Managers and their Wives
- Author:
and R. E. Pahl
Allen Lane, The Penguin Press, ?3.25
Although they take up a cautious position, as befits detached observers, the authors contrive to make readers ask themselves why anybody ever stays married to a manager. They organized a longitudinal study of about 100 men who attended a business course at Madingley Hall, Cambridge, but unlike many sociologists, who have concentrated on managers in terms of their careers or their life styles, the Pahls decided to examine their wives too. What they found is somewhat disturbing.
A fair proportion of well-educated, middle class women declared that their own plans and preferences were as nothing beside the demands of their husband’s career. He might be a spiralist - starting off as a trainee manager in Slough, transferring to Newcastle for broader experience, then settling down behind a director’s desk in Erith. All in the space of a few years.
Meanwhile, his wife loses friends, pride in developing her home, educational opportunities for her children, and any reasonable chance of making her own career. But what does it matter if she sprouts cabbage leaves, provided her husband spirals successfully? Only a few wives are prepared to jib at the rat race. Most are willing spectators. It might seem less unfair if she played a more active part in helping his business life. But that is the American way which does not seem to have crossed the Atlantic - yet.
Everything is rather drab in the Pahls’ world. This must be partly due to their approach. They rarely hint at any particular enjoyment, or particular hate in their informants’ lives. Their data gathering techniques seem adequate, but their interpretation, particularly the extended personal interviews, does not seem to do the material justice. The Pahls are happier with straightforward, factual answers, such as how many wives had young children at home. They shrink from interpreting feelings, from determining how many gain pleasure from being surrounded by children, as opposed to accepting responsibility for them. Informants’ comments are presented at face value-sometimes with a suggestion that other thoughts might underlie them, but no more.
Some of their intimidating, frontal attack questions would make most market researchers cringe, and feel unadventurous - ‘What sort of a person do you see yourself as?’ But market researchers are more adventurous at exploring hypotheses about what the data really means.
The book raises questions about people and life which deserve to be looked at more carefully. A manager’s wife has emotions, as well as shopping lists.
- Author:
Mark Lovell
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