Last night I talked with mom about this blog (she doesn't understand computer things so it takes a bit to try to explain what a blog is and how it works). The thing though is that I don't know why I tell her things like this because she can flip back and forth on a dime to one day be supporting you and the next turn around and be using the same things to cut you down. So in that way she can be very manipulative, I think. As if I need that on top of all the rest of my problems. But then the day before yesterday she decided she wanted to give me more money than what she's gifting all of us kids this year. That was very nice of her and she pursued that further (how to do it) yesterday, but she does understand that I didn't ask for that and she said she made sure my brothers understand that too. It's very hard to deal with the flip-flopping though, as you can imagine. Also, I've expressed concerns several times lately that I thought her needs weren't satisfactorily being met and that that had to be her top priority over giving us kids money. She does really care sincerely about our welfare though, I think, but I'm not desperate or anything, just poor.
Also, one thing about her giving me more money might also be her way of trying to position herself into the most useful (her happiness) configuration of family relations. There are several things here that might bear consideration. One is that somehow the family relations, as I've described elsewhere, are not that healthy which puts her in a vulnerable position that "makes" her act like this. The other thing is that, not being sure exactly how the family got to be the way it is - out interrelationships with one another, I mean - it's not clear how much of this kind of activity by mom was a "cause", rather than an "effect" of the family being the way it is. This is might be a form of "Which came first, the chicken or the egg?" although the answer in this case might be "both". In any case, if this blog ends out backfiring on me she'll make sure I take all the blame and confirm that I was just asking for it, etc., but if the blog ends out for my benefit in some way she'll try to take some of the benefit and limelight. If you've ever worked with anyone like that you'll probably understand how irritating it can be.
Anyway, I mention this because family relations are a significant part of my life and this is an autobiographical blog, after all. Also, it might have some bearing or even a certain amount of explanatory power regarding some significant issues in my past.
***
Returning to our text, the next kind of "story" organizations tell is:
"2. Stories about whether the boss is human. Such stories include three events. The status credentials of the central character are established, the character is presented with an opportunity to perform a status-equalization act, and the character does or does not abrogate status temporarily, exhibiting (or not exhibiting) 'human' qualities (e.g., Ray Kroc cleaning a bathroom)." (p. 125)
I wouldn't be surprised it there weren't stories of this nature floating around somewhere in the bowels of the Vienna mission, but I don't remember being privy to them (again, remember that I never really became a true insider).
First of all, I think my boss had a certain lack of confidence of his informal power in the mission, and maybe also the vulnerability of his formal power as well. He was from the same mission I was and I think his demeanor was was somewhat reflective of that mission in particular, in that he was a rather an unassuming man (in contrast to his - I think - somewhat snotty wife). I think he could blend into the wallpaper rather well, which in general was something the mission appreciated as a valuable skill, but for the position he was in maybe he didn't quite stand out as much as he needed to in order to garner the respect needed for his position in the mission. However, that being said, I'm sure playing second fiddle to the director of the mission would not have been an easy task, since the director was such strong figurehead, a bullwark not to be toyed with. That is, he might have had the highest theological credentials (Th.D. as well as books published, etc.) and also had a presence that immediately grabbed the attention of everyone when we were all gathered together. That's not to say that he didn't let others take the stage or get proper credit for things, because that wasn't the case at all; nor did he interfere in others' work unnecessarily. It's just that he was the kind of persona that, without words, gave the immediate impression to those around him that "the buck stops here." My boss didn't have that kind of demeanor and almost seemed lost in the shadow of his boss in some ways.
The director of the mission was definitely not above doing nitty gritty things, like Ray Kroc of McDonald's fame, but I think that such things would have been mainly for symbolic value, rather than of great substance or used very frequently. An important exception to this (that is, where it wouldn't be only a symbolic gesture), of course, would be activities "in-country," that is in Eastern Europe on mission trips, during which forays a person did whatever was needed to get the job done and there usually were just 2 of you staff members there, so in this way the director would have built a history in the mission of being "human". In contrast, the concern, I think, for my boss (the second in command) would not have been not seeming "human" enough, but being seen authoritative enough. I'm sure my problems with the mission didn't help matters for him. But I can't exactly feel sorry for him either, because I don't think he was as "innocent" as it might have seemed on the face of things, especially regarding the mission's relationship to me, which included my relationship to him.
However, it's also possible that my understanding of my boss was greatly hampered by my myopic focus on him via my relationship with him as my boss. I've noted elsewhere that there seemed to be a common model of how secretaries related to their boss's and there was supposed to be, I think a greater level of vulnerability in that relationship than with other relationships, and that vulnerability was greater for the secretary than for the boss in that relationship. Because of this, I may have been exposed more to a side of my boss that was thought to facilitate that sort of a relationship, and in that way my view of him might be skewed towards the 'human' side, even though I did also see him in interactions with others as well, including him leading large group meetings in the director's absence.
***
As a brief aside here, I'd like to discuss the paradigms open to the Vienna mission that could have guided its work in Eastern Europe and its organizational culture. Here are some possibilities:
1. The mission as a seminary. If this were the case, the mission should have been run like a seminary, based on real or theoretical seminary models, taking a cue from the seminary literature. The Association of Theological Schools would be a likely source for this kind of modeling information.
2. The mission as a mission. If missions theory was a major influence on the Vienna mission, the field of missiology should have formed the backdrop as to how the mission was run.
3. The mission as an East European mission. As you can tell this paradigm was more one of praxis than of theory, otherwise there probably would have been more of a knowledge base, journals and a professional organization to support it.
4. The mission as [national] security organization. This model would use the world of espionage and the military as its model, perhaps similar to how a community college I once taught it pursued the corporate world as its model, sending emissaries around the country to various large corporations to try to learn from them as to how to function.
My contention is that the security organization model overshadowed the others, although this would have been a "behind-closed-doors" type of similarity because of wanting to deflect interest and accusations of this nature from "enemy" sources (i.e., communist countries and friends), and also wanting to be sufficiently mission like (#2) both to satisfy their own consciences and view of what the organization was really like and also to convince those back home that that was the primary model they were using. I think that then current thinking about Eastern European missions (#3 on this list of models) was similar enough to #4 (security organizations), that these two were more or less combined into one. However, since the Eastern European model was much less developed than the security model, I think it's highly likely that the security model was more influential. Of all of these, I think that #1 (the seminary model) was the least influential as to how the mission really operated. After all, although a Th.M. was required for permanent instructors and textbook writers, they didn't have a system of tenure nor the concomitant hierarchy (i.e., from teaching assistant to provost).
The fact that the #4/#3 (security organization and Eastern European mission models) were "behind the scenes" models of how the mission operated leads me to some serious questions as to how far they might have taken that/those models, especially the security one. The fact that they had two military reserve chaplains in strategically placed and influential positions by itself raises concern. Was there a point where they could decide that they'd gone far enough in using this model? Was there a point at which it would have been hard to stop going farther with this model? For example, taking just the reserve chaplains alone, would the mission's act of taking them on board in the positions they did open them up to U.S. military influence of the mission, and which would be difficult to extricate oneself from (such as the threat of blackmail - being exposed for having the relationship at all in the first place)? Supposedly, if the mission was open to any kind of influence of this nature, it would have been in the interest of both the mission and those other "security organization" parties to keep things under wraps, so that would have undoubtedly placed limits on what could or could not be done vis a vis security organization influence of the mission.
As you can see, I can't be 100% sure of how I've described things here, but I'm pretty certain of these things:
#1 (Seminary model) was the least influential.
#2 (Missions model) was the upfront model.
#3/#4 (Eastern European mission / security organization models) were the internal "hidden" models.
I can't say whether #2 or some configuration of #3/#4 were the more powerful, but I do know, as I've said before, that the mission was literally obsessed with security issues. This combination of models would by itself, I think, have been a source of stress in as much as members had to either try to live with apparent conflicts between the two models (and not necessarily try to resolve the conflict) or develop a mental (and social? and structural?) framework that allowed for both to co-exist.
***
I hate to post this right in the middle of this list of stories in the text, but I think I've put enough material here to warrant posting it now, so you'll just have to wait for the next post to find out about the other 5 stories in organizations.
