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

TL;DR: In this article, the authors argue that rational actors make their organizations increasingly similar as they try to change them, and describe three isomorphic processes-coercive, mimetic, and normative.
Abstract: 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.
Citations
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Dissertation
13 Oct 2018
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors investigate the processus entrepreneurial des diplomes in the context of the creation of an entreprise in the country of Burkina Faso (DES/BF).
Abstract: Au debut des annees 90, des chercheurs avec a leur tete Gartner (1985) ont estime qu’il etait tout aussi important de comprendre comment se cree et se developpe une entreprise, que de continuer a chercher quelles sont les caracteristiques de celles et ceux qui creent une entreprise. Ainsi, l’objectif de cette recherche est de comprendre le processus entrepreneurial des diplomes de l’enseignement superieur au Burkina Faso (DES/BF). Notre recherche se fonde sur des logiques causale et effectuale du processus de creation d’entreprise et mobilise un dispositif methodologique qualitatif. L’investigation empirique des six cas de creation aboutit aux principaux resultats suivants: les primo createurs DES/BF ne realisent pas des activites autres que celles evoquees dans la litterature, ensuite les processus entrepreneuriaux des DES/BF sont influences differemment par des caracteristiques individuelles et des facteurs de l’environnement, enfin les processus entrepreneuriaux suivent des logiques causale ou effectuale.

6 citations

DissertationDOI
01 Jan 2009
TL;DR: In this article, the authors examined the barriers that impede the successful transfer of the parent's occupational safety and health (OSH) practices at the Malaysian subsidiaries of a of a U.K. MNC.
Abstract: The study examines the barriers that impede the successful transfer of the parent's occupational safety and health (OSH) practices at the Malaysian subsidiaries of a of a U.K. MNC. The study examines the process of transfer, translation and corruption of management practices as they move across the national boundaries. The study applies a case study approach and is exploratory in nature. The quantitative and qualitative methods are used to analyze the data. Overall a total of 291 employees participated in the study. Out of the total, 159 participated in the survey questionnaires and 132 in the qualitative interviews. The findings indicate two key factors had influenced the transfer and adoption of practices at the subsidiaries: the stage of economic development and the normative, cultural-cognitive systems of the host country, specifically ethnic stratification. The contribution of the study is in applying institutional theory to produce understanding of processes in the cross national transfer of management practices. The study provides researchers better understanding in applying institutional theory in the transfer and adoption of management practices in MNCs. For the HR practitioners the study provides better understanding in managing rewards systems and training of management practices.

6 citations

Book ChapterDOI
05 May 2015
TL;DR: In this article, Lücke adressiert der vorliegende Beitrag, indem er Strukturbildungsund Autonomisierungsprozessen durch und in UN-missionen aus konfliktsystemischer und weltgesellschaftstheoretischer perspektive analysiert.
Abstract: Die Mandatierung und Implementierung von UN-Missionen als Teil internationaler Interventionen stellt eine institutionalisierte Form der Konfliktbearbeitung durch internationale Organisationen im weltpolitischen System dar, die sich seit den 1990er Jahren als politisches Instrument verstetigt hat. Während zahlreiche Beiträge aus der Forschung zu internationalen Organisationen sowie der Friedensund Konfliktforschung bereits die Legitimität, Rechenschaftspflichten und Effizienz solcher Einsätze diskutieren, fehlt es bisher an Ansätzen, die sich mit der Funktion von Missionen für die Herstellung gesellschaftlicher Ordnung auseinandersetzen. Diese Lücke adressiert der vorliegende Beitrag, indem er Strukturbildungsund Autonomisierungsprozessen durch und in UN-Missionen aus konfliktsystemischer und weltgesellschaftstheoretischer Perspektive analysiert. Interventionen und UN-Missionen werden dabei als Strukturmerkmale von Weltgesellschaft verstanden und untersucht. Der vorliegende Beitrag ordnet die im Jahre 2003 ausgehobene UN-Mission im Irak (UNAMI) einem in diesem Sinne umfassenderen Prozess einer internationalen Intervention zu, innerhalb derer die Mission auf der Makroebene mandatiert wird. Damit wird die Funktion der Mission als Teil eines Konfliktsystems zwischen UN-Sicherheitsrat und der Regierung des Irak erklärbar. Im Anschluss daran lässt sich ausführen, inwieweit organisationale Autonomisierungsprozesse, hier zwischen UN-Mission und UN-Sicherheitsrat, Teil organisationaler Konfliktregelung sind, die den Konflikt innerhalb der Organisation erst bearbeitbar machen. Organisationale Autonomisierungsprozesse meinen, dass die durchführende Organisationseinheit (UN-Mission) gegenüber der sie mandatierenden Organisationseinheit (UN-Sicherheitsrat) autonom operieren kann und dabei auf nationaler bzw. lokaler Ebene Informationen sammeln und Entscheidungen treffen kann (siehe Bauer et al. in diesem Sonderheft). Für den Autonomisierungsprozess spielt die Kommunikation organisationaler (Erwartungs-/Ziel-) Zuschreibungen durch die mandatierende Organisationseinheit (UN-Sicherheitsrat) an die Mission (UNAMI) als ausführende Organisationseinheit eine zentrale Rolle, da sie das Mandat der Mission festlegt und damit deren

6 citations

References
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Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: This article synthesize the large but diverse literature on organizational legitimacy, highlighting similarities and disparities among the leading strategic and institutional approaches, and identify three primary forms of legitimacy: pragmatic, based on audience self-interest; moral, based upon normative approval; and cognitive, according to comprehensibility and taken-for-grantedness.
Abstract: This article synthesizes the large but diverse literature on organizational legitimacy, highlighting similarities and disparities among the leading strategic and institutional approaches. The analysis identifies three primary forms of legitimacy: pragmatic, based on audience self-interest; moral, based on normative approval: and cognitive, based on comprehensibility and taken-for-grantedness. The article then examines strategies for gaining, maintaining, and repairing legitimacy of each type, suggesting both the promises and the pitfalls of such instrumental manipulations.

13,229 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this paper, a theory of stakeholder identification and saliency based on stakeholders possessing one or more of three relationship attributes (power, legitimacy, and urgency) is proposed, and a typology of stakeholders, propositions concerning their saliency to managers of the firm, and research and management implications.
Abstract: Stakeholder theory has been a popular heuristic for describing the management environment for years, but it has not attained full theoretical status. Our aim in this article is to contribute to a theory of stakeholder identification and salience based on stakeholders possessing one or more of three relationship attributes: power, legitimacy, and urgency. By combining these attributes, we generate a typology of stakeholders, propositions concerning their salience to managers of the firm, and research and management implications.

10,630 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
Christine Oliver1
TL;DR: The authors applied the convergent insights of institutional and resource dependence perspectives to the prediction of strategic responses to institutional processes, and proposed a typology of strategies that vary in active organizational resistance from passive conformity to proactive manipulation.
Abstract: This article applies the convergent insights of institutional and resource dependence perspectives to the prediction of strategic responses to institutional processes. The article offers a typology of strategic responses that vary in active organizational resistance from passive conformity to proactive manipulation. Ten institutional factors are hypothesized to predict the occurrence of the alternative proposed strategies and the degree of organizational conformity or resistance to institutional pressures.

7,595 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: This article conducted a meta-analysis of 52 studies and found that corporate virtue in the form of social responsibility and, to a lesser extent, environmental responsibility is likely to pay off, although the operationalizations of CSP and CFP also moderate the positive association.
Abstract: Most theorizing on the relationship between corporate social/environmental performance (CSP) and corporate financial performance (CFP) assumes that the current evidence is too fractured or too variable to draw any generalizable conclusions. With this integrative, quantitative study, we intend to show that the mainstream claim that we have little generalizable knowledge about CSP and CFP is built on shaky grounds. Providing a methodologically more rigorous review than previous efforts, we conduct a meta-analysis of 52 studies (which represent the population of prior quantitative inquiry) yielding a total sample size of 33,878 observations. The meta-analytic findings suggest that corporate virtue in the form of social responsibility and, to a lesser extent, environmental responsibility is likely to pay off, although the operationalizations of CSP and CFP also moderate the positive association. For example, CSP appears to be more highly correlated with accounting-based measures of CFP than with market-based ...

6,493 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors consider structural inertia in organizational populations as an outcome of an ecological-evolutionary process and define structural inertia as a correspondence between a class of organizations and their environments.
Abstract: Considers structural inertia in organizational populations as an outcome of an ecological-evolutionary process. Structural inertia is considered to be a consequence of selection as opposed to a precondition. The focus of this analysis is on the timing of organizational change. Structural inertia is defined to be a correspondence between a class of organizations and their environments. Reliably producing collective action and accounting rationally for their activities are identified as important organizational competencies. This reliability and accountability are achieved when the organization has the capacity to reproduce structure with high fidelity. Organizations are composed of various hierarchical layers that vary in their ability to respond and change. Organizational goals, forms of authority, core technology, and marketing strategy are the four organizational properties used to classify organizations in the proposed theory. Older organizations are found to have more inertia than younger ones. The effect of size on inertia is more difficult to determine. The variance in inertia with respect to the complexity of organizational arrangements is also explored. (SRD)

6,425 citations