Historical Context
The power struggle between the technostructure and the shareholders was first evoked by Thorstein Veblen in "The Theory of the Leisure Class" (1899), questioning who, among the managers and the shareholders, should control the enterprise. At the time and until the end of the 1980s, the shareholders, unable to effectively regroup and organise themselves, could not exert enough pressure to effectively counter the managerial decision-making process. After the Second World War, the rapid augmentation of shareholders further diluted their collective power. This was perceived, by Galbraith, as a divorce between the property of the capital and the direction of the enterprise.
Read more about this topic: Technostructure
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