ABSTRACT
Small business has become big news. In the somewhat frenetic turn and turnabout of fashion and trend in public policy-making, promotion of the merger mania of the 1960s has given way to an altogether different approach. The conventional wisdom no longer emphasises the need for ever bigger corporations in order to harness the economies of large-scale organisation, for now the stress is laid on the advantages of smaller units: divestment, management buy-outs, workers’ co-ops, and encouragement for the individual entrepreneur are the current order of the day. This change of direction is welcomed by the Acton Society which, since its foundation in 1948, has endeavoured to examine the structures and organisation of work and government from the viewpoint of how they affect such human values as freedom and participation for the individual, both as a worker and as a citizen.
