Cultural conditioning in public organizations: A survey of the ideological perspectives of Air War College students

The 1986 Department of Defense Reorganization Act (Public Law 99-433, otherwise known as Goldwater-Nichols) aimed to reduce cultural barriers to interservice collaboration through joint service education and assignments for officers destined for further advancement within the joint service community. Using professional stratification as a psychocultural force in the life of organizations, this research addressed comparative impacts of joint indoctrination on the values of joint specialty officers in the Air War College class of 1993. Basic military doctrine, a cultural form and "carrier" of underlying institutional values, served as the focus for hypothesis testing. Values were operationalized in respondent perceptions of the enduring validity of Air Force basic doctrine (a cultural artifact) relative to the "new" joint perspectives. A rank-sum comparison (Mann-Whitney U) was used to assess group responses.;No statistically significant differences were noted between the espoused or the artifactual values of the two groups. While the espoused values of core-elite and other professionals expectedly evidenced little variance, an observed lack of divergence in artifactual values contravened the premise that those closest to the core technical function(s) of the organization would be significantly more attached to primary cultural forms. A secondary analysis indicated greater doctrinal conservatism among aviators having both prior joint treatments.;Two possibilities exist regarding artifactual values: (1) a homogenizing organizational (Air Force) cultural influence overrode professional-occupational differences and (2) a dominant institutional concept of general military officership dampened such differences. Owing to rank-sum inferential limitations, it was not possible to determine which situation applied. However, the secondary evaluation of joint treatment effects implied an organizational, or service-oriented, valuation by both aviators and nonaviators.;The research indicated that a concerted attempt to modify cultural values may have a leveling effect on occupational subcultures. Concurrently, the reverse effect of joint measures on artifactual values implied that such exposure may exacerbate, rather than reduce, cultural resistance to challenges to the fundamental values of core and noncore professionals.;Further investigation is warranted into the relationship between professional status and organizational roles, individual and collective values, and change-learning in public organizations having strong (entrenched) professional cultures.