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- Title
A COMMENT ON KANTER'S "MANAGERIAL CAREERS OF AIR FORCE GENERALS".
- Authors
Lang, Kurt
- Abstract
This section comments on the article, Managerial Careers of Air Force Generals: A Test of the Janowitz Convergence Hypothesis, by Arnold Kanter. In applying the structural convergence hypothesis to the U.S. Air Force, Kanter adopts the most narrow possible formulation. His test for convergence at the elite level is the extent to which the professional managerial expertise has diffused among general-grade officers. The narrow formulation may nevertheless be useful as a point of departure, as a first approximation of underlying trends, especially given the central importance that analysts of the modern military assign to the role model of the military manager as personifying the values of the officer profession. Unfortunately this usefulness is diminished by a conceptual confusion. Kanter sees the specific experience of the officer in administration as the logically most appropriate preparation for the general manager role. Yet, at the elite level a distinction between required skills is critical. As already implied, the higher his rank the more likely is the officer to function as a coordinator of other specialties, including but not limited to those defined as administrative and managerial.
- Subjects
UNITED States; MILITARY science; CAREER development; MILITARY sociology; UNITED States. Air Force; UNITED States armed forces
- Publication
Journal of Political & Military Sociology, 1976, Vol 4, Issue 1, p141
- ISSN
0047-2697
- Publication type
Article