Part I: AN INTRODUCTION TO INQUIRY. 1. Human Inquiry and Science. 2. Paradigms, Theory, and Research. 3. The Ethics and Politics of Social Research. Part II: THE STRUCTURING OF INQUIRY: QUANTITATIVE AND QUALITATIVE. 4. Research Design. 5. Conceptualization, Operationalization, and Measurement. 6. Indexes, Scales, and Typologies. 7. The Logic of Sampling. Part III: MODES OF OBSERVATION: QUANTITATIVE AND QUALITATIVE. 8. Experiments. 9. Survey Research. 10. Qualitative Field Research. 11. Unobtrusive Research. 12. Evaluation Research. Part IV: ANALYSIS OF DATA:QUANTITATIVE AND QUALITATIVE . 13. Qualitative Data Analysis. 14. Quantitative Data Analysis. 15. Reading and Writing Social Research. Appendix A. Using the Library. Appendix B. Random Numbers. Appendix C. Distribution of Chi Square. Appendix D. Normal Curve Areas. Appendix E. Estimated Sampling Error.

社会研究方法基础 = The Basics of Social Research

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)

'Institutionalized Organizations: Formal Structure as Myth and Ceremony', American Journal of Sociology, 83, pp. 340-63.

Schooling in Capitalist America.

Pricing the Priceless Child: The Changing Social Value of Children

Ontario’s Ministry of Training, Colleges and Universities is currently attempting to increase institutional differentiation within that province’s post-secondary education system. We contend that such policies aimed to trigger organizational change are likely to generate unanticipated responses. Using insights from the field of organizational studies, we anticipate four plausible responses from universities to the ministry’s directives: remaining sensitive to their market demand, ceremonial compliance, continued status seeking, and isomorphism. We provide several policy recommendations that might help the ministry overcome these possible barriers to further differentiation. Resume Le ministere de la Formation et des Colleges et Universites de l’Ontario cherche a accroitre la differentiation institutionnelle du systeme d’education postsecondaire ontarien. Nous soutenons que les politiques publiques visant a declencher ce changement organisationnel vont vraisemblablement engendrer des reactions imprevues. Tirant nos connaissances des champs d’etudes organisationnelles, nous anticipons quatre reactions potentielles aux directives du ministere par les universites. Ainsi, les universites peuvent : demeurer receptives aux demandes de leur clientele, entreprendre une conformite superficielle, s’engager dans une recherche perpetuelle d’un statut superieur ou favoriser l’isomorphisme. Nous suggerons plusieurs recommandations de politiques publiques qui peuvent aider le ministere a faire progresser la differentiation en surmontant ces eventuels obstacles.

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Barriers to Differentiation: Applying Organizational Studies to Ontario Higher Education

This study empirically examines how for-profit career colleges in Ontario, Canada market themselves to prospective students. It uses a mixed-methods approach to review the content of 489 online promotional profiles representing 375 unique for-profit colleges. It finds that for-profit colleges adopt several distinct marketing strategies, including (1) emphasizing their expedient provision of modern, practical skills and (2) the convenience afforded by the location of their campuses. We interpret these findings through the lens of the new institutionalist theoretical perspective, highlighting how these organizations draw upon alternative strategies to legitimate their chosen forms.

Alternative pathways to legitimacy: promotional practices in the Ontario for-profit college sector

This article draws from American research on ‘‘concerted cultivation’’ to compare the parenting logics of 41 upper-middle-class parents in Toronto, Canada. We consider not only how parents structur...

https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/0038040720908173

Educational Status Hierarchies, After-School Activities, and Parenting Logics: Lessons from Canada:

Existing research on marketing within PSE tends to focus on homogeneous groups of high-status organisations. This study ameliorates this gap in the literature, conducting a comparative analysis of promotional materials produced by public universities and community colleges in Ontario, Canada. We find that these two groups draw on unique strategies to communicate their quality to external constituents. Public universities emphasise faculty and institutional-level accomplishments, such as research grants and rankings. Meanwhile, community colleges, lacking access to these symbolic resources, employ corporate-like strategies, such as taglines and non-traditional logos.

Roger Pizarro Milian

Papers

Barriers to Differentiation: Applying Organizational Studies to Ontario Higher Education

Alternative pathways to legitimacy: promotional practices in the Ontario for-profit college sector

Educational Status Hierarchies, After-School Activities, and Parenting Logics: Lessons from Canada:

Symbolic resources and marketing strategies in Ontario higher education: a comparative analysis

Location, location, location: Examining the rural-urban skills gap in Canada