The existential psychology of Ernest Becker (1971, 1973, 1975) is used to argue that organizations exist to provide a framework of myth which makes action possible. What they see as "useful" consists in furtherance of the myth. But knowledge about organizations requires seeing the myth as a myth: demythologizing. This poses a dilemma for the applied organizational scientist.
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Howard S. Schwartz (1985) studied this question.
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