Power and Politics in Organizations: How Politics Affects Power

The upcoming presidential election has provided ample evidence of how politics affects powers in a variety of organizations, and not simply the organizations of the nation directly related to the business of governance. If political power solely determined what occurred behind the closed doors of governing institutions, than the leaders of world corporate organizations would care little whom was at the nation's helm. However, to take only one recent example, the power of the Food and Drug Administration to create

Also, the power of schools to raise extra funds for after hoursprograms can be limited by political pressure, such as the recentcontroversy over giving Snapple an exclusive contract for vending machinesbeing used in the New York City school system. The FDA has banned of certain substances,such as alcohol and cigarettes, from being targeted at children. The FDA can even affectconsumer's daily frames of attention and reference, given the ubiquity offood and product advertising. a series of recommended daily allowances ofwhat Americans should eat, to determine what products should containwarning labels as hazardous to one's health, and to select what foods tosuggest and subsidize as part of federally funded nutritional programs suchas school lunches and food stamps, all affect the power of multinationalfood corporations to dominate the marketplace. Even McDonald's cannot falsely advertise. Thus, no matter how powerful an organization may be in terms of itsmarketing power, and the strength of its organizational head, it still mustcombat the realities of political pressures. Even Martha Stewart wassubject to the SEC. Many inthe industry, though powerful in determining the marketing of theirspecific products, fear pressure for the government to prohibit advertisingin the future, against soft drinks and sugary cereals during children'sprogramming, as well as to vending machines behind banned from schoolhallways. Even themost powerful organization and CEO cannot ignore the political pressuresand powers of the government of the land where it dwells.