Original scientific paper
Managers’ Value Judgments and their Perception of Science
Branka Golub
orcid.org/0000-0002-3793-8460
; Institute for Social Research in Zagreb, Zagreb, Croatia
Abstract
Science is an extremely important and powerful lever for finding social and economic answers to problems and needs of a modern man. Therefore, it is vital to know what relevant social actors, such as the public, and positioned social groups – scientists, politicians or
managers – think about it. Managers were selected as the least studied social factor who, being an elite professional group, also play a crucial role in implementing scientific ideas into (useful) practice.
Empirical findings obtained in 2004 from the available sample of Croatian top managers (212) showed that their perception of the cognitive and social role of science included a certain degree of scepticism about the capacity and achievement of science, beside a great amount of epistemological realism (positivism) and optimistic and neutral opinions. Scepticism was expressed in epistemological relativism and some reservations about the implications
of science on the life of modern man. Relative socio-professional homogeneity of the managers indicated that differences in their
perception of science could not be explained by their social profile. Therefore, their different perception of cognitive and social aspects of science correlated with value judgments which emerged from three patterns of general value judgments, based on 35 value statements.
Value judgments about science were especially prominent in relation to the liberalcosmopolitan optimism in the sphere of social and environmental effects of science and in atypical managerial pattern, where the values of rigid traditionalism tinted by ethnocentricity
reflected on sceptical perception of science.
Keywords
science; perception of science; value orientations; industrial culture; managers
Hrčak ID:
41694
URI
Publication date:
21.10.2009.
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