Plato
defined a slave as one who accepts from another the purposes
which control his conduct. This condition obtains even where
there is no slavery in the legal sense. It is found wherever men
are engaged in activity which is socially serviceable, but whose
service they do not understand and have no personal interest in.
Much is said about scientific management of work. It is a narrow
view which restricts the science which secures efficiency of
operation to movements of the muscles. The chief opportunity for
science is the discovery of the relations of a man to his
work--including his relations to others who take part -- which
will enlist his intelligent interest in what he is doing.
Efficiency in production often demands division of labor. But it
is reduced to a mechanical routine unless workers see the
technical, intellectual, and social relationships involved in
what they do, and engage in their work because of the motivation
furnished by such perceptions. The tendency to reduce such
things as efficiency of activity and scientific management to
purely technical externals is evidence of the one-sided
stimulation of thought given to those in control of industry --
those who supply its aims. Because of their lack of all-round
and well-balanced social interest, there is not sufficient
stimulus for attention to the human factors and relationships in
industry. Intelligence is narrowed to the factors concerned with
technical production and marketing of goods.
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