Whenever we gather to undertake a task in common, power appears. This is because we all have different ideas about how even the most mundane and simple task should be accomplished. Just think how difficult it is to get a handful of people to agree upon a common time and place to meet. Our experience of coordinating a meeting of friends would lead us to expect no-shows, dissent, frustration, absolute uproar and even revolt. If such a simple task is troublesome, imagine coordinating hundreds or thousands of people in contemporary organizations. Interestingly enough, however, much mainstream organization theory views organizations as places where thousands of diligent souls work contentedly towards a universally accepted goal. If political squabbles appear, then this is the fault of a power-hungry manager, a few deviant subordinates or an organization that is in terminal decline. In this otherwise perfect world, good people in good organizations do not engage in politics. They just work towards the common good. But is organizational life really like this?

The widespread assumption that organizations are groups of people working together to achieve a common goal is naive. All the evidence suggests that, though we work together at times, we also frequently work against each other (e.g. Pfeffer, 1981, 1992). Indeed, there is rarely lasting agreement or understanding even about what the ‘common goal’ we desire actually is.