Gestão de organizações religiosas: um estudo sobre as estruturas organizacionais das igrejas evangélicas

Abstract

Society is formed by organizations belonging to the First, Second and Third Sector, where the first Sector deals with public power organizations, the second Sector refers to companies in the market for profit, and finally, the Third Sector where nongovernment organizations (NGO) with no profit. The Third Sector emerged from a need of organized civil society to promote actions aimed at social and environmental changes. In Brazil, the third sector include the Religious Organizations, providing spiritual, welfare and charity services. Religious Organizations have doubled their followers every decade, causing significant impacts on Brazilian society, therefore, they need the attention of researchers, specifically from the point of view of administration science. Given this context, this work aims to relate concepts of the Theory of Structural Configuration with what is observed in Evangelical Religious Organizations, specifically in Evangelical churches, and thus compare with the central ideas of the Structuralist Theory of Administration. The methodology used in this work was a descriptive research and qualitative approach, having as data collection technique a participant observation carried out in an evangelical church in the city of Benjamin Constant, Amazonas State, Brazil, where the author of this work is one of the main responsible for the general coordination of the church. This observation was carried out in a panoramic way, being developed according to the author's experience in the management practice of these organizations. The analysis of the observation found that the evangelical churches have an organization based on principles of chains of command, characteristic of the linear and simple model structure. Generally speaking, religious organizations are not coordinated through amateurism, and there is a pattern that for decades has demonstrated the efficiency of evangelical churches.