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)

This paper critically examines some of the ways in which conceptions of interculturalism are being positively contrasted with multiculturalism, especially as political ideas. It argues that while some advocates of a political interculturalism wish to emphasise its positive qualities in terms of encouraging communication, recognising dynamic identities, promoting unity and critiquing illiberal cultural practices, each of these qualities too are important (on occasion foundational) features of multiculturalism. The paper begins with a broad introduction before exploring the provenance of multiculturalism as an intellectual tradition, with a view to assessing the extent to which its origins continue to shape its contemporary public ‘identity’. We adopt this line of enquiry to identify the extent to which some of the criticism of multiculturalism is rooted in an objection to earlier formulations that displayed precisely those elements deemed unsatisfactory when compared with interculturalism. Following this discussion, the paper moves on to four specific areas of comparison between multiculturalism and interculturalism. It concludes that until interculturalism as a political discourse is able to offer a distinct perspective, one that can speak to a variety of concerns emanating from complex identities and matters of equality and diversity in a more persuasive manner than at present, interculturalism cannot, intellectually at least, eclipse multiculturalism, and so should be considered as complementary to multiculturalism.

/pdf/how-does-interculturalism-contrast-with-multiculturalism-44n1a6qf0v.pdf

How does Interculturalism Contrast with Multiculturalism

The Rights Revolution: Lawyers, Activists, and Supreme Courts in Comparative Perspective.Charles R. Epp

Dealing in Virtue: International Commercial Arbitration and the Construction of a Transnational Legal Order

/pdf/the-hollow-hope-can-courts-bring-about-social-change-zm20ktydva.pdf

The Hollow Hope: Can Courts Bring About Social Change?

The simmering debate in Europe about multiculturalism versus assimilation has now come to a boil. The German Chancellor, Angela Merkel, famously stated in October 2010 that “multiculturalism in Germany (Multikulti) had failed, completely failed”. In February 2011, both Prime Minister David Cameron and President Nicholas Sarkozy could also be heard declaring that multiculturalism was a failure, although only the French President endorsed assimilation as the alternative. Others argue that both assimilation and multiculturalism have failed.
These dramatic statements represent the challenge of interpretation and policy analysis to which this book is addressed. If these single words can identify a failure of society and of the policies of government, then there has to be a better model, concept and policy. This study tries to work towards a better solution, and uses the term ‘interculturalism’ to represent that solution.

Interculturalism: Europe and Its Muslims in Search of Sound Societal Models. CEPS Paperbacks. June 2011

https://repub.eur.nl/pub/117232/Reading_diasporic_engagements_through_th.pdf

Reading diasporic engagements through the lens of citizenship : Turkey as a test case

This article seeks to promote an integrated approach to the study of citizenship policies, which pays due attention to their potential impact on migrants whose self-recognition are formally delimited by legal definitions. Through a novel approach that makes use of naturalisation processes as an empirical entry point into the narratives of citizenship embraced by Turkish migrants, this article investigates the role of dual citizenship policies in three European countries: Spain, the Netherlands and the UK. The evidence from the sample group displays a process of ‘self-bargaining’ prior to the naturalisation decision, which calls into question the link established between legal and emotional bonds of citizenship. The Dutch example demonstrates how Turkish migrants cope with the ban on dual citizenship by downplaying the identity-conferring role of citizenship status. This leads to a decoupling of legal and emotional aspects of citizenship and thereby to the adoption of a thin sense of citizenship. While Spa...

Citizenship on paper or at heart? a closer look into the dual citizenship debate in Europe

Country report: Belgium

Inspired by a super-diversity approach, this paper seeks to explore the influence of the ‘ethnic hierarchy’ of ‘old’ minority groups over the way ‘new’ migrants from Turkey negotiate their interaction in the daily life in three settings: Amsterdam, London and Barcelona. By focusing on highly educated migrants from Turkey who by virtue of their country of origin or religion are positioned at the bottom of ‘ethnic hierarchies’, it strives to understand the significance of these different sources of diversity in daily interaction. Applying boundary-drawing strategies developed for ethnic boundaries, this paper argues that education does not necessarily ‘trump’ nationality, but allows for substantial claims of difference. New migrants from Turkey carve out a space for themselves by on the one hand homogenizing Turkish or other Muslim communities through attributing ‘unwanted’ behaviours and on the other re-defining the boundaries of their individual identity with emphasis on different sources of diver...

Zeynep Yanasmayan

Papers

Interculturalism: Europe and Its Muslims in Search of Sound Societal Models. CEPS Paperbacks. June 2011

Reading diasporic engagements through the lens of citizenship : Turkey as a test case

Citizenship on paper or at heart? a closer look into the dual citizenship debate in Europe

Country report: Belgium

Does education ‘trump’ nationality? Boundary-drawing practices among highly educated migrants from Turkey