To Know the Real Drucker: Eight Articles Will Help You is a collection of eight articles by Peter Drucker: “The Unfashionable Kierkegaard” (1949) and its introduction (1992), “The New World-View” (1957), “From Analysis to Perception: The New World View” (1989), “Reflections of a Social Ecologist” (1992), “What Is a Functioning Society?” (1942), “From Rousseau to Hitler” (1942), “The Human Situation Today” (1957), and “Management as Social Function and Liberal Art” (1989). 

Readers can find the source of each articles in the table of contents and editor’s note per article. Of the eight articles, only the last one is from Drucker’s works on management. The other seven are from his books on society, politics, and economics. Although the world has hailed him as the “Father of Modern Management,” he considered himself a “social ecologist.” This book will play an indispensable role in explaining the reason for that and in further understanding the foundation of faith and worldview which Drucker’s social ecology (and, of course, management) is built on.

 

Peter F. Drucker (1909-2005) was raised in a culturally rich family environment and was influenced by the Judeo-Christian tradition. He immigrated to the United States in 1937 and was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom on June 20, 2002.

A lifelong writer, Drucker is world-renowned for his more than 40 books. He studied finance in his early years and received a doctorate of law from the University of Frankfurt in 1931. He admired John M. Keynes (1883-1946) but was a follower of Joseph A. Schumpeter (1883-1955). Politically, he was highly critical of totalitarianism.

As a “social ecologist,” Drucker had keen insights and the courage to pursue innovation despite criticism. He established modern management discipline, advocating theoretical innovation and practical inquiry into management issues. Thus, he has been acclaimed as the “Father of Modern Management” and the “Guru of Gurus of Management.”

Drucker lived for nearly a century. He experienced two world wars, witnessed the processes of scientific, technological and ideological changes, observed the changes that took place from the industrial age to the intellectual (knowledge) and information ages, experienced the transformation from a capitalist society to a postmodern knowledge-based society, and offered prescient insights into world trends and human growth in the 21st century. We can say that his contributions will not be limited to the 20th century; his work will undoubtedly have an even more positive and far-reaching impact on developments and changes in the world’s future.

 

Forward The Way of Drucker’s Management Philosophy  009

Editor’s Forword  021

 

ARTICLE 1 Introduction & The Unfashionable Kierkegaard

(Abstracted from The Ecological Vision, Part 8: Why Society Is Not Enough)  033

Appendix 1

Nineteen Questions Regarding Reading The Unfashionable Kierkegaard”  059

An Understanding  065

 

ARTICLE 2  The New World-View

(Abstracted from Landmarks of Tomorrow, Chapter 1)  079

Appendix 2

Ten Questions Regarding Reading “The New World-View”  100

An Understanding 103

 

ARTICLE 3 From Analysis to Perception: The New World View

(Abstracted from The New Realities, Conclusion)  117

An Understanding  132

 

ARTICLE 4  Reflections of a Social Ecologist: The Social Ecology’s Themes, Work and Characteristic (Abstracted from The Ecological Vision, Afterword)  143

Appendix 3

Eleven Questions Regarding Reading “Reflections of a Social Ecologist”  171

An Understanding  175

 

ARTICLE 5 What Is a Functioning Society? —The General Theory of Society

(Abstracted from The Future of Industrial Man, Chapter 2)  181

An Understanding  202

 

ARTICLE 6  From Rousseau to Hitler: The Lesson from History 

(Abstracted from The Future of Industrial Man, Chapter 7)  215

Appendix 4  Peter F. Drucker’s View on Freedom  243

An Understanding  259

 

ARTICLE 7  The Human Situation Today: Upcoming Challenges

(Abstracted from Landmarks of Tomorrow, Chapter 10)  267

An Understanding  286

 

PART FOUR  Management as a Liberal Art: The Means to Achieve Social Ecological Vision 295

ARTICLE 8  Management as Social Function and Liberal Art: The Field, Legitimacy,

Principles and Characteristic

(Abstracted from The New Realities, Chapter 15)  297

An Understanding  313

 

The Eight Essential Quotes of Drucker— The Most Fundamental Beliefs and Values in His Social Ecology and Management as a Liberal Art  321

 

To Know the Real Drucker: Eight Articles Will Help You, edited by Minglo Shao 

Mr. Minglo Shao is a Chinese entrepreneur with a strong innovative spirit. China reformed its economy and opened to the world in the 1980s. Since then, Mr. Shao has founded successful companies in real estate, logistics services, management consulting and training and other fields. As founder of the Peter Drucker Academy, he has administrated, studied, and taught Peter Drucker’s thoughts for over 20 years. Mr. Shao believes that “all of Drucker’s works are one book,” reflecting his interpretation of Drucker’s holistic philosophy, which encompasses society, community, government, and management, integrating the four themes into a whole. 

 

Mr. Shao was one of twelve participants involved in creating the manuscript of Peter Drucker’s Managing in the Next Society (2002). In recent years, Mr. Shao has devoted himself to researching Drucker’s management philosophy, attempting to “interpret Drucker’s thought in Drucker’s language,” publishing the compilation Drucker on Totalitarianism and Salvation by Society (2021). In To Know the Real Drucker: Eight Articles Will Help You, he borrowed the mode of discussion and writing Drucker employed in Managing in the Next Society. 

 

Beginning in August 2022, Mr. Shao organized seminars themed on the eight articles in this book, and I had the honor of participating in discussions of relevant chapters. To Know the Real Drucker: Eight Articles Will Help You is the second book Mr. Shao has edited. The manuscript ultimately focused on “management as a social function and liberal art,” attempting to open the way to understanding Drucker’s thought via the spiritual dimension and new worldview philosophy dimension. 

 

The book has four parts: 

Part one deals with faith. “The Unfashionable Kierkegaard” introduces readers to Drucker’s spiritual world and serves as an entry point into his system of thought. This approach is challenging, posing difficulties for those unfamiliar with Western religious thought have not yet developed religious beliefs. But once one comprehends the idea that “man exists both in the social dimension and in the spiritual dimension,” as Drucker proposes, it opens the door to his philosophical system. 

 

The second part deals with worldview. Drucker argues for a holistic new worldview in the philosophical area in two articles: the first is based on changes in social phenomena in the United States in the early postwar period, proposing a corresponding “the new world-view of a configuration” (Landmarks of Tomorrow, 1957). The second looks at worldwide social phenomena at the end of the Cold War, advocating for “From Analysis to Perception: The New World View.” (The New Realities, 1989). 

 

The third part is the application of religious faith and worldview. Kierkegaard believed that “human existence is possible as existence not in despair, as existence not in tragedy; it is possible as existence in faith.” When people have faith, they are both individuals in the spiritual dimension and citizens in the social dimension. Only when individuals (including entrepreneurs) face society’s imperfections in faith can they confront difficulties and endure despair; only then can they persist in their mission. Drucker regarded the two articles on worldview as essential methods for perceiving and analyzing different social ecologies, including industrial society, knowledge society, entrepreneurial society, and nonprofit social organizations (the social sector). Regardless of the stage or form of social development, Drucker’s social-ecological vision is consistent; that is, to build a tolerant, functioning society in the face of social imperfections. 

 

Part four gives full play to management’s function in establishing an effective operational social ecology organization. In 2023, I proofread the archives of Mr. Shao’s conversations with Peter Drucker. Mr. Shao recalled that Drucker once told him that “The rapid development of competent managers and entrepreneurs capable of competing with the world’s best, is surely China’s greatest need, and the key to the country’s social and economic success.” Peter Drucker was long concerned with China and kept in touch with Chinese entrepreneurs, students studying abroad, and scholars such as Mr. Shao. 

 

Dr. Jack Liu, Professor,

College of Humanities of Social Science, 

California State University, Fullerton Los Angeles, California