The Mannesmann study avoided questions whose framing would have biased its results.

Evidence

In a peculiar apology for the conformism of the contract work that had been carried out, it was also stated that the study had skirted the problem of the relationship between increasing productivity and the humanization of relations within the company, and the problem of how far workers were in principle interested in improving the atmosphere of their workplace, and how far they instead perceived in this the risk of being simply manipulated to increase productionsince the way in which such questions were posed would have affected the results connected with the atmosphere of the workplace. — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School, 2092

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to the broader critical-theory critique of commissioned industrial sociology as conformist — the Frankfurt School’s tension between empirical contract work and its own theoretical program.