Violations of Service Fairness and Legal Ramifications: The Case of the Managed Care Industry

Adapted from Chan's (2000) model depicting success of litigation, this paper argues that with the application of various legislation, health maintenance organizations' (HMOs') violations of service fairness to each group: enrollees, physicians, and hospitals give rise to each group's lawsuits against the HMOs. Various authors (Bowen et al., 1999; Seiders and Berry, 1998) indicate that justice concepts such as distributive, procedural, and interactional justice can be applied to the area of service fairness. The violation of these underlying justice principles with HMOs' service unfairness to enrollees, physicians, and hospitals is examined. A general synopsis of the ethical issues in the managed care industry is provided. The various lawsuits launched by each group: enrollees, physicians, and hospitals together with the key statutes used are discussed. This paper also highlights the provisions and ramifications of the 11 April 2000 landmark agreement that Aetna made with Texas Attorney General John Cornyn to settle the 1998 lawsuit brought against the company. Lastly, the current ethical issues in the managed care industry are further discussed. The value of this paper can be adapted to the study of organizations' service fairness violations in other industries or in the educational, governmental, and not-for-profit sectors both nationally and internationally.     

论知识型组织员工的人性假设及其激励

基于知识型组织员工人力资源的独有特征，提出一种新的人性假设——“价值人”假设，即知识型组织中员工是工具价值与自我价值二维存在的统一体。在“价值人”假设条件下，知识型组织员工管理模式应从传统的“命令-控制”型向“引导-激励”型转变，运用激励的制度安排来激发员工的工作热情。     

Policy Issues Raised by For-Profit Spinoffs from Professional Associations: An Evaluation of a Recent AICPA Initiative

This paper provides an evaluation of the spinoff of a for-profit company from the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA), a nonprofit professional association. The evaluation is based on a review of the literature on public policy issues surrounding organizational conversions from nonprofit to for-profit legal status. Many criticisms of this for-profit spinoff were voiced by professional leaders and accounting regulators, and we demonstrate that these criticisms are grounded in widely recognized policy principles relating to nonprofit conversions. The public policy issues raised by this study have implications for the governance of professional associations in all disciplines.     

Individual rights and organizational theory

Rights are very important concepts in everyday life. And they are especially important to participants in organizations. Yet, our theories of organization and management have largely ignored rights — stressing, instead, other concepts, such as goals, roles, etc. This article describes the historical significance of rights and their relevance in understanding social behavior. The advantages of a right-based organizational theory (versus traditional goal-based theories) are discussed.This article draws on the author's forthcoming book,A Social-Contract Theory of Organizations (University of Notre Dame Press, 1988).     

Unfolding institutional plurality in hybrid organizations through practices: The case of a cooperative bank

This paper provides a theoretically informed analysis of how institutional pluralism unfolds in hybrid organizations through practices. Building on Quattrone's (2015) procedural model, the paper studies institutional plurality in the case of an Italian cooperative bank that has experienced enduring success. By reversing the usual approach to logic, defined as a stable set of beliefs, this paper shows that this hybrid organization uses a recursive system of practices in search of social order. This hybrid organization interrogates its organizational imperatives and defines adequate ways to achieve them. This paper then observes that this system of practices is permeable to external pressures, i.e., inspections by the central bank, a reform of cooperative banks, political pressure for mergers and acquisitions, and Italy's sovereign debt crisis. While such an organization appears to be ongoingly accountable to its multiple stakeholders, external pressures undermine its community accountability system and push this hybrid organization towards compliance accountability. Based on our findings, this paper develops a process model for hybrid organizations to navigate institutional plurality and to explain the potential limitations of the accountability system.     

学习型组织--西方学者研究综述

文章对西方学者有关学习型组织的研究进行了总结 ,以便于学者的进一步研究及其在管理实践中的应用 ,内容主要包括学习型组织的界定、个体学习与组织学习以及创建有效的学习型组织等问题     

关于环保非政府组织发展的法律制度分析

相对发达国家的环保非政府组织而言,我国环保非政府组织显得先天不足,后天乏力,环保非政府组织自身的缺陷和尚不健全的法律体制是其发展滞后的重要原因,细致而有可操作性的法律制度才能形成对环保非政府组织的有力保障.     

民间组织管理制度的经济学分析

我国现行的"管制型"民间组织管理模式不利于民间组织的发展。通过比较现行管理制度下的成本与收益发现,要推动民间组织管理制度的变革,建立和谐的国家与社会关系,必须放松对民间组织的控制。     

Law without justice: The dilemmas of formalization and fairness in the legalistic organization

There is growing evidence of a litigation mentality rampant in organizations, which has created a legalistic mindset in many managers. Increasingly, managerial decisions are becoming dominated by a concern for what is legally defensible at the expense of broader social considerations such as justice and fairness. The papers in this special issue explore how this legalistic mindset has created new organizational and social dilemmas, and situations of law whithout justice.     

Behind closed doors: Sex bias at professional and managerial levels

U.S. companies have made important strides in combating sex discrimination in the workplace over the last two decades, but more subtle forms of sex bias still exist, often in decisions and behaviors that occur behind closed doors. This paper focuses on sex bias at professional and managerial levels. It explores sources of sex bias in the informal culture, selection and recruitment, task assignment, performance appraisal, promotion, and salary allocation, and then suggests action steps to help reduce sex bias in each of these areas.