Paper Summary
Farrell extends Hirschman’s exit, voice, and loyalty framework into a four-part model of responses to dissatisfaction: exit, voice, loyalty, and neglect. The important addition is neglect: a passive, destructive response where someone remains in the organization but reduces effort, attention, care, or commitment. This differs from exit because the person has not left, and from voice because they are not trying to repair the situation.
This matters because it shows that dissatisfaction does not always produce either reform or departure. People may stay while slowly disengaging, letting the relationship decay without making a clean break. In organizational behavior, this became a major way to operationalize Hirschman’s categories for empirical study.
Relevance
For Machines That Let You Leave, neglect is a crucial failure mode. A user may not meaningfully exit an AI system, but may also stop actively governing their relationship to it. They may remain attached out of habit, convenience, or learned helplessness while their offline agency weakens. This suggests that an exit-oriented AI should not only measure continued use or successful departure; it should also detect passive dependence, reduced initiative, and declining self-directed action.