We can tell them to get lost, but we won't do that: cultural control and resistance in voluntary work.

O'Toole, Michelle; Grey, Christopher

Abstract

Although cultural control and resistance in organizations have been widely researched, this has invariably been within the context of paid work. This paper examines how they operate within voluntary work, using the case of the Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI). Here, volunteers undertake the dangerous work of sea rescues, working for local lifeboat stations. While the RNLI deploys standard techniques of cultural control, the combination of volunteering, localism and dangerous work creates the possibility of complex and ambiguous forms of resistance to cultural control, thereby extending our understanding of these phenomena.

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Publication Date: Jan 1, 2016
• Journal: Organization studies
• Print ISSN: 0170-8406
• Electronic ISSN: 1741-3044
• Publisher: SAGE Publications
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 37
• Issue: 1
• Pages: 55-75
• Institution Citation: O'TOOLE, M. and GREY, C. 2016. We can tell them to get lost, but we won't do that: cultural control and resistance in voluntary work. Organization studies [online], 37(1), pages 55-75. Available from: https://doi.org/10.1177/0170840615604507
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/0170840615604507
• Keywords: Civil society; Cultural control; Dangerous work; Identity; Non-profit organisations; Organisational control; Paid work; Resistance; Royal National Lifeboat Institution; Voluntary work