective view for them. The researcher himself becomes the part of the study, the researcher’s neutrality cannot be guaranteed. One of the disadvantages of the method is the limit of reminiscence. The time for which the interviewees are able to remember is limited. There is a fear of human’s memory. How long ago can the re-callers remember? What do they want to remember for? How does time and the present vary the human’s memory? The contact between the interviewee and the researcher can affect the study. Lázár Vértesi thinks we must confront the information from the written documents with the oral history interviews.13 To study the differences and samenesses can enrich and deepen our information about the past. Ritchie Donald says the reminiscent’s direct memory is too valuable to leave it out of consideration. 14 Gábor Gyáni’s opinion is that we must consider all kinds of written documents W.B. Sommer, M.K. Quinlan (2009): The Oral History Manual. É. Szabolcs: Kvalitatív kutatási metodológia a pedagógiában, 65. 13 L. Vértesi: Oral history. A szemtanúként elbeszélt történelem lehetőségei, 171. 14 Ibidem. 11
12
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to be subjective if they have been written with a special purpose.15 These are for example the charters, official files of middle Ages. We think oral history sources must be treated in moderation. Its being authentic is undisputed; it has a hidden reserve beside written documents. It gives primary footings but it must match with written sources. What can we do to be valid, objective and reliable? Confronting several viewpoints about the same story can be helpful. We must also analyze the interviewee’s behaviour during the interview. To know the interviewee’s age, position, education, role in the time of the past and present. We must know the circumstances of the story in the past and know the changes have happened since the story. Summary Oral history is a method that can help to create a truer picture of the past, documenting the lives, life reviews, and feelings of all kinds of people. Collecting oral history, we have a sense of catching and holding something valuable from the receding tide of the past. Collecting and preserving the valuable oral treasure around you, this method enriches you and future generations. It can be evaluated alongside the traditional sources of history to construct a more democratic way of preserving historical information, protecting oral tradition, constructing a more diverse and accurate portrait of the past. The knowledge locked in people’s memories can add vital information and unique human perspectives to our collective understanding of the past. Documenting that information in a systematic way adds value to the storehouse of human knowledge. If we do not collect and preserve everyday memories, oral traditions, then one day they will disappear forever. Using oral history as a method is our duty of reminiscence. Bibliography 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 15
Connelly F.M., Clandinin D.J. (1990): Narrative inquiry, Educational Researcher. 19. 5, 477485. Tóth E.Z. (2000): Klio és az oral history, Múltunk, 3, 165-177. Szabolcs É. (2001): Kvalitatív kutatási metodológia a pedagógiában, Műszaki könyvkiadó, Budapest. Gyáni G. (2002): 56-os menekültek emlékező stratégiái, in: Tamás, Kanyó: Emigráció és identitás. 56-os menekültek Svájcban, L’Harmatten, Budapest. Gyáni G. (2000): Emlékezés és Oral history, in: G. Gyáni: Emlékezés, emlékezet és a történelem elbeszélése, Napvilág Kiadó, Budapest, 128-144. Hanák G. – Kövér G. (1995): Biográfia és Oral history, in: T. Valuch (szerk.): Hatalom és társadalom a XX. századi magyar történelemben, Osiris 1956-os Intézet, Budapest 92-100.
G. Gyáni: Emlékezés és oral history, 38.
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114 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13.
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Anikó Nagy Varga Gyarmati G. (2004): Az oral history kézikönyve, Múltunk. Politikatörténeti folyóirat, 4. szám 196-200. Lázár V. (2004): Oral history. A szemtanúként elbeszélt történelem lehetőségei. Aetas történettudományi folyóirat, 19. évf. 1. sz. 158-173. Ritchie D.A. (2003): Doing Oral History. Oxford University Press, New York. Sommer W.B., Quinlan M.K. (2009): The Oral History Manual, AltaMira Press, USA. Kanyó T. (2002): Emigráció és identitás. 56-os menekültek Svájcban, L’Harmatten, Budapest. Kanyó T. (2002): Beszámoló a XII. Nemzetközi Oral history Konferenciáról. Világtörténet 24, 3-4, 105-106. Thompson P. (1978): The Voice of the Past. Oral History, Oxford University Press, Oxford.
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Careers of Women in Higher Education – The Results of the CHERD Gender Research at the University of Debrecen Zsuzsa Zsófia Tornyi1 Abstract Researching gender differences in higher education would not be complete if we did not study the other significant acting-group beside students: the instructors. As the higher we look at the hierarchy of education and science we find fewer women; their number and ratio in leading positions is pretty low. With the intention of finding causes we examined the characteristics of their entering in the work field, their motivation, special features of their walks of life, and the background elements of careers of women; supporting and moderating factors. Our main inquiry was to see what those women who got into higher positions did differently than those (women) with the same conditions; how they can manage requirements set by their gender, society and also themselves.
Gender Similarities and Differences There are two opposing theoretical approaches for the explanation of the differences between the male and female genders: the theories of biological-genetical roots and those having a psychological-sociological nature. According to the first approach, biological differences – and with them social differences – are determined, while the second explanation reasons that differences in social roles are not a necessary consequence of biological distinction (Czeizel 1985; Kendall 2003). Rather, it suggests that the interpretation and evaluation of these differences and the results deduced from them have long been the target of debate, for the biological bases of gender differences are the foundations of thousand-year old social habituations, expectations and roles (Koncz 1985).
1
Assistant professor of University of Debrecen, Faculty of Child and Adult Education.
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The question is not about the existence of biological differences, but rather in measuring the effects of genetic dissimilarities, and how they influence the differences between the psychological make-up, abilities and social roles of men and women. The so-called “gender theory”, which considers the reasons of gender differences to be of psychological and sociological nature, does not explain these dissimilarities as necessary. Rather, it sees these distinctions as evolving under the influence of the social environment during childhood socialization. However, the biological and psychological differentiations between men and women are an undeniable factor to the ultimate survival of human life (Czeizel 1985; Kendall 2003). Socialization hands down values and role models that evolve during the routine division of labour, i.e. it develops and stimulates the abilities accredited to men and women. However, besides the biological differences, traditions that are deeply rooted in the foundations of society also regulate what the members of the two genders must do and what is proper for them to do (Buda 1985; Kendall 2003). Thus, instead of developing human abilities on a large scale, this separation will bring about the separation of professions based on the manner determined by the gender. According to Lévai (2000), of all the myths of the twentieth century, it is the myth of good family that we might consider to be the strongest. This serves desires which are built on the positive images we attach to family, and puts the emphasis on love and appreciation. The power of public opinion supports this by acknowledging the family as a fundamental unit of society. As the primary field of children’s socialization, the role of the family can hardly be under-estimated; it is the symbol of responsibilities, togetherness and solidarity. According to the myth, the main character of this micro-society is the loving mother who is responsible for the peace and harmony of the family. Emphasizing her particular characteristic of maternal instinct, the woman’s task is thus to ensure the development and future of the children, and to provide for all the conditions that are necessary for the physical and mental welfare of her husband. The primary responsibility of the man is providing for the physical and financial welfare of the family, and in some cases, their physical protection. The father is the embodiment of discipline, manners and the outer world, while the mother is that of home and household. The myth proves itself by the fact that those who live in a family tend to be happier than people who remain outside family ties (Kendall 2003; Lévai 2000). Nevertheless, the employment of women outside their homes has not only opened the gates of houses, but brought about a change of approach, especially in the Western societies in the 1960s and -70s. In Hungary, after the Second World War the foundations of the employment structure of the population changed. The development of the economy made it necessary for the vast majority of able-bodied women to find a paying job outside their homes; however, public opinion still saw the real role of women as mothers (Koncz 1985). During their economic
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activity, women typically had to join an employment hierarchy formed and dominated by men. This fact largely determined their prospects in the labour market, and women’s swing in the socio-economic structure was be characterized by the declining of the initial differences until today (Kulcsár 1985). In former socialist countries the expansion of women’s employment was also urged by economic and social factors: under the aegis of the need for a larger labour force and the attempt to eliminate class differences, the social policy that urged every woman to work in the name of equal rights caused a sudden and huge expansion to women’s employment (Koncz 1985). As a result of these developments, the dominant approach of separated roles lost its exclusive nature; the concept of the family was re-evaluated; and the modern ideal of a relationship based on partnership started to be more accepted. Although stepping into the world of labour does not lead automatically to the equality of man-woman relationships or to a fair division of labor at home, it still proved to be an important step. Women were able to enter areas that had previously been dominated by men: they appeared in universities and started to pursue intellectual careers in massive numbers (Hrubos 2001, Kissné 2005), and were able to prove that activity, ambition and independence are not exclusively masculine features. However, they have had to walk a long road to prove this, and the walk by no means over. Career of Women in Higher Education The first and most important step for a woman to be able to get into positions of instructor researcher was to enable their university studies. That is how it happened in Hungary, too: first women managed to achieve the freedom to study then to be able to go for the freedom to teach as well and conquer the pulpit. ‘Enabling women to have higher education played a part in women’s emancipation, in fact, it was a very important step towards it. No wonder that it was included as one of the main claims in women’s societies in the second half of the 19th century. It was not only a question of principle to equalize men and women in this area but also had a great practical, economical and social significance’ – says Ildikó Müller in her study (2006:223). Because opening the universities for women made it possible for women to step into intellectual work fields that require higher education alongside men (Müller, 2006.). Women’s position in higher education in Hungary has got into the centre of attention in the past hundred years, in spite of the fact that women’s education looks back to a couple thousand years of history in the same way as men’s (Pukánszky, 2006.). However, women’s entering into higher education was the first main step for women with talent and commitment to academic work to the academic field (Kissné, 2002, 2005.).
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Although more and more women attained higher education degrees, women who were still drawn to academic work fields had to cope with set stereotypes and legal obstacles, let alone their own personal doubts. Socialism opened the gates of higher education wider than in its previous cultural politics and this could be felt by the change in the number of students. The majority of women of course took the opportunity and the decreased number of students meant more and more women with talent and commitment to academic work (Fox 2003, Kissné, 2002, 2005). However, we need to differentiate between the college and university majors. Gender segregation according to the branch of studies can be spotted: there is a high attendance in kindergarten teacher, junior and high school teacher majors and also in arts faculty – in humanities and social studies – and in medical colleges. There is a similar attendance of women and men in the PhD, economic, legal and polity studies, and the ration of women can be said low in the fields of engineering, technology and some majors of natural science (Hrubos, 2001). Hungary is training many talented men and women but women seem to ‘disappear’ or ‘run out’ from the field as the years go by: while the ratio of women getting diploma is over 50%, in the area of research and leaders of higher education their rate is around 12% (Csépe, 2008). Nonetheless, as the money and energy put into the training of these human resources are not utilized properly, it means a huge loss for the branch and the whole economy, and also for the whole society (Papp & Groó, 2005; Papp, 2006), since not only the principles of the society and women’s chances are damaged but it can mean a loss for the whole society (Hain, 2007). The University of Debrecen through the Eyes of Women We carried out our survey among the instructors of the University of Debrecen between February and June of 2009. We had a complete survey with 479 questionnaires handed out. 134 got back to us, meaning that the ratio in the case of questionnaires sent by post was relevant in our present research, as well. Ratio of women instructors in suited the results published in this subject-matter; the higher ratio can be seen at faculties which opened first for women (General Practitioner faculty, Arts faculty), and at faculties which trained women for traditionally women’s fields (Faculty of Child and Adult Education). We have got questionnaires back from all the points of hierarchy of the university. Motivation for their entrance to academic fields let us consider three main directions: in the first category – 54,3% - chose the academic field because of their love for their profession. In the second group we can find those who got their first academic degree due to requirements in their workplaces (50,9%), in the third one we can include people who chose teaching-research for the prestige of the PhD degree (44,0%).
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32, 2% of the respondents have university doctor degree, 61,2% have PhD degree, 8,8% have the degree of C.Sc., 15,8 % have habilitation and 5,3% have honored professor rank. Barriers In our questionnaire, we asked the female instructors of the University of Debrecen to choose the three main factors that meant the greatest obstacles in their professional career. The obstacles ranked by the women are the following: (1) having children (32,5 %), (2) lack of confidence (28,1%), (3) lack of support on the part of the boss (26,3%), (4) family responsibilities (23,7%) and the lack of a supporter or mentor (21,9%). Both internal and external obstacles appeared in the lives of our female instructors which can be explained – the (1); (4) with the conflict between the traditional and personal requirements, (2); (3) and (5) with characteristics learned at gender socialization, acquisition of gender roles and personal insecurity. According to Beáta Nagy (1999) women start off with a great disadvantage since they are taught the very opposite qualities through gender socialization and acquisition of gender roles from the ones that are needed for a successful manager or leader. ‘The >Research work can be compatible with having children< challenge can be met where the individual pledge and help from the family are combined’ – says Valéria Csépe (2008:1399). Because of their age, women have children in the period of their doctorate studies or dissertation and not everyone can manage both tasks. Neither the current scholarships nor the expected funded research assistant’s or graduate teaching assistant’ salary can enable families to get professional help. Research work demands a lot of personal effort even if there is help from the family. Most families cannot afford to have the mother work in a part-time job. Many research centers, university, academic or other kind do not take it with pleasure if there is a part-time attendance and research time put into time limits (Csépe, 2008, Lind 2008). This is supported by the counter-question of our previous one, namely, asking for the three main supporting factors in women’s professional career. To our surprise, the main support does not come from the husband – though they are the second with 44,4% - but it comes from the motivation and hard-working with 50%. There is a supporting role of the bosses, 34,1% of the ladies said that their boss was one of the main supporting force in their work, then comes the help of the parents (29,4%) and that of mentors (28,6%), which is also worth mentioning. Academic Life The quality indicators of researching are publications. Our instructor ladies have published mainly in Hungarian journals in the last 5 years (4,7 studies on average) and
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in foreign periodicals 2,7 studies on average. Furthermore, they have published in Hungarian study collections (2,8) and have written 5,99 abstracts of conferences. In the past five years they have had about 22 people writing theses. One person went for OTDK (National Academic Student Circle) and had one doctorandus. We cannot forget that the role of a mentor-tutor in the graduate and post graduate training has great significance and working with thesis writers and doctorandus is time and energy consuming, which makes it harder to obtain the tasks of research and publication. It is worth mentioning that the support of the direct environment, tasks of mentoring and tutoring – as we can see it in the study of Szántó & Susánszky & Palasik (2008) are explicitly mentioned as solutions to the problem of inequality between men and women. Women consider it a more positive affect of publicity of the delegation of tasks at the workplace and the relationship with the immediate supervisor which varies according to gender and age (Paksi, 2007, Szántó & Susánszky & Palasik, 2008). Besides numerical questions aimed at professional career, there were some questions which wanted to gain opinion about the academic career. 44,3% of the respondents are satisfied with their careers, 53,4% are partly satisfied and only 2,3% answered that they are not satisfied with their careers. The question: ‘If you could start over, would you choose the same profession?’ got positive answer from 66,2 %. 12,3% would not choose the teacher-researcher field and 21,5 could not tell. Success It is very interesting that through this research we get to know the main features and promoters of academic/scientific success. The women who gave answers could give 12 points in a four level scale according to their importance. In the following chart we can read the five most important promoters of academic/scientific success (Chart 1). Chart 1: The five most important characteristics of academic/scientific success, average Average Hard work, endurance
3,82
Supportive professional background
3,69
Mentor
3,52
Talent
3,45
The role of supervisor, the quality of correction/overseeing
3,44
Good relationship with the professional researchers of the given field of study
3,44
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The academic success is therefore determined by both inside and outside features (see more: Pusztai 2007). It is interesting that the women who answered considered hard work and endurance the most important elements, talent is not really important, it stands only in the fourth place. The elements which are not connected to the person are more important: professional help, which is the second, a mentor, the help of the supervisor, and the good relationship with the professors, professionals of that given academic/scientific field. There are not many studies regarding the situation of women, which would not mention the role dilemma that comes from the burden of family and career (Lind 2008). This often requires a choice which basically determines their success or career. In the academic field becoming more successful, climbing up the ladder and becoming a leader often hindered by the opposition of work and family (Csépe 2008). As for mobility and career opportunities, the chance of women with family is less than of their male counterparts and this is also strengthened by the view of these women themselves who say that the reproductional role of women is the cause of gender related differences in career opportunities (Nagy 1997). In spite of this 40 % of women with little children would like to have successful careers, but they can only imagine this without the damage of the family – and men (fathers) have positive feelings towards their wives career only if the family does not disintegrate (Paksi 2007). This is also supported by the idea that the number of those who equally want family and work, grow, and the number of those decrease who consider private life important, two-third of the women consider private life more important than work (Pongrácz 2001, 38). Success explanations Career and success are terms in our topic which need more elaborate explanation. The women had to answer an open question connected to these two terms: „What would she consider the most success in her life?” This question divided them but there are some common aspects too: there are four distinguishable groups among the women who we will introduce now: the mothers, the jugglers, the altruists, and the explorers. The Mothers consider the family as their most important success: „my child”, „my family” and there were those who even shared their doubts „if my answer was my children, would it be very unacademic?” These women also referred to the masculine character of their workplaces, the traditional division of labour, which Kissné Novák (2002) calls the most restrictive element of women's career. This means a definite disadvantage – especially in the first years of having a child or children – but also later it hinders the opportunities of women in their professional and academic progress. Besides – adds Kissné (2002) – women got used to the fact that the leading role always
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belongs to men, they are the orgazisers, and this tendency is even true at work even if the woman has the same qualification. In European culture the inequality of men-women roles within the family are also present at workplaces (Kissné 2002, Zimmer, 2003). The specific nature of female workforce should not be neglected: at a specific time of her life family is the priority and certain functions cannot be given to anyone else, and this has an important impact on their work. For instance, a woman who has a child is temporarily „unstable” at work, when the children are still small and if they get sick, she cannot work because she stays at home with them, and those women cannot even do extra work, participate in trainings or be part of public events. The solution of these problems is a serious issue at workplaces employing mostly women (Koncz 1985, Zimmer 2003). This presents a problem to women, too. The Juggler – according to Koncz (2005) would like to reach a double role – the coordination of family and work, or they consider their best achievement if they try to do this. „A good employee and a good mother” - says one of the women, or as an other teacher claims „I wouldn't feel successful either without my children and husband or without my job.” Regarding family and career we distinguish two groups: those who delay their career and those who delay starting a family. Today the latter is typical: before starting a family – without giving up their studies – they are stepping up the ladder, and only after reaching a goal (here it is the PhD) do they start thinking about a family. In addition – according to Estók Éva (2005, 150) –, achieving the role of the „good intellectual mother” can be questioned: in the answers we can see the work-centric, career-oriented views of intellectual mothers. The third group of success – explanations is the Altruists. They teach, that is their profession, they mostly define themselves as instructors: „I would like to do my job to the contentment of my students, … the love, trust and knowledge of my students”, and they consider their most important success if they or one of their students publish books. The Explorers considered their scientific titles and their success in science the most important success in their lives: they often mentioned the PhD stage, habilitation, the academic title, the „creating of professional workshops”, „a significant scientific discovery,” „the contribution to the college's development.” Career It is also important to note that the career-explanation of the respondents is different: life career, work career, family career, labour market career mostly oppose. As the careers explained by the society and by the individuals are not always the
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same (Koncz 2005). In connection with the creation of balance the respondents are usually optimistic. According to Kissné Novák Éva (2002, 2005) there are four hindrances to the scientific life of women. She claims that the time spent at home with the family is a disadvantage. Women who also have families can be part of the scientific life only when their children become more independent, and this may mean an unbeatable disadvantage, as from the aspect of science this means a long period of time. As a second aspect – which by no means has a prioritization – draws attention to the lack of self confidence of women (Kendall 2003). As a result of this women are usually only helpers of their colleagues, so the success of her work goes to her male colleague. The following insight refers to the masculine aspect of workplaces – which is shown - according to some examples – in the publications published by more people, by the order of the names of women. Finally, the sensitivity of women and their different ways of dealing with conflicts are also disadvantages, because there are only a few women who can leave their family conflicts behind and reach professional goals instead. Besides the „glass ceiling” phenomenon, insecurity, failures and the treatment of these failures are also important to mention. Although there are opinions which claim that women who would like to reach a scientific success deny the role of being a mother as this hinders them in their career prospects, these ideas have still not been confirmed (Kissné 2002, 2005). The idea of the successful woman is still not an accepted notion in scientific life. If she becomes successful it is instantly suspicious, and not only in the eyes of men. Thus they usually claim more from women in science not to become suspicious. Lots of women who reached really impressive results in science claimed that they had to work harder than their male colleagues (Fox 2003, Kissné 2002). Anett Schenk's (2003, 3) study also shows that the reason of having little number of female professors is the tension between having a family and a career (habilitation). Furthermore, the habilitation is not a guarantee to have a job at the university before getting more than enough professors in that given field (Schenk 2003). When defining the role of public education and higher education in Europe one of the most important issues was the equality of men and women: to research what opportunities, what social and cultural patterns, skills, professional life the educational system provides for male and female students. The increasing number of women in higher education, as well as their role and place in higher education is a current topic which requires an extensive research. Summary This paper was written by using a new kind of approach: we did not compare the female instructors with their male counterparts, we compared them with their fe-
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male counterparts. During the research we answered several questions, and found new research fields. We got to know the female instructors of the University of Debrecen who as doctorandas – mainly more conscious than their predecessors – are preparing to the significant roles and challenges of women and as instructors and scientists they juggle with the gender, social, and their own expectations. A group which was examined is not homogenous: according to the differences in the fields of science, and age. They also represent differences in their success-explanations and career-explanations. Our main question was about those women who reached impressive careers: What did they do differently than they other female colleagues? We have not reached a definite answer to this question yet. On the basis of the research we can claim that we can distinguish between the female intructors and researchers according to fields of science, their place in the hierarchy of education, and different age groups. They also differ in the motivation of starting a scientific life, in facing problems, in viewing family and career. We mostly focused on the female instructors and researchers and their success-and career-explanations. According to this we can distinguish four groups: the mothers who are afraid of being unscientific, the jugglers who want to reach a „double” career, the altruists who teach because of the success of their students, and the explorers who are really proud of their scientific achievements. Although it is obvious but we always have to clarify that it is important to deal with female instructors and researchers. Women with degrees being satisfied with their career and leading a harmonic family life are the keys to the future. The research of the female instructors and researchers is not only important for women but for the whole society. As the emergence of women in higher education and science resulted social changes, along with changes in the labour market and gender-roles. There is hardly any study which does not consider the dilemma of role that comes from the double charges of work and family. This often means a demand for decision and sets the basis for the progress of women. In the field of research the chances getting degrees and consequently becoming a leader are decreased by the conflict of work and having children (Fox 2003, Csépe, 2008.). Regarding chance of mobility and career, researchers with children have fewer opportunities than their male colleagues, which is backed up by the fact that the respondents see the cause of inequality of career chances in women’s child reproduction tasks (Nagy, 1997). In oppose to this, 40% of mothers would like to run a career and make progress in their work, but they can only imagine this if their families do not suffer damage as a result – men’s (husbands’) opinion are positive in connection with their spouse’s employment only if that is the case (Paksi, 2007.). This is emphasized by the fact that although there is an increasing number of those supporting work and career as equally important by the higher level of their education and there is a decrease in the number of those emphasizing personal life – still two thirds of the respondent women prioritize personal life over their profession (Pongrácz, 2001:38.).
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Judgment of career – and mainly academic career – is not an obvious question. We are speaking about professional careers marked with academic ranks, titles and commissions for leadership in connection with female instructors. Many professional areas are devoted to the employment and career opportunities, although those studies which give numerical data about how the role and chances of researcher women change in the beginning of the 21st century are most interesting (Csépe, 2008). Most of the thorough studies search for the answer – and we also join this mission – to find what we could do to have more women with talent and high performance in high positions as there are now. Bibliography 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15. 16. 17. 18.
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Buda B. (1985): Női szerep – női szocializáció – női identitás, in: K. Koncz (szerk.): Nők és férfiak – hiedelmek, tények, Budapest: Kossuth Könyvkiadó, 93-107. Czeizel E. (1985): A nők biológiai „természete” és társadalmi lehetőségei, in: K. Koncz (szerk.): Nők és férfiak – hiedelmek, tények, Budapest: Kossuth Könyvkiadó, 21-47. Csépe V. (2008): „Édes teher” – Szerepválságban vannak-e a kutatónők? Magyar Tudomány 11, 1396–1403. Estók É. (2005): A jó (értelmiségi) anya, in: M. Palasik & B. Sipos (szerk.): Házastárs? Munkatárs? Vetélytárs? Budapest: Napvilág Kiadó, 150-155. Fox M.F. (2003): Gender, Hierarchy and Science, in: J. Saltzman Chafetz (ed.): Handbook of the Sociology of Gender, Springer, 441-457. Hain F. (2007): Üvegfalak és üvegplafonok – nőként diplomásnak lenni. http ://www.felvi.hu/ index.ofi?mfa_id=414&hir_id=7679&oldal=1 (2008.05.05.) Kendall D. (2003): Sociology in our times. Belmont, CA Wadsworth-Thompson Learning. Lind I. (2008): Balancing Career and Family in Higher Education – New Trends and Results. http://www.bawie.de/web/files/15/de/Beitrag_Band_Gender07_ENG.pdf (2012.04.09.). Hrubos I. (2001): A nők esélyei a felsőoktatásban I-II-III, Magyar Felsőoktatás 2001/8.9.10. 37-38, 37-38, 39-40. Kissné Novák É. (2002): Nők a magyar tudományban, Magyar Tudomány, 3. 340-348. Kissné Novák É. (2005): Nők felsőfokon, in: M. Palasik & B. Sipos (szerk.): Házastárs? Munkatárs? Vetélytárs? Budapest: Napvilág Kiadó, 141-149. Koncz K. (1985): A nők bővülő foglalkoztatását kísérő feminizálódás jelensége és történelmi folyamata, in: K. Koncz (szerk.): Nők és férfiak – hiedelmek, tények, Budapest: Kossuth Könyvkiadó, 151-165. Koncz K, (2005): Női karrierjellemzők: esélyek és korlátok a női életpályán, In: M. Palasik & B. Sipos (szerk.): Házastárs? Munkatárs? Vetélytárs? Budapest: Napvilág Kiadó, 57-77. Kulcsár R, (1985): A nők társadalmi mobilitásának jellemzői, In: K. Koncz (szerk.): Nők és férfiak – hiedelmek, tények, Budapest: Kossuth Könyvkiadó, 166-180. Lévai K. (2000): A nő szerint a világ, Budapest: Osiris Kiadó. Müller I. (2006): Vélemények a nők felsőfokú képzéséről a dualizmus idő-szakában, in: G. Gyáni – B. Nagy (szerk.): Nők a modernizálódó magyar társadalomban Debrecen: Csokonai Kiadó. Nagy B. (1997): Karrier női módra, in: K. Lévai – I.G. Tóth (szerk.): Szerepváltozások – Jelentés a nők helyzetéről 1997, Budapest: TÁRKI – Munkaügyi Minisztérium, 35-51 Nagy B. (1999): Munkahelyi előmenetel (1993-94), in: T. Pongrácz & I.G. Tóth (szerk.): Szerepváltozások – Jelentés a nők és férfiak helyzetéről 1999, Budapest: TÁRKI-Szociális és Családügyi Minisztérium Nőképviseleti Titkársága.
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19. Paksi V. (2007): Család és/vagy hivatás? Nők a természettudományi kutatói pályán. http:// www.felvi.hu/bin/content/dload/merlegenfelsooktatas/070827Termtud_ kutatonok_vegleges. pdf (2008.09.15.). 20. Papp E. & Groó D. (2005): A nők helyzete a magyar tudományban. Magyar Tudomány, 11. 21. Papp E. (2006): WP8 jelentés – A WP8: „Monitoring the Enwise follow-up activities” munkacsomag keretében készült felmérés eredményei Magyarországon, Budapest: Tudományos és Technológiai Alapítvány. http://www.cec-wys.org/prilohy/973359c6/ NationalLanguageReportHU.doc (2009.02.14.). 22. Pongrácz T. (2001): A család és a munka szerepe a nők életében, in: I. Nagy & T. Pongrácz & I.G. Tóth (szerk.): Szerepváltozások – Jelentés a nők és férfiak helyzetéről, Budapest: TÁRKI – Szociális és Családügyi Minisztérium. 23. Pukánszky B. (2006): A nőnevelés évezredei, Budapest: Gondolat Kiadó. 24. Pusztai G, (2009): Mentor vagy idol? A doktorandusz-témavezető kapcsolat formái a tudományos utánpótlásképzésben, In: G. Pusztai – M. Rébay (szerk.): Kié az oktatáskutatás? Tanulmányok Kozma Tamás 70. Születésnapjára, Debrecen: Csokonai Kiadó 337-353. 25. Schenk A. (2003): Female Professors in Sweden and Germany. http://csn.uni-muenster.de/ women-eu/download/TP%2003-03%20Schenk.pdf (accessed: 01. 21, 2009). 26. Szántó Z. – Susánszky É. – Palasik M. (2008): Női kutatói karrierek vizsgálata Európában, Magyar Tudomány, 5, 635-638. 27. Tornyi Z.Z. (2009): Female Roles, Opportunities and Statuses among Female Professors and Researchers in Hungary’s “Calvinist Rome”, in: E. Adamiak & M. Chrząstowska & C. Methuen & S. Sobkowiak (eds.): Gender and Religion in Central and Eastern Europe, Studies and Texts 124, Poznań: Adam Mickiewicz University, 263-276. 28. Zimmer A. (2003): Research and Trainingnetwork - Women in European Universities - Final Report 2000-2003. http://csn.uni-muenster.de/women-eu/download/ FinalReport_Zimmer_20.11.2003.pdf (accessed: 15. 05. 2009).
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Managerial Ethics vs. Social Responsibility Troy B. Wiwczaroski1 – Tar IldikÓ2 – Szabados György3 Abstract Twenty-four hour, instant and global news reporting have allowed the general public to gain more focus on the decisions, activities and related impacts of business on all of our lives. Several grievous ethical mistakes have done significant damage to our environments – natural, social and financial. Companies are under pressure to assume responsibility for their actions and how these affect society, just as managers are no longer assumed to make ethically determined decisions. The onus is on business to ‘behave’ and managers find themselves in a struggle between making their companies profitable and attempting to side-step the trap of having to make ethically indefensible decisions to be successful. This article explores this background, definitions and nature of the worlds of managerial ethics and social responsibility. Keywords: business, activities, ethics, CSR, environments natural, social and financial
Introduction On the night of 2-3 December 1984, disaster struck in Bhopal, India, when a massive mix of toxic gases leaked from the Union Carbide India Limited plant, spreading through shantytowns located all around the vicinity. Half a million people were injured, almost 4,000 of these severely, and estimates of an additional 4,000 and an eventual number of 12,000 total deaths have been reported in the aftermath of that single night’s events (Varma et al., 2005). Reportedly, attempts to reduce expenses at the plant had led to the safety hazards in due course causing the disaster, with half Associate professor, University of Debrecen, Centre of Agricultural and Applied Economic Sciences,
[email protected]. 2 Assistant professor, University of Debrecen, Centre of Agricultural and Applied Economic Sciences,
[email protected]. 3 Assistant professor, University of Debrecen, Centre of Agricultural and Applied Economic Sciences,
[email protected]. 1
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of the supervisory staff having been laid off in the months preceding the accident. Union Carbide was accused of not taking the day to day operations of its overseas businesses seriously, of failing to develop and implement proper management and intercultural strategies in situ, leading to low morale, employee distrust of company officials and, ultimately, to neglect of safety procedures and standards (Cassels, 1993). Union carbide’s PR response was dismal, at best, exacerbating the company’s problems, by pointing the finger of blame on others and attempting to side-step responsibility (Browning, 1993). In 1989, the Exxon-Valdez oil tanker, on its way to California, had a major accident while attempting to enter Prince William Sound (in the Gulf of Alaska), resulting in the spilling of 750,000 barrels of crude oil into the ocean and onto the Alaskan shore. The company that owned the ship delayed taking necessary measures to prevent a larger environmental catastrophe, as well as providing actual information on the disaster’s actual scope. The event soon became the focus of media attention and, since the managements of the shipping company and Exxon both failed to handle the situation responsibly and professionally, both soon lost their credibility in public opinion. The term “Exxon-Valdez” has remained a catchword for arrogant, careless behavior ever since (Horváth, 2003). In October 2001, a scandal shook what was purportedly one of America’s corporate giants, ENRON, when it was revealed that the company had been involved with its accounting partner, Arthur Anderson – at that time one of the five largest audit and accountancy partnerships in the world -, in the largest scam to defraud investors in the nation’s history. Arthur Anderson had blatantly ‘cooked the books’ for ENRON, falsifying earnings reports to raise ENRON’s stock prices and to allow the company to offer continuously greater numbers of stocks to private investors (Dharan et al., 2004). Eventually, over $70 billion US Dollars would be lost by ENRON investors, with an even more painful $2 billion US Dollar loss by company trustees and employees from their pension and savings plans, as well as losses in stock options used by ENRON to beef up payment packages. The vast majority of all the individuals who lost money in the scandal never recovered a penny. ENRON and Arthur Anderson ceased to exist. Suicides, heart attacks and jail sentences followed; many careers died along with the companies (Healy et al., 2003). The events within, surrounding and following the fall of ENRON would serve as a prelude and a precursor to the economic disaster which would occur in 2008. On the afternoon of April 22, 2010, an oil leak was discovered at the British Petroleum (BP) Deepwater Horizon oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico. According to the Flow Rate Technical Group, the leak amounted to about 4.9 million barrels (780,000 m3) of oil, the largest in history to ever occur in US-controlled waters (From Hoch, 2010). Then-CEO Tony Hayward initially made thoughtless statements to the press, viewed as being grossly underestimating and seeking to mislead public opinion on the true impacts of the oil spill. Over 80% of Americans
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polled felt that BP had handled the spill very poorly (Cohen, 2010). Hundreds of billions of US dollars in losses affecting a wide range of industries along the Gulf Coast of the Southern United States, massive loss of marine life and a still undetermined secondary impact of the spill are keeping BP tangled in litigation. The final cost of this disaster is yet to be calculated, but the damage to BP in the American public is lasting. Up to 40% drops in BP fuel sales have been reported in the backlash to BP’s mismanagement of the spill. An inescapable by-product of aluminum earth producing is called red sludge, a mixture which is not processed in Hungary, but stored in huge amounts, making it the largest concentrated quantity of hazardous waste in the country. MAL Co. Ltd. had constructed several storage containment ponds west of the small town of Ajka, in Western Hungary. One corner segment of one of the largest of these ponds had become eroded and weakened by autumn 2010, due to negligence, poor monitoring and record precipitation in that year. The ensuing flood which occurred when the containment wall was breached not only almost completely destroyed three townships and the affected environment, but also caused 10 deaths and numerous injuries. For days after the disaster, MAL’s management continued to maintain that they and their company were innocent victims of this catastrophe too; complaining that they had become the scapegoats for what was actually an unpreventable, natural disaster. Statements made to the press by the chief manager (i.e. that the waste was actually harmless and non-alkaline) deprecating the accusations made against MAL’s management seemed preposterous, especially since the information the management was feeding the media often contained grievous errors. The events were closely followed by the mass media and led to nationwide public outrage. Human action and ethics The list of corporate scandals - deadly, monetary or both – is seemingly limitless, with the 2008 emergence of the current economic crisis only exacerbating the general public’s mistrust of big business. Public opinion aside, examined from a management science point of view, one recognized that there is actually a clash between three domains of human action, which complicate the question of how one should interrogate ethics and social responsibility in management decision making. The first of these domains is that of codified law, i.e. the legal standard applicable in the case of a questionable business decision in ascertaining whether one has actually acted outside of the law in the pursuit of profit. The second consists of the social standards of the society or societies affected by the decision in question. Sociology uses the term “justice” (mainly in the field of inequities), but a kind of social or anticipated justice may also be understood in this case. This is the actual realm of ethics and it is complicated by the global reach of modern business, as well as the
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globalized nature of the employment, goods and services markets. Ethics may be defined as an individual’s personal beliefs on whether a behavior is right or wrong. Managerial ethics are composed of standards of behavior that direct and guide managers at work (Griffin, 2008). In other words, what might pass as being ethical behavior at a corporation’s headquarters in London might cause a public uproar at the same corporation’s point of sale in Lahore. Further exacerbating the question of whether one acts ethically and responsibly in conducting business is, at least in democratic societies, the domain of free choice, i.e. the personal standards one brings to work as a decision maker. Similarly, Griffin (2008) differentiates between manager and employee ethics inside an organization. The actual amount of explicit control a society has over a manager’s thinking depends on the predetermined state of balance between the level of severity of the applicable legal standard on the one side, and the scope of the degree of personal freedom available to the manager in question on the other. The tipping point for this balance lies in the social standard or one’s consciousness of ethics, used as a means of influencing one’s behavior and thought on how freely one feels one may decide on any ethical or social issue, without fear of persecution, penalty or societal rejection. For ethics to ‘work’ in a company’s management, the notion of obedience must be present in the corporate consciousness. More directly, the stakeholders and decision makers within a company’s management structure must agree to a set of norms and standards, through which the individual or group enforces a regime of ‘boundaries’ or ‘discipline’ on itself and others working in or for the company. A typical example in Hungary is the introduction of an ethical code of behavior for the banking sector, introduced after exchange rates of several foreign currencies soared (compounded by a severe weakening of the domestic currency), casting numerous debtors into grave financial situations. The problem lies in the enforceability of such codes. These ‘rules’ may indeed be powerful tools for governing managerial and/or employee behavior, as reflected e.g. in studies of Japanese management culture (Ala, 1999), but these rules are not equivalent with any law. Infractions against the norms or standards of a company are dealt with outside of the public domain and society may never become aware of what the guilty party might have done which could have actually affected people living outside the corporation itself. Ethical dilemmas Several examples of ethical dilemmas within companies serve to clarify how troubling such problems may be. Advertising is one particular area of business often cited as a clear example of where businesses fail to be truthful with their customers. Whether on the radio, on TV or in newspapers, magazines or as a pop-up on
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a website, advertising is everywhere and there has developed a stigma attached to it as a business tool used by businesses to trick the customer with false claims and distortions, in order to make money. Business would naturally respond to critics by arguing that advertising actually empowers customers, by providing them with the information about product alternatives, thereby giving them more choice on what they spend their money. One of the latest ethical challenges to advertising, however, is found in the accusation that advertising somehow warps social values. Placement of TV ads targeting children is one such example. According to the argument, children’s programming is constantly interrupted with ads showing our children a world filled with sugar and improper nutrition: sodas and syrupy drinks of all kinds; every kind of imaginable sweet: chocolates, creams and cookies; and fatty foods: chips, sugar-coated and chocolate breakfast cereals and fast food. Missing, critics argue, are ads promoting a healthy diet and nutrition, creating a false reality for children, in which every child seen in every commercial is happily enjoying snacking and drinking whatever the child wants, whenever the child wants, and remains physically fit – day after day. This crosses an ethical line for some. Moreover, many of these commercials come with the added promise of some special gift for purchasing the product. Stickers, wash-off temporary tattoos, small toys and even product-related online fan clubs and fan magazines place the advertised products in front of children at any and every given moment possible. This saturation of our children with what are arguably the images of an unhealthy lifestyle crosses an ethical line, as well. The reality, critics posit, is that our children are snacking and eating more unhealthy foods than ever before in human history and that they are facing burgeoning rates of diabetes, obesity and a myriad of other diet-related health problems, which will dog them for life. Packaging and labeling pose another ethical problem for the businesscustomer relationship. Government regulators, consumer watchdog groups and marketing departments from every kind of company imaginable squabble over what the ‘standards of conduct’ should be in relation to ‘proper’ and ‘truthful’ product labeling. There are, unfortunately, several infamous examples of ‘Hungarian’ products grossly mislabeled and/or packaged in such a manner to make them ‘look Hungarian’, when the packaging contents are decidedly anything but a domestic product. In 2011, several major food store chains were given serious fines for misrepresentation of foreign food products as being Hungarian, when they were actually imports. Whether one recalls the problems associated with Chinese garlic labeled with a Hungarian flag, a product sold as Szegedi paprika containing South American paprika and other chemicals or Tokaji-labeled wines produced outside of Hungary, companies have a history of unethical business practices. Aldi, for example, labeled an entire series of non-Hungarian products with the
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special label “Magyar Minőség” (Hungarian Quality), when the products contained no Hungarian ingredients. This behavior represents a serious violation of ethical trust in misleading Hungarian consumers. Auchan was caught in a similar gamble. Using the label “Auchan Hungaricum”, the supermarket chain proposed to pass off goods from producers in 100% foreign ownership as being Hungarian-produced. Some examples which got Auchan fines from government regulators include: • “Rama” margarine - Unilever Kft. • “Globus” mayonnaise - Unilever Kft. • “Sága” Foods turkey meat containing bologna salami - SáGa Foods Zrt. • “Omnia” coffee - Sara Lee Hungary Zrt. • “Boci” chocolate bars - Nestlé Hungaria Kft. • “Győri” cookies, “Pilóta” cookies - Danone Kft. • “Sió” peach juice - Sió Eckes Kft • “Baba” cosmetic products - Unilever Kft. • “Borsodi” beer - Borsodi Sörgyár Zrt. (Interbrew) • “Soproni” beer - Heineken Hungária Sörgyárak Zrt. Complicating the issue of shoppers being able to easily identify Hungarian products is the fact that many of the product names in the list above are Hungarian in themselves or represent formerly Hungarian owned companies. Even more ethically questionable is the blatant misuse of the term “Hungaricum.” The term has been offered as a type of special pedigree since 1999, and is used variably by many areas of Hungarian society and business, to denote the uniqueness of this country and its culture. The Hungarian Parliament has, since the time of these examples of violations, voted to approve the so-called ‘Hungaricum Law’, through which the government hopes to offer protection for domestic companies of all size to produce uniquely and - unusual in their ‘Hungarianness’ - products and services of all shapes and sizes. The law is but one example of how governments attempt to force a version of ‘truth’ onto advertisers and companies. Guidelines What are the guidelines used for dealing with ethical dilemmas in business? Naturally, the most basic questions are simple, yet to the point: • Is it legal? • Is it right? • Is it harmful? If so, to whom? To what degree? • Is it beneficial? If so, to whom? To what degree? • Does the benefit outweigh the harm and/or vice-versa?
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In all the examples of business and managerial problems cited thus far, the answers to these questions should have been clear. Yet, these are exactly the questions businesses and decision makers most easily avoid answering, as they are often only abstractions, once one intellectually pushes past them and decides to base one’s decisions and actions on so-called ‘grey’ areas, i.e. to push the boundaries of ‘right’ and ‘wrong’, ‘beneficial’ and ‘harmful’. As one example, the case could be made that fruit juices are inherently beneficial for children, as they contain a wide range of vitamins and minerals promoting proper growth and development. Examined more closely, the same product which is touted as being healthy due to its fruit content only actually contains below 15%, is full of a variety of sugars, artificial colors, aromas and flavor-boosting or altering additives, to make the product resemble a fruit juice. Indeed, sometimes products labeled as fruit juices with only 1% fruit content may be found on shelves! In such cases, there is a second set of guidelines for dealing with ethical dilemmas, the application of which business ethicists hope would prevent decision makers in companies from acting unethically: • Would you be willing to allow everyone to do what you are considering? • Would you like your family to know about this? • Would you like your decision to be printed in a newspaper, revealed online, in radio or TV news? • Have you consulted with an objective listener, who is knowledgeable about the possible impacts of your decision? • Are you prepared to face criticism, legal and/or criminal responsibility for your actions? Managers and ethics By personalizing the questions, the decision maker is confronted with him/her self as an individual and not merely as a faceless part of a possibly giant organization. The impacts and - especially -the consequences of a business decision are brought to bear, from which, the ethicist hopes, one cannot so easily escape. Just how accountable should, e.g. managers be towards society? After all, business could argue that managers are not public servants, but privately hired employees, and therefore only directly accountable to their companies’ shareholders. The manager’s job is to successfully run a business and not to deal with qualms about what is ‘right’ or ‘wrong’, as long as the company remains firmly within the limits of the law. Does this, in turn, mean that managers are released from any necessity to concern themselves with ethical considerations relating to their business decisions? Such an attitude would be dangerous in today’s world of instantly shared data, hidden webcams and twitter. Rather, managers should consider ethics as a set of general guidelines for helping them to make decisions
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about their and their companies’ futures, in order to prevent social backlash (and, thereby, a potential loss of customers), legal entanglements or simply the loss of face within their business sectors. In many multinational companies, employees and management are offered training in ethics. Managers are essentially caretakers. As they do not actually own the businesses they run, managers not only have to ensure that any decisions they make move their companies towards maximum long-term value, while prohibiting profit losses due to the consequences of the – albeit objectively or subjectively unethical decisions they have made. In fact, the conscious making of any decision which would knowingly diminish a company’s profits would be to cheat one’s owners and also be unethical. Evidently, a manager might find him/herself in an ethical dilemma in the daily operations of a company or in a certain unexpected situation. What should a manager therefore do? First, if an individual is confronted by a day-to-day business operation which might be harmful to others, then that person should best choose somewhere else to work. For example, someone who believes that a product is in and of itself somehow ‘wrong’, e.g. cigarettes, alcohol, energy drinks, should understand that no one is obligated to work for a company that produces such items. This is also frequently a concern of managerial style and roles. While one may choose not to work for a business with subjectively ethical problems, agreeing to work for a company means accepting a salary to manage its everyday operations and signifies a trust and an obligation to the employer. The manager is therefore duty-bound to take all necessary steps to ensure that the interests of the company are best represented and pursued in all matters. Not to do so would be to act unethically – as equally unethically as some view the tobacco industry. Some might argue that ethics place undo limits on managers in meeting their obligations to their employers, by limiting their ability to make decisions freely. This argument fails to account for the overwhelming number of daily decisions which a manager makes to press a business activity forward without being confronted with any such limitations. Not all business activities are conducted on the edge of legality. Nor do most business decisions represent a clash between ethical conduct and a manager’s self-interest. Not surprisingly, the subject of ethics usually arises when something wrong has happened due to/at an organization. In such cases, personal responsibility is often involved. Of course, whenever the aims of a business or the self-interest of a manager come into conflict with ethics, society – and indeed, the law – will demand that ethics take precedence. Managers are required to act within the law, just as are all citizens and non-managerial employees at any company. Societies based on the rule of law work on a basis of respect and the mandate that all companies in all sectors and industries are presumed to be upholding the law on any given day, affecting any given decision or strategy. Without this basis, companies and industries would have to either be over-regulated or simply become government owned; both al-
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ternatives would strangle the freedom of markets and stifle economic growth by removing true decision making from the realm of actual profit-oriented business management. Companies and social responsibility Following the spirit and letter of the law will not always be ‘good’ for companies and neither does doing so represent full compliance with ethical norms, which differ at times from purely legal aspects. In business, as well as daily life, events occur and decisions are made which are strictly legal, but not always ethical, just as there are cases when the opposite applies. This holistic notion of a business acting as a part of a society causes varying degrees of uncertainty in business ethics. Businesses have, first and foremost, a duty to consider their own interests, as well as those of their primary stakeholders (e.g., investors, business partners, subcontractors) in order to succeed as businesses. Without this investment in each other, cooperation would be impossible, leaving such activities as logistics or construction incapable of functioning. Second, there are the employees and customers, without whom nothing could be accomplished and no profits would return on certain types of investments. Third, there are also the people involved in accountancy, banking and finance, supply chains, external communications, marketing/advertizing, organized labor and product distribution. The list could be expanded in any number of ways, depending on the business in question. The European Union has recently weighed in with its own policy on the social responsibilities of European businesses, with the publication of its Policy on Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR). CSR is often attacked by critics who argue that, due to the voluntary nature and the lack of legal regulation over corporate social responsibility and the activities this term encompasses, CSR unintentionally lends decision making companies even more opportunities to wield power in a society. This belief rests on the argument that companies are given too much freedom to form and define corporate social responsibility as they see fit, as well as in the ways it uses CSR as a strategy to dupe the general public into believing what is not true about how businesses operate. One example of company’s misusing CSR to excuse unethical and unsocial behavior is the UK’s Tesco supermarket chain, which has fired thousands of employees, while touting its CSR policy: “One of our most important values is to treat people how we would like to be treated. We try to achieve this by being a good employer and by playing our part in local communities. People tell us that they want use to use our size and success to be a force for good.” (Tesco, 28-29)
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Source: Porter and Kramer, 2006. Above, see a diagram of the intended roles of CSR within businesses.
Summary Whatever the case or decision under criticism, ethics and social responsibility will continue to pose problems for managers, as societies and their norms are constantly changing. Only a few decades ago, smoking was common and acceptable in most public places and media. It has since become something of a pariah among the ‘vices’, taking businesses down with it. What will not change is the necessity for decision makers to remain within legal boundaries in tackling problems of operating companies and the accompanying need to think ahead to how even the near future might reflect back on what was decided, how and why. Bibliography 1. 2.
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Ala M., Cordeiro W.P. (1999): Can we learn management techniques form the Japanese ringi process?. Business Forum, 24 (½), 22-24. Browning J. (1993): Jack A. Gottschalk. ed (PDF). Union Carbide: Disaster at Bhopal. Crisis Response: Inside Stories on Managing Image Under Siege. Detroit, "Union Carbide's former vice-president of health, safety and environmental programs tells how he dealt with the catastrophe from a PR point of view."
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3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8.
9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15. 16. 17. 18.
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