White-Collar Blues: Management Loyalties in an Age of Corporate Restructuring

Long the backbone of corporate America, middle managers have been undermined since U.S. firms began restructuring operations within the past decade, sharply trimming budgets and jobs. This downsizing changed middle management's employment relationship, ending ``lifetime'' employment and sparking morale problems: ``For the first time managers are being treated as a variable cost rather than a part of the fixed base,'' according to the author. Yet America's corporations are rebounding. Drawing on interviews and case studies, Heckscher, chair of Rutgers Univ.'s labor studies department, analyzes this situation, rejecting conventional rationales for restructuring like the pressure of global competition and the need for automation. The author posits that the decline of paternalism, the emergence of professional managers committed to a process or technology, a deemphasis on bureaucratic procedures and the evolution of entrepreneurial cultures triggered America's corporate rebirth. He contends that corporate loyalty continues to flourish, and employment ``free-agency'' has not materialized. An incisive study. (Mar.)