General Conclusions
In this study, organizational age predicted the structure of women's shelters more powerfully than did ideological differences among shelters; even interactions between ideology and age were unimportant. Thus the findings appear to support organizational theory (e.g., Katz & Kahn, 1978; Miller, 1978) and to contradict assumptions that ideology can importantly influence structural development (e.g., Meyer, 1982; Schechter, 1982). These conclusions, however, should be qualified by the recognition that only women's shelters were studied. Far greater variation in structural development might be revealed by study of a broader range of organizations with more diverse ideologies.
Still in regard to shelters, the demands for systemic change to accommodate development did predominate over the demands associated with variation in shelter ideology. At one level, these results supported organizational theory. At a practical level, the results provided an empirical description of a basis for that organizational phenomenon that is commonly called “selling out.” Consultants' jobs may sometimes require alleviating tendencies among members of a system to blame one another for systemic processes that are, indeed, more productively described in terms of organizational development than in terms of ideological failure.
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The authors acknowledge the help of the following people who made this research possible: to Joan Welsh, former chairperson for the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence and former executive director of Boulder County Safehouse for her suggestions and help reaching shelters, to Gary McClelland for statistical consultation, to Jane Slaughter for assistance in data collection and data analysis, to William Hodges for helpful comments on an earlier draft, to the University of Colorado Psychology Department Phonathon Committee, who allocated funds for data collecotion, and to all the shelter idirectors who cooperated in completing the surveys.
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Epstein, S.R., Russell, G. & Silvern, L. Structure and ideology of shelters for battered women. Am J Commun Psychol 16, 345–367 (1988). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00919375
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00919375