The DOI matches its Crossref record.
The Means of Management Control
Abstract
In the understanding of managerial control over work, the labour process literature has been very influential. Recent critical contributions from the sociological tradition have, however, served to so fragment the underlying perspective that its coherence is now threatened. This paper seeks to demonstrate how a dialectical analysis can lay the basis for a viable amended approach. The need for a dialectical framework has often been urged - illustrations of such a perspective in operation, however, are rare. Using a series of examples, this paper argues that the dialectic of work control can be revealed by focussing on two phenomena: the `levels' and `circuits' of control.
Overview
The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.
Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.
Integrity signals
Registry
Cites
Statistics
Verification
Claims the paper makes
The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.
Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.
Claims other papers make about this one
Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?
In the citing paper
“Contemporary accounts of digital technology at work also seem to exhibit what Storey (1985, p. 194) calls the 'functionalist premises that capital must and can devise coherent systems of control'.”
From New social relations of digital technology and the future of work: Beyond technological determinism (2023) · cites this paper as Storey, 1985
Self-check
Percentages, sums and reported differences re-computed from the paper’s own numbers.
The self-check needs the paper’s full text.
Citations
Cites
No references could be resolved yet.
Research works printed but not linked: 72
- Althusser, L., Reading Capital
- Argenti, J., Corporate Planning, 10.4324/9781315122229 · DOI
- Armstrong, P., UMIST/Aston 2nd Annual Labour Process Conference
- Baldry, C, `Drawing the Line: CAD and the Organisation of Work in the Drawing Office'
- Black, J., UMIST/Aston 2nd Annual Labour Process Conference
- Bradley, H., Studies of Gender and Technology in the Labour Process
- Braverman, H., Labour and Monopoly Capital: The Degradation of Work in the Twentieth Century
- Buchanan, D., Organisations and the Computer Age
- Burawoy, M., Manufacturing Consent, 10.7208/chicago/9780226217710.001.0001 · DOI · Paper page
- 10.1177/003232927800800301 · DOI
- Burawoy, M., 1982, Socialist Review, 11, 106
- Chandler, A.D., Strategy and Structure
- Chandler, A.D., The Visible Hand: The Managerial Revolution in American Business, 10.2307/j.ctvjghwrj · DOI
- 10.1007/BF00158648 · DOI
- Cochrane, S., B.S.A. Annual Conference
- 10.2307/2391959 · DOI · Paper page
- Edwards, P.K., `Control, Compliance and Conflict: Analysing Variations in the Capitalist Labour Process'
- Edwards, R.C., Contested Terrain: The Transformation of the Workplace in the Twentieth Century
- Elger, T., B.S.A. Annual Conference
- Friedman, A.L., Industry and Labour: Class Struggle at Work and Monopoly Capitalism, 10.1007/978-1-349-15845-4 · DOI · Paper page
- 10.1007/BF00158647 · DOI
- Giddens, A., Central Problems in Social Theory, 10.1007/978-1-349-16161-4 · DOI · Paper page
- Glueck, W.F., Business Policy & Strategic Management
- 10.1016/0167-2681(80)90003-7 · DOI
- Gordon, D., Segmented Work, Divided Workers
- Gouldner, A.W., Patterns of Industrial Bureaucracy
- Hofstede, G.H., The Game of Budget Control, 10.4324/9780203714874 · DOI
- Homburg, H., Managerial Strategies and Industrial Relations
- Hopper, T., `Financial Control and the Labour Process in a Nationalised Industry'
- Kelly, J., Scientific Management, Job Redesign and Work Performance
- Knights, D., Job Redesign
- Littler, C., The Development of the Labour Process in Capitalist Societies
- Littler, C., UMIST Aston, 2nd Annual Labour Process Conference
- Littler, C., BSA Conference
- Littler, C.R., Class at Work, The Design, Allocation and Control of Jobs
- Manwaring, T., `The Ghost in the Machine: Tacit Skills and the Labour Process'
- Maynard, H.B., Industrial Engineering Handbook
- Lowe, T., New Perspectives in Management Control
- Marx, K., Capital: A Critique of Political Economy
- Newman, I., UMIST/Aston 2nd Annual Labour Process Conference
- Newman, M., `Systems Analysis and the Politics of Organisational Control'
- Nolan, P., `Homogenise, Divide and Rule: An Essay on Segmented Work, Divided Workers'
- 10.1177/048661347500700203 · DOI
- Pascale, R.T., The Art of Japanese Management
- Penn, R., The Degradation of Work?
- 10.1177/089692058201100309 · DOI
- Peters, T.J., In Search of Excellence: Lessons from America's Best Run Companies
- Purcell, J., Good Industrial Relations: Theory and Practice
- Purcell, J., BSA Annual Conference
- Quinn, J.B., Strategies for Change: Logical Incrementalism
- Quinn, J.B., Readings in the Management of Innovation
- Rose, M., `Managerial Strategy and Trade Union Response'
- Rumelt, R.P., Strategy, Structure and Economic Performance
- Russell, J., 1978, Radical America, 12, 29
- Shillinglaw, G., Cost Accounting: Analysis and Control
- Steiner, G., Managerial Long-Range Planning
- 10.1177/048661347400600207 · DOI
- Storey, J., The Challenge to Management Control
- Storey, J., Managerial Prerogative and the Question of Control
- Storey, J., Management and the Labour Process
- Storey, J., 1985, Journal of Management Studies
- Tarr, G., The Management Barrier
- Thompson, P., The Nature of Work
- Thompson, P., BSA Annual Conference
- Thurley, K., Industrial Relations and Management Strategy
- Tushman, M.L., Reading in the Management of Innovation
- Wickham, J., `Managing the International Labour Process'
- Wilkinson, B., 1982, Management Today, 33
- Wiliamson, O.E., Markets and Hierarchies
- Willmott, H., BSA Annual Conference
- Wood, S., The Degradation of Work
- Zimbalist, A., Case Studies in the Labour Process
Cited by
Follow the Redbrick Road: Reflections on Pathways in and out of the Labor Process Debate
Thompson, P., & Smith, C. (2000) · International Studies of Management & Organization · doi:10.1080/00208825.2000.11656799 · Cited by 99
New social relations of digital technology and the future of work: Beyond technological determinism
Joyce, S., Umney, C., Whittaker, X., & Stuart, M. (2023) · New Technology, Work and Employment · doi:10.1111/ntwe.12276 · Cited by 97
Metadata
- Authors
- Storey, J.
- Venue
- Sociology
- Publisher
- SAGE Publications
- Published
- 1985-05
- Volume
- 19
- Issue
- 2
- Pages
- 193-211
- ISSN
- 0038-0385
- 1469-8684
- Cited by
- 91
- References
- 0
- Language
- en
- Licence
- journals.sagepub.com/page/policies/text-and-data-mining-license (tdm)
About these checks
Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.
Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.
Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.
What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›
Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review
How to cite
Cite CoChat for the checks on this page, and the paper for its own findings.
- This page
- CoChat. (2026). Citation check: The Means of Management Control. https://app.cochat.ai/papers/10.1177/0038038585019002004
- The paper
- Storey, J. (1985). The Means of Management Control. Sociology. https://doi.org/10.1177/0038038585019002004
Data sources
Bibliographic data: Semantic Scholar, OpenAlex, Crossref.
Contains information from the Semantic Scholar Academic Graph Datasets, made available under the ODC Attribution License (ODC-BY 1.0).
Semantic Scholar’s data is described in: Kinney, R., et al. (2023). The Semantic Scholar Open Data Platform. arXiv:2301.10140.
