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Society of subordinates: Inmate organization in a narcotic hospital
BOOK REVIEWS
654
with a broad scope but with a short-term interest in clients. A number of the intra- and extra-organizational factors which alter this orientation are unravelled, and some implications for interorganizational relations drawn out. I feel that Rosengren’s excellent idea deserves even greater specification with some emphasis on its possible relevance to the notions of laterality and longitudinality discussed by his colleague Mark Lefton in Chapter 2. To return to more general comments, Orgunizution and CIients suffers from several omissions. Firstly, there is no real consideration of total institutions, even though various contributors pay lip service to the fact that such organizations offer clients new identities and attempt to extinguish old ones. Secotify, the contributions by Freidson, Perrow, and Long, although coming quite close, never discuss directly the ways in which modern organizations manufacture and employ ideologies and power. Thirdly, after reading the book several times, I have no real sense of what goes on between all of those involved when a client actually encounters an organization. Finally, as promised, there are two additional reactions from my students. They claim, and I agree, that the introductory chapter by Parsons is of little value and detracts from the central thrust of the book. Parsons’ contribution consists of a set of random observations on the division of labor and the problems of solidarity. He offers misplaced, premature reactions to contributions in subsequent chapters and, at this early point, one cannot evaluate the worth of his comments. Unfortunately, after reading the book, they appear, for the most part, worthless. On a more practical level, many students point to the absence of an index which would facilitate cross referencing. It would also have facilitated this review! There is clearly a need /or a book which explores in detail the dynamics of client-organization interaction. Organizations and Clients in my view makes a start, and as such is useful as supplementary reading. Because of its patchiness however, it decidedly is not the book on clients and organizations. JOHN
B. MCKINLAY
Department of Sociology Boston University
Society of Subordinates: Inmate Organization in a Narcotic Hospital by CHARLES R. TITTLE. Indiana University Press, Bloomington, Indiana, 1972. 200 pp. $7.95. A BOOK as dull as this one is likely to be read through
only by book reviewers and by narrow specialists who believe they must be familiar with everything in their field. As they go through one boring page after another, they will no doubt hope that they will pick up some new information or perhaps intellectual gems to repay them for their ordeal. They will be disappointed. This book adds nothing to the literature on incarcerated inmates. This is a pity because it appears that the author had a good opportunity to produce at least an interesting ethnography, if nothing else. He speaks of a 40-80 hr week making observations and interviewing and of the free rein he was given in this institution for narcotics
addicts. But if indeed he spent much time observing the life in the institution and participating in it, his report in this book shows no evidence of it. He relies for his “data” almost entirely on responses of the inmates to his interview questions and other instruments. Thus, he often uses second-hand “indicators” (e.g. reports “best friends”) when he could have drawn upon first-hand observation. He uses notoriously unreliable attitude measures of inmate relationships and self-concepts (e.g. does the inmate feel more like a patient or like a prisoner) when he could have inferred these relationships and self-concepts much more accurately from direct observation. He used self-reports of attendance in group therapy sessions when he could have gotten far more accurate information from his own records. He relied heavily on correlation analysis while repeatedly admitting that this did not allow him to give cause-and-effect explanations with any degree of confidence. His measures of association are almost always of the very low level typical of such studies. He makes little effort to examine the interaction among his “variables” or to trace the process of change in inmate behavior. His “findings” are followed by post hoc explanations of low-level correlations, the bane of “variable analysis.” He indulges in intricate speculation and tests “logical” explanations, but usually with an inconclusive outcome. He naively misuses available data, for example, treating patients’ records entirely as information about patients and not at all as information about the institution and its personnel, which would have been more revealing. Some careful field work with ongoing comparative analysis would have avoided, or at least considerably reduced, many of the pitfalls of this study. It may have led to the consideration of more sociological issues, for example, instead of simply telling us that there was such a complex system of institutional rules that many violations had to be tolerated, he could have examined which violations were tolerated by whom under what circumstances. With such an approach to his study, the author could have had more confidence in his information, could have avoided the pseudo-scientific tricks of the variable analysis trade, and could even have written a readable book. JULIUSA. ROTH
Department of Sociology University of California, Davis
Family Interaction edited by JAMESL. FRAMO.Springer, New York, 1972. xxiii + 248 pp. $9.50. THERE
is something quite touching in the attempts of a group of investigators and therapists applying the rules which they normally apply to their subjects or patients to each other. It doesn’t necessarily make good science but it does suggest that they are very serious about their basic assumptions. Not that this present volume is entirely devoted to such an exploration, but it comes through many of the comments recorded at the Conference reported in this volume. The book is an account of the papers and resulting discussions amongst 29 family therapists and researchers,
654
with a broad scope but with a short-term interest in clients. A number of the intra- and extra-organizational factors which alter this orientation are unravelled, and some implications for interorganizational relations drawn out. I feel that Rosengren’s excellent idea deserves even greater specification with some emphasis on its possible relevance to the notions of laterality and longitudinality discussed by his colleague Mark Lefton in Chapter 2. To return to more general comments, Orgunizution and CIients suffers from several omissions. Firstly, there is no real consideration of total institutions, even though various contributors pay lip service to the fact that such organizations offer clients new identities and attempt to extinguish old ones. Secotify, the contributions by Freidson, Perrow, and Long, although coming quite close, never discuss directly the ways in which modern organizations manufacture and employ ideologies and power. Thirdly, after reading the book several times, I have no real sense of what goes on between all of those involved when a client actually encounters an organization. Finally, as promised, there are two additional reactions from my students. They claim, and I agree, that the introductory chapter by Parsons is of little value and detracts from the central thrust of the book. Parsons’ contribution consists of a set of random observations on the division of labor and the problems of solidarity. He offers misplaced, premature reactions to contributions in subsequent chapters and, at this early point, one cannot evaluate the worth of his comments. Unfortunately, after reading the book, they appear, for the most part, worthless. On a more practical level, many students point to the absence of an index which would facilitate cross referencing. It would also have facilitated this review! There is clearly a need /or a book which explores in detail the dynamics of client-organization interaction. Organizations and Clients in my view makes a start, and as such is useful as supplementary reading. Because of its patchiness however, it decidedly is not the book on clients and organizations. JOHN
B. MCKINLAY
Department of Sociology Boston University
Society of Subordinates: Inmate Organization in a Narcotic Hospital by CHARLES R. TITTLE. Indiana University Press, Bloomington, Indiana, 1972. 200 pp. $7.95. A BOOK as dull as this one is likely to be read through
only by book reviewers and by narrow specialists who believe they must be familiar with everything in their field. As they go through one boring page after another, they will no doubt hope that they will pick up some new information or perhaps intellectual gems to repay them for their ordeal. They will be disappointed. This book adds nothing to the literature on incarcerated inmates. This is a pity because it appears that the author had a good opportunity to produce at least an interesting ethnography, if nothing else. He speaks of a 40-80 hr week making observations and interviewing and of the free rein he was given in this institution for narcotics
addicts. But if indeed he spent much time observing the life in the institution and participating in it, his report in this book shows no evidence of it. He relies for his “data” almost entirely on responses of the inmates to his interview questions and other instruments. Thus, he often uses second-hand “indicators” (e.g. reports “best friends”) when he could have drawn upon first-hand observation. He uses notoriously unreliable attitude measures of inmate relationships and self-concepts (e.g. does the inmate feel more like a patient or like a prisoner) when he could have inferred these relationships and self-concepts much more accurately from direct observation. He used self-reports of attendance in group therapy sessions when he could have gotten far more accurate information from his own records. He relied heavily on correlation analysis while repeatedly admitting that this did not allow him to give cause-and-effect explanations with any degree of confidence. His measures of association are almost always of the very low level typical of such studies. He makes little effort to examine the interaction among his “variables” or to trace the process of change in inmate behavior. His “findings” are followed by post hoc explanations of low-level correlations, the bane of “variable analysis.” He indulges in intricate speculation and tests “logical” explanations, but usually with an inconclusive outcome. He naively misuses available data, for example, treating patients’ records entirely as information about patients and not at all as information about the institution and its personnel, which would have been more revealing. Some careful field work with ongoing comparative analysis would have avoided, or at least considerably reduced, many of the pitfalls of this study. It may have led to the consideration of more sociological issues, for example, instead of simply telling us that there was such a complex system of institutional rules that many violations had to be tolerated, he could have examined which violations were tolerated by whom under what circumstances. With such an approach to his study, the author could have had more confidence in his information, could have avoided the pseudo-scientific tricks of the variable analysis trade, and could even have written a readable book. JULIUSA. ROTH
Department of Sociology University of California, Davis
Family Interaction edited by JAMESL. FRAMO.Springer, New York, 1972. xxiii + 248 pp. $9.50. THERE
is something quite touching in the attempts of a group of investigators and therapists applying the rules which they normally apply to their subjects or patients to each other. It doesn’t necessarily make good science but it does suggest that they are very serious about their basic assumptions. Not that this present volume is entirely devoted to such an exploration, but it comes through many of the comments recorded at the Conference reported in this volume. The book is an account of the papers and resulting discussions amongst 29 family therapists and researchers,