What makes organizations so similar? We contend that the engine of rationalization and bureaucratization has moved from the competitive marketplace to the state and the professions. Once a set of organizations emerges as a field, a paradox arises: rational actors make their organizations increasingly similar as they try to change them. We describe three isomorphic processes-coercive, mimetic, and normative—leading to this outcome. We then specify hypotheses about the impact of resource centralization and dependency, goal ambiguity and technical uncertainty, and professionalization and structuration on isomorphic change. Finally, we suggest implications for theories of organizations and social change.

The iron cage revisited: Institutional isomorphism and collective rationality in organizational fields (Chinese Translation)

Actors and Systems: The Politics of Collective Action.

Longtemps, la sociologie pragmatique a considere qu’elle ne pouvait rien enoncer sur les jeux de pouvoir. Une de ses regles de methode exigeait de s’en remettre aux acteurs eux-memes des lors qu’ils entreprennent de devoiler, au fil de polemiques et de proces, des figures du pouvoir ou de la domination. En s’appuyant sur de nombreux dossiers l’article montre comment inflechir l’enquete pragmatique pour apprehender autrement la critique des rapports de pouvoir, dont le degre de visibilite publique depend de la trajectoire suivie par des acteurs pris dans une logique de crise ou de conflit. Les ressorts principaux d’une emprise reussie et sur lesquels porte tout travail de deprise sont tour a tour exposes : imperatif de justification, entretien d’un besoin de reconnaissance, controle des instruments d’evaluation, production d’un echange inegal invisible.

L’emprise comme expérience. enquêtes pragmatiques et théories du pouvoir

This Introduction contains a brief summary of the key themes, issues, and controversies covered in each of the following chapters.

The Spirit of Luc Boltanski: Chapter Outline, in The Spirit of Luc Boltanski: Essays on the ‘Pragmatic Sociology of Critique’

Abstract The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) has long been the organization responsible for making and harmonizing anti-doping policies in international sport. As the Rodchenkov Act was signed into law in the United States, however, it became possible for the U.S. to target organizers of systematic doping with criminal penalties even outside their national borders, and in doing so also pose a challenge to WADA’s hegemony over the anti-doping narrative. Drawing on official organizational statements and those made by sport stakeholders in media coverage, this article uses the implementation of the Rodchenkov Act as a case study to dissect and analyze the interdependence between national and international anti-doping policy/laws. The analysis shows how the U.S., through the Rodchenkov Act, is pushing the accepted anti-doping paradigm to an extreme and engaging in a form of resistance against WADA’s hegemony. By extending its own authority and abilities beyond its national borders and applying tougher sanctions on doping conspirators, the U.S./USADA position themselves as being the party strong enough to lead and shape the anti-doping regime. In effect, they are grabbing power from WADA and dislocating its hegemony in the process. Even as it reordered its national values above global sport values, it was able to leverage anti-dopism in service of its own goals of authority.

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/17430437.2022.2064100?needAccess=true

’There’s a new sheriff in town’: the Rodchenkov Act, anti-dopism, and the hegemony of WADA in international sport

We propose to apply sociological theories focusing on power and domination, with the twofold objective of advancing sociological research and bettering the understanding of the reality of anti-doping. Ethnographic studies conducted in eight countries have allowed us to compile heterogeneous data based on official documents from institutions, semi-structured interviews and observations in the field. Firstly, the study showed that NADOs had little decision-making power within WADA, besides giving feedback on the consultation processes. Secondly, decisions made by the latter were not always viewed positively, as they were seen as arbitrary and did not reflect NADOs’ opinions and priorities. Furthermore, WADA developed assessment procedures focused on NADOs’ activities and prioritizing short-term effects. As a result, we have perceived a decrease in the adoption of innovative solutions for local problems and the omission of several national realities due to the long chain of delegation existing between decision-making arenas and the implementation of procedures in the field. Finally, the study reveals the dissatisfaction or even disengagement that exists among NADO representatives. We argue that compliance has become the primary objective for some NADOs, which could result in prioritizing actions that are valued and recognised by WADA, thus hindering the development of anti-doping programs adapted to their local realities, or even evading anti-doping procedures.

Power relationships between the WADA and NADOs and their effects on anti-doping

The purpose of the paper is to highlight the interest of using diverse sociological approaches and models for studying anti-doping (developed outside the epistemic community of researchers working on doping) and to point out the sociological interest of the doping issue for social sciences. First, we will present a model developed by pragmatic sociologists for describing social issues in society that could assist researchers in describing the complex reality of the anti-doping issue. The model proposes to examine the ways in which axiology, devices and realities are articulated in anti-doping related criticism and the existing circulation between the six social logics described in it. Its use could allow researchers to apprehend local and global transformations in the system and the articulations between these two levels. Second, we will resume the most relevant results of a research that analysed the prevention activity using an approach of work sociologists. A part of this research sought to identify the meaning that people working in prevention gave to their activity. The received answers were manifold; five ways of “doing prevention” were identified, to which institutions were committed differently. The described panorama showed a dispute where the debate as such was not tabled and nobody seemed able to definitively close the dispute, not even the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA). Finally, an ongoing research will be presented. It focuses on the procedures-based management implemented by WADA and aims to compare its development with the implementation of similar management systems by other institutions. The research could allow us identifying possible related risks, for example, the loss of the pleasure of working, the emergence of fear or the increasing work pressure. We hope the paper will encourage other social researchers to renew the usual theoretical approaches.

A proposal for theoretical and empirical extension of the sociology of anti-doping

La corriente pragmática que se describe en este artículo es la sociología de la controversia y del conflicto. El modelo que se expone es la balística sociológica, que se desarrolló con el objetivo de analizar las trayectorias de determinados problemas sociales, así como las de los actores que toman parte en los procesos de disputa y de los argumentos que movilizan. Además, se analiza cómo estos actores usan los principios morales y la fuerza de las redes de las que forman parte. Aunque estos problemas sociales puedan seguir trayectorias muy diversas, el modelo plantea el ciclo ideal de las controversias dividido en cinco etapas: emergencia del problema, controversia, polémica, movilización y regulación. Se concluye que el modelo resulta particularmente útil para el estudio de causas y movilizaciones de larga duración, en los que haya participado un gran número de actores, interviniendo en varias arenas de discusión. Asimismo, permite superar el clivaje entre los niveles macro y micro y dar cuenta, en todo momento, de los sucesos inesperados y de los efectos que se producen en los procesos de acción pública. Sin embargo, para que dicho análisis sea posible es necesario combinar distintas estrategias metodológicas y resulta conveniente emplear herramientas informáticas que permitan estudiar un gran volumen de datos.

/pdf/la-sociologia-pragmatica-y-el-modelo-de-la-balistica-1dw52vbw.pdf

Ekain Zubizarreta

Papers

Power relationships between the WADA and NADOs and their effects on anti-doping

A proposal for theoretical and empirical extension of the sociology of anti-doping

La sociología pragmática y el modelo de la balística sociológica