Book Reviews
Starting with the literature dealing with ex-
pertise in American politics, Balogh argues
persuasively that "World War II forged a more
permanent link at the national level between
expertise and most federal institutions." He
then describes the symbiotic relationship that
developed into what he calls the "proministra-
tive state" in the Cold War years that followed.
Scientists in particular enjoyed special prestige
in the aftermath of the Manhattan Project,
which created the atomic bomb. Though they
suffered when the government shamelessly dis-
credited]. Robert Oppenheimer in the early
1950s, Balogh shows how they still played a
major role in all federal agencies until the
1970s when divisive debates were increasingly
conducted in public and the scientists' very
visibility subjected them to even greater scruti-
ny. The entrance of new entrepreneurs, relying
on their own experts, eroded the authority of
those in and out of government who had
helped shape the structure of the postwar
United States and undermined the political
power of all experts.
Meanwhile, Balogh ably uses the story of
the development of nuclear power as a case
study. Drawing on a variety of Atomic Energy
Commission (AEC) records and the full sec-
ondary literature, he describes the key episodes
in the nuclear debate. He deals with Sen. Brien
McMahon's demands for civilian control in
1946, with AEC head Lewis Strauss's fierce pro-
motion of private atomic power in the 1950s,
and with the equally intensive efforts of Glenn
Seaborg, the first scientist to chair the commis-
sion, to make nuclear power viable. He writes
with authority about the struggles over siting
and safety in the course of his account.
Balogh is particularly good in detailing the
impact ofthe environmental movement on the
drive for nuclear power. "The discipline of
ecology," he observes, "epitomized the assault
on specialized approaches that might lead to
progress in one area only to create greater harm
somewhere else." As more and more experts
join the fray, the increasingly heated debate
left the public confused. The visible and vocal
controversy effectively squelched the further
development of commercial nuclear power
and tarnished the glamor of the politics of ex-
pertise.
1241
Balogh makes a real contribution to our un-
derstanding ofthe role of science and scientists
in the formulation of public policy. His book
complements the work of George Mazuzan
and]. Samuel Walker on the evolution of
atomic power and adds another dimension to
the story. At the same time, it provides a model
for further study of post-World War II institL-
tions, as Balogh notes tellingly how the mOG
ern state "ultimately had to accommodate the
pluralist, porous, and often parochial land-
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scape that continues to shape American poli-
tics even today."
Allan M. Winkler
Miami University
Oxford, Ohio
'Taylorism Transformed: Scientific Manage-
ment Theory since 1945. By Stephen P. War-
ing. (Chapel Hill: University of North Caroli-
na Press, 1991. xiv + 288 pp. $34.95, ISBN
0-8078-1972-7. )
Stephen P. Waring has performed a public ser-
vice. He has reviewed the management litera-
ture published since World War II, which as
a whole is kindly described as tedious, and
has rendered its fundamental assertions in
straightforward prose. This literature is ex-
tremely important. Intellectual historians are
not usually interested in (purportedly) practi-
cal prescriptions for social engineering, prefer-
ring the higher realms of academic specu-
lation, but these are theories that have had
considerable impact. Indeed, Waring has
probably underestimated their importance,
for they are taught in many places outside the
business schools he surveys and affect enter-
prises beyond the corporation and the factory.
They influence the operations of the academic
organizations in which we work, and we ignore
them at our peril.
The theories and techniques Waring dis-
cusses are a diverse lot: operations research, the
quantitative approach to decision making that
took definitive form in resource allocation
techniques used in the prosecution of World
War II; the hybrid social science of economics,
political science, and sociology intended to
shape the distribution of authority within for-
1242 The Journal of American History
mal organizations, which is principally as-
sociated with the work of Herbert Simon; a
goal-directed management strategy for redi-
recting communications and power flows with-
in work groups, which has been most conspicu-
ously articulated by Peter Drucker; the effort
to implement in organizations the insights
gained from experimental and naturalistic ob-
servations of psychological dynamics, most
particularly those of Kurt Lewin and Abraham
Maslow; and eflorts to translate into American
terms the workplace culture of elite Japanese
firms. Waring approaches all of these schemes
as exercises in normative political theory. He
shows that, with the excepti~n of operations
research, all assume the goal of securing the
consent of the governed in work groups, mak-
ing their cooperation voluntary rather than
coerced-in contradistinction to the Taylorite
management style. But all of them take as a
given the established organizational structures
of the workplace, limiting the possibilities of
managerial reform. And all fail to reject the
fundamental assumption of Taylorism: Mana-
gers, not workers, know best.
Waring's analysis is largely intellectual
history-rendering the debates over theories
in abstract terms. However satisfactory this ap-
proach may be in discussion of high culture,
it has severe limitations in presentation of
ideas intended for practical use. Only occa-
sionally does Waring point to changes in
American occupational structure, changes to
which the management theorists were re-
sponding. Indeed, the reader can easily de-
duce from Waring's evidence that the per-
ceived value of a theory is a function of the
distance of the site on which it was produced
from the workplace; more managers read Peter
Drucker than any other author discussed in
this study, surely because he has been a cor-
porate participant-observer. One wishes that
Waring had been more systematic in his analy-
sis of the users of management theory, specify-
ing which theories appeal to which enterprises
(and, within these, which levels of the occupa-
tional hierarchy receive what sort of treat-
ment); we are given hints, but not definitive
statements. Finally, Waring's inattention to
practicalities is most obvious when he is
describing approaches that are inextricable
December 1992
from specific techniques-from operations re-
search to quality circles - of which he ought to
have told us more. But Waring might choose
to write of the social life of management the-
ories in his future works. In this one, he has
certainly met the objective he set himself and
has provided a primer ofmanagement thought
that deserves a wide audience.
Henrika Kuklick
University 0/ Pennsylvania
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Divided we Govern: Party Contro/, Lawmak-
ing, and Investigations, 1946-1990. By David
R. Mayhew. (New Haven: Yale University Press,
1991. x + 228 pp. $25.00, ISBN 0-300-
04835-1.)
Perhaps historians, unlike many ofus in politi-
cal science, have not assumed that unified par-
ty control of Congress and the presidency
makes for more effective government, particu-
larly for more significant legislation, than the
now familiar divided control. In that case,
historians will be less shaken by David R. May-
hew's elegantly persuasive destruction of his
discipline's conventional wisdom in favor of
party government. Divided we Govern may
even confirm the view of some historians that
broad social forces, not transient political ar-
rangements, are responsible for waves of inno-
vative governmental policy making. But what-
ever their views, historians who read this book
will encounter research and analysis that repre-
sent the best of political science. Mayhew's
knowledge is impressive, his methods clear and
careful, and his writing lucid, straightforward,
and highly sophisticated.
In the forty-four years (1946-1990) under
study, Mayhew identifies 31 high-publicity
congressional investigations critical of the ex-
ecutive branch and 267 important legislative
enactments. Selection criteria are fully and
convincingly presented, and all the chosen in-
vestigations and enactments are listed, each
under its particular two-year congress. The
two-year periods are labeled "unified" during
the eighteen years when one party controlled
House, Senate, and presidency, and "divided"
during the twenty-six years when one party
controlled at least one chamber (usually two