Diffusion of responsibility

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Diffusion of responsibility describes the phenomenon that a task that obviously needs to be done is not accepted or carried out despite a sufficient number and attention of suitable positions or people.

Alternatively, the term can be understood as an ambiguous assignment of a task to a responsible body or person. The problem is regularly known in the private sector and in dealing with authorities, when an assignment of an incorrect execution or decision can no longer be assigned to an individual causer.

The term corresponds to that of responsibility and is used scientifically in psychology , pedagogy and organizational sociology.

In behavioral research , for example, the behavior of viewers during a crime was examined and it was found that the presence of several viewers alone can significantly reduce the likelihood of assistance ( bystander effect ).

When examining the distribution of tasks in organizations , sociology repeatedly comes across the phenomenon that activities that employees consider to be absolutely necessary are still not carried out. The explanation given is, for example, that the connection between one's own organizational role and the nature of the task has not been clarified for the actors in question .

A higher level authority can also be responsible for the emergence of a diffusion of responsibility: It can be caused by a lack of or unclear assignment of responsibility or by the targeted assignment of the same tasks to several competing positions (cf. king mechanism ).

The voluntary dilemma represents a game-theoretical formalization of the diffusion of responsibility.

See also

literature

  • The trust-control nexus in organizational relations. Special issue of the journal: International Sociology, vol. 20, no.3, 2005.
  • Martin Abraham, Günter Büschges: Organizational Sociology . 3rd edition Wiesbaden: VS Verlag 2004.
  • Niklas Luhmann : Organization and decision. Wiesbaden: West German Publishing House 2000.
  • Dirk Baecker : Organization as a system. Frankfurt 1999.

Web links

Wiktionary: Diffusion of responsibility  - explanations of meanings, word origins, synonyms, translations