The "societally conscious lifestyle" comes closest to describing us and the people with whom we work. The Societally Conscious are more concerned with social issues than with themselves. They include conservationists and leaders of consumer movements. They are people who "try to lead lives that conserve, protect, heal," but they include those who have adopted single-issue strategies and are often "aggressively confrontational." Some are those who withdraw from confrontation "to lives of voluntary simplicity."

These are the "demographics" of the Societally Conscious group described by Arnold Mitchell, a profile you might hold up against the people you know in the independent sector:

• Excellent education: Fifty-eight percent have graduated from college or attended graduate school (sample average: 21 percent). Only 15 percent have not gone beyond high school (sample average: 52 percent).

• Liberal politics: Fifty-seven percent declared themselves Independents (sample: 35 percent) and 53 percent liberals (sample: 23 percent).

• Intellectual jobs: Fifty-nine percent are employed in professional or technical occupations (sample: 18 percent).

• Affluence: Half had household incomes of over $25,000 in 1979 (sample: 36 percent), and their average income was $27,200 (sample: $18,000).

• Census regions: Almost a third of the group lives in New England or the Pacific states (sample: 21 percent). They shun the South (23 percent vs. 32 percent for sample). (p. 138)

These are the attitudes of this group, as Mitchell's surveys have revealed them:

• Believe woman's place is in the home: Societally Conscious (S.C.) 3 percent, sample 30 percent.

• Agree that women with small children can work and still be good mothers: S.C. 72 percent, sample 55 percent.

• Believe marijuana should be legalized: S.C. 39 percent, sample 28 percent.

• Think unmarried sex is wrong: S.C. 15 percent, sample 39 percent.

• Believe air pollution is a major worldwide danger: S.C. 91 percent, sample 81 percent.

• Agree too much is spent on protecting the environment: S.C. 13 percent, sample 34 percent.

• Believe industrial growth should be limited: S.C. 58 percent, sample 48 percent.

• Agree too much is spent on military armaments: S.C. 38 percent, sample 27 percent.

• Have a good deal of confidence in elected officials: S.C. 19 percent, sample 30 percent.

• Have a good deal of confidence in company leaders: S.C. 16 percent, sample 31 percent.

• Have a good deal of confidence in military leaders: S.C. 66 percent, sample 54 percent.

• Agree the energy crisis is real and not the concoction of interested groups: S.C. 66 percent, sample 54 percent. (pp. 139—40)

Mitchell comments:

Despite these differences from the norms, the Societally Conscious do not view themselves as rebelling against things. The rebellious groups are those that strikingly mistrust people and feel left out; the Societally Conscious, in contrast, apparently feel they have a say in things, although they may not agree with the majority. Everything suggests that the group is impassioned, knowledgeable, and effective.

Is Mitchell talking about us? I think he is. If that is the case, and those of us in the independent sector do fit the general picture of the "Societally Conscious" minority as presented in that summary, it should raise some disturbing questions for us.

To what extent, for example, are "Societally Conscious" liberals open to points of view held by "Societally Conscious" conservatives? (The SC liberal majority would, presumably, identify with People for the American Way in its challenge to Moral Majority; does this confrontation have the best qualities of public discourse or is it a "dialogue of the deaf?") Is one point of view more societally conscious than the other?

To what extent are these "impassioned, knowledgeable, effective" people—us, remember—imposing their values and attitudes on those less well-informed, less well-educated, less committed to particular solutions or points of view?

But the most difficult question, it seems to me, is certainly this one: To what extent are the professionals in the independent sector becoming alienated from the volunteers?

Alienation can take the form of the professional simply out-distancing the volunteers. The professional may well be better educated in his or her field, often has greater specialized knowledge. Mitchell's profile suggests that the professional may also be guided by values that are not widely shared within his or her own organization. In one case that can be conscious if unspoken: The volunteer in effect defers to the professional's grasp of the situation, even though he or she may not agree with it.

In another case there may be growing separation of values and only the professionals are aware of it—and yet they move ahead anyway. "I know that the membership doesn't think this way, but I know it's right and so that's the way we're going to proceed."

This is, I suspect, a different sort of problem for the administrator of a medical center or research foundation than it is for a public policy organization. The expectations of professionals and volunteers differ in different parts of the sector. Protocols of communication with members and habits of democracy vary greatly.

In thinking about the vital voluntary dimension of the independent sector, however, I worry most about the growing lack of mutual understanding and deep sense of common values between those of us who are professionals and those who are volunteers.

A hospital volunteer has given her Fridays for many years to the hospital thrift shop. She has become convinced that the development staff of the hospital are overpaid and excessively impressed by their own importance. "The paid staff work for the volunteers," she says; "we don't work for them."

A volunteer who works at a botanical garden says that she resents being given the scut work, relegated to it by paid staff. "That isn't what I volunteered for," she says.

Right or wrong, accurate impression or misperception, those kinds of comments are warning signals.

More ominous, of course, are the comments that denigrate the competence, dedication, and value of the volunteers. "If it weren't for the alumni I'd love alumni work." A certain amount of that kind of talk—and I've spoken my share—is exasperation and not cynicism, and shouldn't be taken seriously. But all of us have also detected at times a different and more troubling tone of contempt in such remarks.

The "societally conscious" volunteers I have known are persistent and hard-working; most of them seek no special recognition for their voluntary efforts. They live for their cause. Well-educated, well-established, effective people expect to be treated accordingly. They will not accept arrogance on the part of professionals. The "societally conscious" professionals, on the other hand, are sometimes so committed to their cause that they disdain those of lesser commitment. Some are people guided by an ethic of ultimate ends, and they will cynically manipulate volunteers whenever they are persuaded it will advance their cause.

Professionals work with others' resources. They are surrogates or agents. Volunteers give their own resources, whether these be time, skill, or money. Volunteers act in an original, direct, first-order philanthropic way. To be an agent is to be engaged in second-order participation.

On the other hand, some volunteers minimize the importance of job security to professionals, and imply that those who live off philanthropy are less worthy than those who have other means on which to live. Some professionals let themselves become so dependent on their jobs—emotionally as well as financially—that they are unable to know when they are acting for the organization or for themselves.

In organizational relationships there is a "zone of indifference" (described in Barnard's wonderful book, The Functions of the Executive) in which routine things are kept routine, when instructions are carried out without challenge. Life goes smoothly when communication falls within the zone of indifference. Life becomes fractious when the zone of indifference narrows; calling attention to one's own importance in the system has the inevitable result of prompting others to reflect on theirs. Organizational life with a narrow zone of indifference can become intolerable. In my experience, societally conscious people are people with a narrow zone of indifference.

Another kind of hazard in the professional-volunteer relationship is a consequence of the very shared values and strong sense of community that most of us work hard to encourage. People working together closely, not for their own personal benefit but for a cause, are people who develop strong personal bonds. Yet in terms of organizational values, such ties are beneficial only up to a point. Good organization, especially in large organizations, requires what have been called "adequate minimal relationships." Family love (as Boulding remarked in The Organizational Revolution) is appropriate in families, and the "family" metaphor carried loosely into other kinds of human organizations can be harmful—to the members as well as to the organization. Professionals and volunteers are not brothers and sisters; there are more stringent limitations on organizational loyalties than there are on kinship.

The sociologist Philip Selznick (in Leadership in Administration) once contrasted "organizations" with "institutions." An organization is a group brought together to accomplish a particular task by common, coordinated effort; its members are recruited on the basis of the contribution they can make to the task; the members are, therefore, expendable: As other skills are needed, members can be replaced.

An institution, on the other hand, is an organization with a memory, with a past and a future; the relationship among the members has become "infused with value," and the members are not "expendable" in the same sense at all. The organization that calls upon its members for a total commitment and that attempts to build close, personal relationships and a common dedication will find it difficult to pas judgment on a member who falters, fails, or even disrupts the group in its work.