Leadership in Voluntary Organizations: the Controversy Over Social Action in Protestant Churches

Abstract

Leadership in Voluntary Organizations is the latest effort by Wood in his continuing study of how the political economy of religious organizations affects their involvement in social action. This work, which supplements his earlier contributions, closely examines the value conflicts that exist at the local church level and explores the mechanisms by which organizations take action, despite those conflicts. He focuses on the that comes to be associated with a certain course of action in identifying that action with the values of the organization. This claim, when successfully made, can neutralize opposition while minimizing desertions from the organization. The applicability of Wood's core value theory of legitimacy is not limited to religious and voluntary organizations, however, and in an understated conclusion, Wood provides some examples of this generalizability.