James G. March

James G. March
Born	1928 Cleveland, Ohio
Fields	political science, organization theory
Institutions	Carnegie Institute of Technology University of California, Irvine Stanford University
Alma mater	Yale University
Influences	Herbert A. Simon

James Gardner March (born 1928 in Cleveland, Ohio) is Jack Steele Parker professor emeritus at Stanford University and the Stanford Graduate School of Education, best known for his research on organizations, his (jointly with Richard Cyert) A behavioral theory of the firm and organizational decision making.^[1]

Early Life and Education

March received his B.A. from the University of Wisconsin at Madison in 1945 in political science. He received his M.A. in 1950 and Ph.D. in 1953 from Yale University, both in political science.^[1][2]

James March is an honorary doctor at numerous universities:

• Copenhagen Business School (then: Copenhagen School of Economics), 1978
• Swedish School of Economics (Helsinki), 1979
• University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, 1980
• University of Bergen, 1980; (Economics)
• Uppsala University, 1987; (Economics)
• Helsinki School of Economics, 1991
• Dublin City University, 1994; (Economics)
• Göteborg University, 1998
• University of Poitiers, 2001
• University of Trento, 200
• University of Southern Denmark, 2003
• Budapest University of Economics, 2003
• York University (Toronto), 2007
• Hautes Etudes Commerciales (HEC Paris), 2007
• Ramon Llull University (Barcelona), 2007
• Lappeenranta (Finland) University of Technology
• 2008; Stockholm (Sweden) Stockholm School of Economics, 2009

Career

From 1953 to 1964, he has served on the faculties of the Carnegie Institute of Technology as a Senior Research Fellow and Assistant Professor, and later Professor of Industrial Administration and Psychology.

From 1964 to 1970, March University of California, Irvine as Professor of Psychology and Sociology, and was Dean of the School of Social Sciences from 1964-1969.

In 1970 March moved to Stanford University where he remains as Professor Emeritus.^[1] During his time at Stanford, he has held several titles including Professor of Political Science and Sociology, David Jacks Professor of Higher Education (1970-1978), Professor of Management (1978-1979), Fred H. Merrill Professor of Management (1979-1992), Jack Steele Parker Professor of International Management (1992–present). He has also served as a Senior Fellow at Hoover Institution (1978-1987) and the director of the Scandinavian Consortium for Organizational Research (Scancor)(1989-1999).

He has been elected to the National Academy of Science,^[1] the American Academy of Arts and Sciences,^[1] and the National Academy of Education,^[1] and has been a member of the National Science Board. He is a member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences^[3] and the Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters.^[4]

He has received numerous teaching awards such as the Walter J. Gores Award for Excellence in Teaching in 1995 from Stanford University.^[1] He interacts and communicates in many different forms as books, articles, interactive seminars, films and poetry.

Contributions

March is highly respected for his broad theoretical perspective which combined theories from psychology and other behavioural sciences. As a core member of the Carnegie School, he collaborated with the cognitive psychologist Herbert A. Simon on several works on organization theory.^[5]

March is also known for his seminal work on the behavioural perspective on the theory of the firm along with Richard Cyert (1963).

In 1972, March worked together with Johan Olsen and Michael D. Cohen on the systemic-anarchic perspective of organizational decision making known as the Garbage Can Model.^[6]

The scope of his academic work is broad, but focused on understanding how decisions happen in individuals, groups, organizations, companies and society. He explores factors that influences decision making, such as risk orientation, leadership and the ambiguity of the present and the past; politics and vested interests by stakeholders; the challenges of giving and receiving advice; the challenges of organizational and individual learning and the challenges of balancing exploration and exploitation in organizations.

Personal

James March is the father of four children and is a grandfather.^[1]

Bibliography: Selected Articles

• Levitan, Richard E.; March, James G. (1957). "A Set of Necessary, Sufficient, and Independent Conditions for Proportional Representation" (abstract)". Econometrica 25: 361–362.
• March, James G. (1958). "A Behavioral Theory of Decision Making". Personnel Administration 21 (3): 8–10.
• Cyert, Richard M.; Dill, William R.; March, James G. (1958). "The Role of Expectations in Business Decision-Making". Administrative Science Quarterly 3: 309–340.
• March, James G. (1962). "The Business Firm as a Political Coalition". Journal of Politics 24: 662–678. doi:10.1017/s0022381600016169.
• James G. March, "The Power of Power", pp. 39–70 in David Easton, ed., Varieties of Political Theory. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1966.
• James G. March, "The Technology of Foolishness", Civiløkonomen (Copenhagen), 18 (1971) 4, 4-12.
• Cohen, Michael D.; March, James G.; Olsen, Johan P. (1972). "A Garbage Can Model of Organizational Choice". Administrative Science Quarterly 17 (1): 1–25. doi:10.2307/2392088.
• March, James G.; Olsen, Johan P. (1975). "The Uncertainty of the Past: Organizational Learning Under Ambiguity". European Journal of Political Research 3: 147–171. doi:10.1111/j.1475-6765.1975.tb00521.x.
• March, James G. (1978). "Bounded Rationality, Ambiguity, and the Engineering of Choice". Bell Journal of Economics 9: 587–608. doi:10.2307/3003600.
• March, James G. (1979). "Ambiguity and the Engineering of Choice". International Studies of Management and Organizations 9: 9–39.
• March, James C.; March, James G. (1981). "Performance Sampling and Weibull Distributions". Administrative Science Quarterly 26: 90–92. doi:10.2307/2392602.
• Martha S. Feldman and James G. March, "Information in Organizations as Signal and Symbol", Administrative Science Quarterly, 26 (198l) 171-186.
• James G. March, "Decisions in Organizations and Theories of Choice", pp. 205–244 in Andrew Van de Ven and William Joyce, eds., Perspectives on Organization Design and Behavior. New York, NY: Wiley Interscience, 1981.
• March, James G. (1981). "Footnotes to Organizational Change". Administrative Science Quarterly 26: 563–577. doi:10.2307/2392340.
• Levinthal, Daniel; March, James G. (1981). "A Model of Adaptive Organizational Search". Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization 2: 307–333. doi:10.1016/0167-2681(81)90012-3.
• James G. March and Zur Shapira, "Behavioral Decision Theory and Organizational Decision Theory", pp. 92–115 in Gerardo Ungson and Daniel Braunstein, eds., Decision Making: An Interdisciplinary Inquiry. Boston, MA: Kent Publishing Company, 1982.
• Harrison, J. Richard; March, James G. (1984). "Decision Making and Post-Decision Surprises". Administrative Science Quarterly 29: 26–42. doi:10.2307/2393078.
• James G. March and Guje Sevón, "Gossip, Information, and Decision-Making", pp. 95–107 in Lee S. Sproull and J. Patrick Crecine, eds., Advances in Information Processing in Organizations, Vol. I. Greenwich, CT: JAI Press, 1984.
• March, James G.; Olsen, Johan P. (1984). "The New Institutionalism: Organizational Factors in Political Life". American Political Science Review 78: 734–749. doi:10.2307/1961840.
• Herriott, Scott R.; Levinthal, Daniel; March, James G. (1985). "Learning from Experience in Organizations". American Economic Review 75: 298–302.
• James R. Glenn, Jr., and James G. March, "Presidential Time Allocation 1970-1984", pp. 263–266 in Michael D. Cohen and James G. March, Leadership and Ambiguity, 2nd ed. Cambridge, MA: Harvard Business School Press, 1986.
• Eaton Baier, Vicki; March, James G.; Sætren, Harald (1986). "Implementation and Ambiguity". Scandinavian Journal of Management Studies 2: 197–212. doi:10.1016/0281-7527(86)90016-2.
• James G. March, "Theories of Making Choice and Making Decisions", pp. 305–325 in Rolf Wolff, ed., Organizing Industrial Development - Visible Guiding Hands. Berlin: de Gruyter, 1986.
• James G. March, "Ambiguity and Accounting: The Elusive Link between Information and Decision Making", Accounting, Organizations, and Society, 12 (1987) 153-168. Also pp. 31–49 in Barry E. Cushing, ed., Accounting and Culture, American Accounting Association, 1987.
• March, James G.; Shapira, Zur (1987). "Managerial Perspectives on Risk and Risk Taking". Management Science 33: 1404–1418. doi:10.1287/mnsc.33.11.1404.
• Levitt, Barbara; March, James G. (1988). "Organizational Learning". Annual Review of Sociology 14: 319–340. doi:10.1146/annurev.soc.14.1.319.
• James G. March and Guje Sevón, "Behavioral Perspectives on Theories of the Firm", pp. 369–402 in W. Fred van Raaij, Gery M. van Veldhoven, and Karl-Erik Wärneryd, eds., Handbook of Economic Psychology. Dordrecht, Netherlands: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1988.
• James G. March and Lee S. Sproull, "Technology, Management, and Competitive Advantage", pp. 144–173 in Paul S. Goodman, Lee S. Sproull and Associates, Technology and Organizations. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1990.
• March, James G.; Sproull, Lee S.; Tamuz, Michal (1991). "Learning from Samples of One or Fewer". Organization Science 2: 1–13. doi:10.1287/orsc.2.1.1.
• March, James G. (1991). "Exploration and Exploitation in Organizational Learning". Organization Science 2 (1): 71–87. doi:10.1287/orsc.2.1.71.
• March, James G. (1991). "Organizational Consultants and Organizational Research". Journal of Applied Communication Research 19: 20–31. doi:10.1080/00909889109365290.
• March, James G. (1991). "How Decisions Happen in Organizations". Human-Computer Interaction 6: 95–117. doi:10.1207/s15327051hci0602_1.
• March, James G.; Simon, Herbert A. (1993). "Organizations Revisited". Industrial and Corporate Change 2: 299–316. doi:10.1093/icc/2.1.299.
• March, James G. (2006). "Rationality, Foolishness, and Adaptive Intelligence". Strategic Management Journal 27: 201–214. doi:10.1002/smj.515.
• James G. March and Johan P. Olsen, "The Logic of Appropriateness", pp. 689–708 in Michael Moran, Martin Rein, and Robert E. Goodin (eds.) The Oxford Handbook of Public Policy. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006.
• James G. March and Johan P. Olsen, "Elaborating the 'New Institutionalism'", pp. 3–20 in R.A.W. Rhodes, S. Binder and B. Rockman (eds.) The Oxford Handbook of Political Institutions. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006.
• March, James G. (2007). "The Study of Organizations and Organizing Since 1945". Organization Studies 28: 9–19. doi:10.1177/0170840607075277.
• Augier, Mie; March, James G. (2007). "The Pursuit of Relevance in Management Education". California Management Review 49: 129–146. doi:10.2307/41166398.
• March, James G. (2007). "Scholarship, Scholary Institutions, and Scholarly Communities". Organization Science 18: 537–542. doi:10.1287/orsc.1070.0269.
• March, James G. (2007). "Ibsen, Ideals, and the Subornation of Lies". Organization Studies 28: 1277–1285. doi:10.1177/0170840607079223.
• Michael D. Cohen, James G. March, and Johan P. Olsen, "The Garbage Can Model", International Encyclopedia of Organization Studies, Sage, forthcoming 2008.
• Augier, Mie; March, James G. (2008). "Realism and Comprehension in Economics: A Footnote to an Exchange between Oliver E. Williamson and Herbert A. Simon". Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization 66: 95–105. doi:10.1016/j.jebo.2007.05.003.

Bibliography: Books

March has written many books and some with different co-authors:

• An introduction to the theory and measurement of influence (1955)
• James G. March and Herbert A. Simon, Organizations. New York: Wiley, 1958. 2nd ed., Oxford: Blackwell Publishers, 1993. Translated into Arabic, Chinese, Dutch, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Polish, Portuguese, and Spanish. Voted the seventh most influential management book of the 20th century in a poll of the Fellows of the Academy of Management.^[7]
• Richard M. Cyert and James G. March, A Behavioral Theory of the Firm. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1963. 2nd ed., Oxford: Blackwell Publishers, 1992. Translated into Chinese, French, German, Italian, and Japanese.
• James G. March, ed., Handbook of Organizations. Chicago, IL: Rand McNally, 1965.
• Heinz Eulau and James G. March, eds., Political Science. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1969.
• Bernard R. Gelbaum and James G. March, Mathematics for the Social and Behavioral Sciences: Probability, Calculus and Statistics. Philadelphia, PA: W. B. Saunders Co., 1969.
• Michael D. Cohen and James G. March, Leadership and Ambiguity: The American College President. New York, NY: McGraw-Hill, 1974. 2nd ed., Cambridge, MA: Harvard Business School Press, 1986.
• Charles A. Lave and James G. March, An Introduction to Models in the Social Sciences. New York: Harper and Row, 1975. 2nd ed., Lanham, MD: University Press of America, 1993. Translated into Dutch, Japanese, and Spanish. (1975) ISBN 0-8191-8381-4
• James G. March and Johan P. Olsen, Ambiguity and Choice in Organizations. Bergen, Norway: Universitetsforlaget, 1976. Translated into Japanese. (1980) ISBN 82-00-01960-8
• James G. March, Autonomy as a Factor in Group Organization: A Study in Politics, New York: Arno Press, 1980. ISBN 0-405-12980-7
• James G. March and Roger Weissinger-Baylon, eds., Ambiguity and Command: Organizational Perspectives on Military Decision Making. Cambridge, MA: Ballinger, 1986.
• James G. March, Decisions and Organizations. Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1988. ISBN 0-631-16856-7. Translated into French, German, Italian, and Japanese.
• James G. March and Johan P. Olsen, Rediscovering Institutions: The Organizational Basis of Politics. New York: Free Press/Macmillan, 1989. Translated into Italian and Spanish. ISBN 0-02-920115-2
• James G. March, A Primer on Decision Making: How Decisions Happen. New York, NY: The Free Press, 1994. Translated into Chinese, Greek, and Italian. ISBN 0-02-920035-0
• James G. March, Fornuft og Forandring: Ledelse i en Verden Beriget av Uklarhet (Danish: Reason and Change: Leadership in a World Enriched by Ambiguity), articles selected and translated by Kristian Kreiner and Marianne Risberg. Copenhagen: Samfundslitteratur, 1995.
• James G. March and Johan P. Olsen, Democratic Governance. New York, NY: The Free Press, 1995. ISBN 0-02-874054-8. Translated into Italian.
• James G. March, The Pursuit of Organizational Intelligence. Oxford: Blackwell Publishers, 1999. ISBN 0-631-21102-0.
• James G. March, Martin Schulz, and Xueguang Zhou, The Dynamics of Rules: Change in Written Organizational Codes. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2000. ISBN 0-8047-3996-X. Translated into Chinese and Italian.
• Mie Augier and James G. March, eds., Economics of Change, Choice, and Organization: Essays in Memory of Richard M. Cyert. Cheltenham, UK: Edward Elgar Publishing, Ltd., 2002.
• James G. March and Thierry Weil, Le leadership dans les organizations. (French: Leadership in Organizations). Paris: Les Presses de l’École des Mines, 2003. Translated into English as On Leadership. See below.
• Mie Augier and James G. March, eds., Models of a Man: Essays in Memory of Herbert A. Simon. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2004.
• James G. March, Valg, Vane og Vision: Perspektiver på Aspiration og Adfærd (Danish: Choice, Habit and Vision: Perspectives on Aspirations and Behavior), articles selected and translated by Kristian Kreiner and Mie Augier. Copenhagen: Samfundslitteratur, 2005.
• James G. March, Szervezeti tanulás és döntéshozatal (Hungarian: Organizational Learning and Decision Making), articles selected and translated by students at the László Rajk College. Budapest: Alinea Kiadó, 2005.
• James G. March and Thierry Weil, On Leadership. Oxford, UK: Blackwell Publishers, 2005. ISBN 1-4051-3247-7. Translated into Spanish, Korean, Italian, Chinese.
• James G. March, Explorations in Organizations. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2008.
• James G. March, The Ambiguities of Experience. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, forthcoming.

Bibliography: Films

• Passion and Discipline: Don Quixote’s Lessons for Leadership. A film (67 minutes) conceived and written by James G. March, produced and directed by Steven C. Schecter. Schecter Films (in association with the Stanford Graduate School of Business), 2003.
• Heroes and History: The Lessons for Leadership from Tolstoy’s War and Peace. A film (65 minutes) conceived and written by James G. March, produced and directed by Steven C. Schecter. Schecter Films (in association with the Yale School of Management and the Copenhagen business School), 2008.

Bibliography: Poetry

• James G. March, Academic Notes. London: Poets' and Painters' Press, 1974.
• James G. March, Aged Wisconsin. London: Poets' and Painters' Press, 1977.
• James G. March, Pleasures of the Process, London: Poets' and Painters' Press, 1980.
• James G. March, Slow Learner. London: Poets' and Painters' Press, 1985.
• James G. March, Minor Memos. London: Poets' and Painters' Press, 1990.
• James G. March, Late Harvest. Palo Alto, CA: Bonde Press, 2000.
• James G. March, Footprints. Palo Alto, CA: Bonde Press, 2005.
• James G. March, Quiet Corners. Palo Alto, CA: Bonde Press, 2008.

References

1. "Faculty Profiles - James G March - Bio Main". Stanford University. Retrieved 17 July 2010.
2. "James G March CV" (PDF). Retrieved 9 November 2015.
3. "The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences: James G. March". Retrieved 10 November 2015.
4. "Gruppe 7: Samfunnsfag (herunder sosiologi, statsvitenskap og økonomi)" [Group 7: Social sciences (including sociology, political science and economics)] (in Norwegian). Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters. Retrieved 9 January 2011.
5. March, James G. and Herbert Simon, Organizations, John Wiley and Sons, 1958, ISBN 0-471-56793-0
6. Cohen, Michael D.; March, James G.; Olsen, Johann P. (1972). "A Garbage Can Model of Organizational Choice". Administrative Science Quarterly 17 (l): 1. doi:10.2307/2392088. JSTOR 2392088.
7. Bedeian, Arthur G.; Wren, Daniel A. (Winter 2001). "Most Influential Management Books of the 20th Century" (PDF). Organizational Dynamics 29 (3): 221–225. doi:10.1016/S0090-2616(01)00022-5.

External links

• Biography, Stanford faculty