Definition
To conduct, direct, or exercise controlling authority over a business, enterprise, property, or set of affairs — particularly where the undertaking is sufficiently complex to require skill, discretion, and judgment. The word appears in legal instruments, statutes, and case law as a term denoting active, ongoing authority rather than mere ownership or passive interest.
As a legal term of art, MANAGE carries functional weight in several recurring contexts:
1. Business and corporate law. Directors, officers, members, or appointed managers are authorized to manage the affairs of an entity. Whether management authority is vested in owners collectively or delegated to designated individuals is a structural question with significant legal consequences, particularly in limited liability companies and partnerships.
2. Property and estate law. Fiduciaries — trustees, conservators, executors, guardians — are charged with managing property on behalf of beneficiaries or protected persons. The duty to manage implies an affirmative obligation: prudent stewardship, not passivity.
3. Regulatory and administrative law. Federal and state statutes frequently impose management obligations on holders of public resources, federal lands, or regulated assets. Management in this sense means compliance with a statutory scheme of active stewardship and required planning.
4. Employment and agency law. An employee given authority to manage acts with apparent or actual authority to bind the principal within the scope of managerial functions assigned.
Common Language
Modern common usage (Wiktionary): To direct or be in charge of something; to handle or control a situation; to succeed at an attempt despite difficulty; to achieve something without outside help.
Historical common usage (Webster's 1913): The handling or government of anything, especially a horse; management; administration. (Marked as obsolete in that form; the noun "manage" survived mainly in equestrian and poetic usage — see Shakespeare and Bacon quotations.)
Editorial note: Everyday usage treats "manage" as broad and informal — one can manage a schedule, manage to survive, or manage without help. Legal usage is narrower and purposive: it implies vested authority, a defined subject matter, ongoing duty, and usually accountability to another party. When "manage" appears in a contract, trust instrument, statute, or corporate document, it signals delegated control with legal consequences attached — not merely the colloquial sense of getting something done.
Common Confusion
MANAGE vs. CONTROL vs. OPERATE: These words are often used interchangeably in legal drafting but can have distinct implications. "Manage" typically implies discretionary judgment and ongoing stewardship authority. "Control" can be broader (carrying connotations of domination or decisive influence without necessarily requiring day-to-day involvement) or more specific in securities and corporate law (triggering special regulatory consequences). "Operate" tends to be narrower, focusing on the physical or functional running of a facility or business rather than its governance. Courts have distinguished these terms when the scope of authority is disputed, particularly in partnership agreements, LLC operating agreements, and environmental liability contexts.
Why It Matters in Research
The legal weight of "manage" depends almost entirely on context. A researcher encountering the word in an LLC operating agreement is in different doctrinal territory than one reading it in a federal land management statute or a trust instrument, even though the surface meaning looks identical. Failure to read "manage" in its document-specific and statutory context is a common source of interpretive error.
In LLC research specifically, the distinction between member-managed and manager-managed structures is a threshold organizational question. It determines who has apparent authority to bind the entity, who owes fiduciary duties to whom, and what governance provisions the default statutory rules supply. This distinction does not exist in the same form for corporations or general partnerships, so cross-entity analogies should be made with care.
In historical sources, "manage" is used in a more openly discretionary sense — Bouvier notes it applies to affairs that are "somewhat complex and extended" and require "authority, discretion, and judgment." This framing reflects a pre-modern understanding of management as an art requiring personal judgment rather than rule-following. Researchers reading older cases should not assume that "manage" in an 1890 case maps cleanly onto the defined management roles created by modern organizational statutes.
In fiduciary contexts, courts have read "manage" as importing an affirmative duty of attention. A trustee who fails to act — who neglects investments, ignores deteriorating property, or defers decisions indefinitely — may be found to have breached the duty to manage even in the absence of any affirmative misconduct. The word implies action, not merely authorization.
Regulatory usage of "manage" in federal land and environmental statutes introduces an additional layer: management here is constrained by statutory planning requirements, mandatory consultation obligations, and judicially reviewable standards. The discretion implied by "manage" is not unlimited; it is bounded by the regulatory scheme within which it appears.
Historical Dictionary Support
Black's Law Dictionary (1st ed.) defines the term concisely: "To conduct; to carry on; to direct the concerns of a business or establishment. Generally applied to affairs that are somewhat complicated and that involve skill and judgment." Bouvier's is substantively in agreement and adds the qualifier that the word is "generally applied to affairs somewhat complex and extended, and requiring a degree of authority, discretion, and judgment." Both sources anchor the term in active, skilled direction rather than mere possession or nominal oversight.
Anderson's does not offer a direct entry for manage as a standalone term, though the surrounding entries on professional conduct and duty of care reflect the same period assumption: that management implies applied expertise and accountability.
Notably, none of the historical dictionaries address the structural corporate and organizational uses of "manage" that dominate modern practice — the member/manager distinction in LLCs, for example, postdates these sources by decades. Researchers relying on historical definitions alone will find adequate support for the general meaning but will need to turn to modern statutory text and case law for the governance-specific applications.
Jurisdictional Note
The legal significance of "manage" in the LLC context varies because LLC statutes are state-specific and the default rules for management authority differ across jurisdictions. Some states presume member-management absent a contrary designation in the operating agreement; others require the articles or certificate to specify. Federal land management statutes apply uniformly to federal lands but interact with state law on adjacent private holdings and water rights.
Encyclopedia Cross-Reference
LLCs — Member-Managed vs. Manager-Managed LLCs (The Law Mind Business Organizations & Corporate Law Encyclopedia)
Conservatorship — Management of Property and Finances (The Law Mind Family Law Encyclopedia)
National Forest Management Act and Federal Land Management (The Law Mind Environmental & Energy Law Encyclopedia)