This document discusses four case studies examining organizational success and failure through a political frame: the High Line park in NYC and Walmart as successes, and the No Child Left Behind Act and Iraq War as failures. It describes how community support and perseverance led to the development of the High Line park. Walmart's focus on low prices and customer satisfaction led to its growth as the largest retailer. No Child Left Behind increased testing pressure without supporting schools equitably. The Iraq War was initiated without conclusive evidence and resulted in huge costs and loss of life.

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The Political Frame
Wen-Hsing, Yang
Long Island University

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The Political Frame is an organizational construct of seeing the world populated by blobs
of organizations interacting in various positive and negative ways to obtain what scarce
resources exist. Rather than viewing the immediate organization by itself, it must be seen as a
global player dominating, balancing or kneeling before surrounding organizations. Always
affecting the organization are social change, fiscal tensions, uncertain success and a rapidly
changing, ultimately uncontrollable economy. The power relationships across various levels of
management are always in flux, depending on the changes in leverage among personnel, sales
figures, and influential personalities. In this article, four cases studies (two successful and two
unsuccessful) are examined for their political framework. The successful High Line Park in New
York City and the amazing chain store Wal-Mart are countered with the failures of No child Left
Behind Act and the Iraq War under the administration of President George W. Bush.
Success stories with dynamic personal management in the tradition set by Aruna Roy
(Bolman & Deal, 2013) include the current premier outdoor surprise park the High Line in New
York City. In 1999, Joshua David and Robert Hammond started a non-for-profit corporation
Friends of the High Line for the sole purpose of repurposing the remaining fragment of an
elevated railroad track running several blocks down the west side of Manhattan (New York City
Economic Development Corporation, 2016). In Paris, France, a similar idea developed there is
known as the Promenade plantée. A year-long photo shoot of the property as it looked in 2000
was completed by photographer Joel Sternfeld; his work revealed the beautiful landscape as it
evolved from various seeds blown there from neighboring parks or carried there by animals and
birds (New York City Economic Development Corporation, 2016). The old train line still had
cross ties under steel tracks but various grasses and wildflowers decorated the landscape. It is a
dramatic change from the shadowy cobble stone streets below. Slow and steady spread the word

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about the potential park for people to visit. Fashion designer Diane von Furstenberg got involved
with a fund raising campaign in her studio, with her husband (Barry Diller) who gathered
community support for the redevelopment of the High Line. Others supporter include city
council members Gifford Miller and Christian C. Quinn. NY City Government offered $50
million to authorize the proposed park. In the end, they received more than $150 million (New
York City Economic Development Corporation, 2016). The Transportation Board approved the
idea and Mayor Bloomberg agreed to do it, despite the fact that the previous Mayor Giuliani had
slated the train for demolition.
In the park, there are many different native plants, spectacular views of both the Hudson
River and the eastern view of Manhattan, park benches along a wide promenade. This park was
designed by consultants who were selected by a committee from the many applicants. The High
Line Park attracts many visitors and provides a fresh, country atmosphere within a congested
city. In addition to the park space, there are 33 new housing, commercial, retail, non-profit,
affordable units and a new location for the Whitney Museum (NYC economic development
cooperation, 2016). The High Line is a successful personal crusade case; it shows how single
minded individuals with long term perseverance can harness extraordinary political power into
something not only wonderful but desirable. Additionally, this crusade provided a park where
none existed and which can be used by all, except dogs. Currently, similar projects are being
considered in other major American cities.
Another great success in managing business system can be seen in Sam Walton, the
visionary who created Wal-Mart, a wide-spread chain of giant department store with food. Sam’s
vision of wanting to supply the consumer with the most value for the least dollar almost seems
consumer based rather than business based. The first Wal-Mart opened in 1962 and was

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managed into a powerful business. Wal-Mart used the network Retail Link as a connection to
gather customers’ information and coordinate the suppliers (Bolman & Deal, 2013). Retail Link
delivers the most accurate sales information to their partners. This shows sensitivity to the
market changes and the ability to anticipate and satisfy the needs of its customers. Wal-Mart
currently has over 3000 stores in its global chain selling a large variety of inexpensive items
(Bolman & Deal, 2013). These extraordinary measures to keep its customer base satisfied
enough to keep returning has made Wal-Mart the current most successful global retain stores.
This, however, has made the authors of Bolman and Deal (2013), take note that a giant barracuda
like Wal-Mart is too competitive and perhaps too big for the little stores that make up most
neighborhoods and communities. America is a capitalistic society and market-based. Wal-Mart is
large and powerful, and as people are willing to spend money and support their products, Wal-
Mart may only get bigger. Since Wal-Mart dominates a large range of consumer markets, the
authors feel this market is no longer free. This particular problem of any company getting too big
that it dominates cannot be checked by a free market democracy that values enterprise and
rewards the entrepreneur. The authors contend that the market however, is not free. Wal-Mart is
the one ruling the USA market with hugs percentages of sales of the pet food (31 percent), meat
(37percent), office/school supply (45 percent )and bottle water (24 percent) industries (Bolman
& Deal, 2013). However, nobody can predict the future of this powerful player but governments,
labor unions, investors and consumers and global village will all have something to say.
On the other side of these various successes are failures or semi-failures.
The No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) was sponsored by bipartisan committee of
Democrats and Republicans in 2001 and was signed into law by President George W. Bush in
January of 2002. NCLB used standardized tests in select criteria (math, reading in grades 3

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through 8, additional subjects in high schools) determined by each state to measure students’
performances and school’s success, and subsequently, to reward the winner and penalize the
loser, both among students and among schools (Camera, 2015). This increases the competition
among, and stress on, students with their academic performance as well as principals and
teachers who do not wish to loose funding (and jobs) for their school should they fail to conquer
the state standardized tests. The standardized system is important, however, the problem is to
measure these numbers fairly. Educational success depends on the school’s resources, the quality
of the teachers, the atmosphere in the classroom, the participation of parents, different teaching
styles, the size of classrooms, exam standards and the location of the schools and, ultimately, the
student. High functioning students should theoretically do well in all subjects as matches their
aptitude. Low functioning students may need more time and need more opportunities to
understand the material. This Act is designed to assist with students’ study, according to their
ability of comprehension, understanding and interpretation skills. Unfortunately, it did not
succeed.
Since funding of schools became dependent on students’ scores, the need for
improvement is critical for the maintenance of the school. That amount of pressure on an
organization to survive means it will do anything to survive, including cheat. Allowing states to
determine the content of the tests proved counterproductive, in that tests were made easier to
show more progress among students. Teachers ended up teaching the test instead of their
students, but if that is what is required to keep the school from ultimately closing, then that is
what happened. Additional errors in the Act’s language included vague references to
scientifically proven methods of teaching as well as the discovery of what makes a successful
teacher, all of which is primarily theoretical and not really practical. The thinking that

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engendered this Act may have been creative among politicians but it was definitely not designed
with teachers and students in mind, merely funding.
The greatest political debacle so far of the 21st Century must be the decision by President
George W. Bush to go to war in Iraq. In the wake of the tragedy of 9/11 and under the premise of
rooting out weapons of mass destruction, the President urged a war without proof despite Vice
President Dick Cheney calling the supporting evidence a “Slam Dunk” on one occasion (Tenet &
Harlow 2007). The possible proof consisted of previous US administrations spending billions
supplying Saddam Hussein with explosives and other materials for bombs to fight Iran (Coyote
2013). In this particular instance, various advisers to President Bush and the President himself
used information that was false. Congress voted for the war (a notable excepting being Bernie
Sanders) to right the injustice of 9/11.
In the years since the withdrawal of the troops, various books have appeared condemning
the actions of the President and his cabinet. For this war, the death toll was huge and the price
tag astronomical (Coyote 2013). When a search of “Bush and the Iraq War” is done on the
Amazon book website, the titles of some of the books are be very revealing: “Weapons of Mass
Deception; the uses of propaganda in Bush’s war on Iraq” by Sheldon Rampton and John
Stauber (2003), “Hubris, the inside story of the spin, scandal, and selling of the Iraq War” by
Michael Isikoff and David Corn (2007), and “The Prosecution of George W. Bush for Murder”
by Vincent Bugliosi.
If there is any advice President Barack Obama can tell to President George W. Bush, it is
to “value life”. The successful passing of the ACA has saved and will save millions of dollars for
both the government and the newly insured population because President Obama valued the life

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of his constituents. The failure of the Iraq War was due to a selfish administration, which had no
value of human life (American or Middle Eastern) whatsoever.

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References:
Bolman, L.J. (2013). Reframing organization. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
Camera, L. (2015). No child left behind has final been left behind. Retrieved from
http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2015/12/09/congress-replaces-no
child-left-behind-shifts-power-to-states
Coyote, C. E. (2013). Iraq War 2003: What really Happened Behind the Scenes. Self-published
New York City Economic Development. (2016). The high line. Retrieved from
http://www.nycedc.com/project/high-line
Tenet, G. & Harlow, B. (2007). At the center of the storm: my year at the CIA. New York:
Harper Collins.