Men and Women of the Corporation

Between Facts and Norms: Contributions to a Discourse Theory of Law and Democracy

The Rise of the Creative Class

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)

Public Management Reform. A Comparative Analysis

We develop a typology for analysing branding processes in municipalities: a place, organizational and democracy branding strategy. Our main contribution is to expand the view of municipalities as places, taking the debate on the branding of cities, regions and municipalities in a more nuanced direction. Our findings show that the place branding perspective is insufficient for understanding branding efforts; in fact, organizational branding is the most prevalent strategy. However, democracy branding is also strongly present. Using logistic regression, we conclude that the place branding debate should be nuanced by what we know about municipal size, identity and perceived media influence.

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Place, Organization, Democracy: Three Strategies For Municipal Branding

Place,뀀Ƞorganization,뀀Ƞdemocracy:뀀ȠThree뀀Ƞstrategies뀀Ƞfor뀀Ƞ municipal뀀Ƞbranding뀀Ƞ

Scholars have often studied social, political and economic factors affecting trust. This paper considers the relationship between spatial location and trust in politicians. It is hypothesiz...

/pdf/the-centre-periphery-dimension-and-trust-in-politicians-the-29sy5whos4.pdf

The centre–periphery dimension and trust in politicians: the case of Norway

Governance networks are increasingly important in urban planning, in policy implementation and in service provision, and are often organized to improve efficiency and innovation in the pursuit of some public purpose. We argue that their democratic merits, in addition to their efficiency and output aspects, must be taken into consideration if they are to be understood as legitimate problem solvers on behalf of a local democratic authority. Here we draw on entrepreneurial and deliberative perspectives on urban governance, and work out criteria for assessing network performance. The insights of both perspectives are needed, we argue, to study legitimacy in contemporary urban policies, and we ask whether it is possible to strike a balance between democratic procedural standards and producing the desired outcomes. Empirically we compare the performance of a network with a strong entrepreneurial orientation with that of a network with a deliberative orientation, both located in the same city and operating withi...

Two networks, one city: Democracy and governance networks in urban transformation

As prefectoral systems are generally regarded to be systems that underpin and serve as the basis for centralization, this article examines how they have developed and how they work, and why they are still considered necessary in decentralized Scandinavia. The article finds that the prefect’s authority towards the municipalities varies in Scandinavia. The Norwegian and Swedish prefectures hold rather powerful roles, while the Danish ones do not. The article suggests that this may have something to do with the need for an institution that brings about cohesion and coordination. Prefectoral systems are basically pragmatic solutions to the problem of enforcing national standards and common values across regions and municipalities, but their role may vary with institutional conditions created by local government reforms. The article further suggests that the authority of the prefecture varies with the character of central-local relations, and that it is vulnerable to changes in dominant political goals and values.

Hilde Bjørnå

Papers

Place, Organization, Democracy: Three Strategies For Municipal Branding

Place,뀀Ƞorganization,뀀Ƞdemocracy:뀀ȠThree뀀Ƞstrategies뀀Ƞfor뀀Ƞ municipal뀀Ƞbranding뀀Ƞ

The centre–periphery dimension and trust in politicians: the case of Norway

Two networks, one city: Democracy and governance networks in urban transformation

Prefectoral Systems and Central–Local Government Relations in Scandinavia