The Limits of the Hierarchy

In practice

The reckoning has four parts. First, the evidence: in nineteen seventy-six Mahmoud Wahba and Lawrence Bridwell reviewed the research on Maslow's need hierarchy and found little support for its central claim, that needs switch on in a fixed order and lower needs must be met before higher ones matter. Second, culture: the book points to Geert Hofstede's cross-cultural research as raising a further concern, that the hierarchy reflects Western, individualist values that put self-actualisation at the top, while more collectivist cultures may place belonging and harmony where Maslow's ladder has no room for them. Third, the theory at the book's own centre: Deci and Ryan reject hierarchical need models altogether. In Self-Determination Theory, autonomy, relatedness and competence are active at the same time, and frustrating any one of them does damage whatever the state of the others. Fourth, the book's decision: it keeps the hierarchy anyway, not because it is accurate, but because leaders need a diagnostic sequence, a rough map of common patterns for deciding where a person is and what might help.