Exit, Voice, and Loyalty

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Exit, Voice, and Loyalty (English for mutatis mutandis. Emigration, opposition and loyalty ) is the title of a both economically and sociologically argumentative book by Albert O. Hirschman .

Its focus is on three basic ways of reacting to a decline in social organizations' performance. So they can

  • dissolve the business relationship with the organization ( exit ),
  • try to consolidate the relationship again through complaints, change requests etc. ( voice ), or
  • support the organization nonetheless ( loyalty ).

Mixed forms occur, often characterized by delayed reactions. The concept was very well received in economic, social and political science research.

Examples

Members of companies, trade unions, etc. can leave the organization if they are dissatisfied or terminate their membership ( Exit ) or try to change them by complaining, deselection of officials, etc. ( Voice ).

If students are dissatisfied with the content or the general conditions of their studies, they can either break off their studies or simply withdraw and no longer appear ( Exit ). You also have the option of e.g. B. to use university policy campaigns for better study conditions or to work by consulting the student advisory service to actively change their situation ( Voice ).

Members of a nation can react to an increasingly repressive political system with emigration (Exit) or protest (Voice) . For example, the citizens of the GDR reacted by emigrating to the West because they did not see the option of communicating with the political system to improve their situation as effective. It was not until the fall of 1989 that citizens resorted to the voice option by gathering for mass protests. The voice factor - the Monday demonstrations - was an essential factor in the disintegration of the system in 1989, which led to the fall of the Berlin Wall. It is interesting in this context that, according to the principle of the classic exit voice theory, the protest (voice) is weakened by a massive exit. In connection with the GDR, either emigration was not so pronounced that the protest could be weakened, or the protest was reinforced by the pronounced emigration of citizens.

literature

  • Albert O. Hirschman : Exit, Voice and Loyalty. Responses to Decline in Firms, Organizations and States. Harvard University Press, Cambridge MA 1970, ISBN 0-674-27650-7
    • Churn and contradiction. Reactions to a decline in performance in companies, organizations and states (= publications on cooperation research A: Studies. Vol. 8). Mohr, Tübingen 1974, ISBN 3-16-335251-0
  • Ulrich Arnswald: Hirschman's theory of exit, voice, and loyalty reconsidered. Europ. Inst. For Internat. Affairs, Heidelberg 1997, ISBN 3-933179-00-9 .
  • Claus Offe : Albert O. Hirschman. Exit, Voice, and Loyalty. Responses to Decline in Firms, Organizations and States. In: Dirk Kaesler , Ludgera Vogt (Hrsg.): Major works of sociology (= Kröner's pocket edition . Volume 396). 2nd, revised edition. Kröner, Stuttgart 2007, ISBN 978-3-520-39602-0 , pp. 197-200.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Schulze-Stocker, Franziska / Schäfer-Hock, Christian / Pelz, Robert 2019: Intervention in the course of studies and advice. In: Dörner, Olaf et al. (Ed.): Advice in the context of lifelong learning. Concepts, organization, politics, areas of tension (series of publications by the adult education section of the German Society for Educational Science), Berlin: Verlag Barbara Budrich, pp. 221–233.
  2. ^ Albert O. Hirschman, Migration, Contradiction and the Fate of the German Democratic Republic. In: Leviathan : Zeitschrift für Sozialwissenschaft (Vol. 20, Issue 3/1992, translated from the American by Ulrich Struve) pp. 330–358.