The iron cage revisited: Institutional isomorphism and collective rationality in organizational fields (Chinese Translation)
01 Jan 2008-
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.
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Dissertation•
01 Feb 2017
Abstract: xv CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION 1.1.Background to the Study 1 1.2.Statement of the Problem 5 1.3.Objectives of the Study 7 1.4.Research Questions 7 1.5.Significance of the Study 7 1.6.Scope of the Study 8 1.7.Limitations of the Study 9 1.8.Research Methodology 9 CHAPTER TWO: LITERATURE REVIEW AND THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK 2.1. Economic and Financial Crimes: A Conceptualization 14 2.2. Sources and Causes of Economic and Financial Crimes in Nigeria 20 2.3. The Political Economy of Economic and Financial Crime Control in Nigeria31 2.4. The Legal Framework for Economic and Financial Crimes Control in Nigeria35 2.5. Factors Affecting Effective Enforcement of Laws against Economic and Financial Crimes in Nigeria 43
14 citations
Dissertation•
07 Sep 2012
TL;DR: In this paper, a deux plans theoriques differents, l'un prescriptif and l'autre analytique, are discussed, with the aim of interroger l'ensemble des parties prenantes de l’Universite d’Entreprise.
Abstract: L’Universite d’Entreprise est un objet peu traite par la litterature. Elle est ainsi majoritairement percue comme une structure devant, notamment par la formation et le developpement des competences, contribuer a l’atteinte des objectifs strategiques de son organisation-mere, mais egalement favoriser le renforcement d’une culture interne. Par-dela cette definition instrumentale, a quoi sert une Universite d’Entreprise ? La denomination meme de ce type de structure interroge. Y aurait-il, outre la mission gestionnaire qui lui est confiee, des « fonctions latentes » pour l’Universite d’Entreprise ? Comment depasser la vision culturelle pour en questionner les motivations profondes ? Nous avons souhaite mobiliser au cours de ce travail un cadre interpretatif permettant de depasser la fonction visible de l’objet et ainsi interroger sa dimension imaginaire. Pour ce faire, nous avons eu recours a deux plans theoriques differents, l’un prescriptif et l’autre analytique, afin d’interroger dans un mouvement iteratif les differents roles et fonctions qui pourraient etre ceux de l’Universite d’Entreprise. Un dispositif particulier issu de methodes qualitatives a ete construit. Il repose sur le recueil de deux types de discours differents, l’un controle, l’autre spontane, afin de favoriser l’analyse des deux plans theoriques. Par ailleurs, nous avons souhaite interroger l’ensemble des parties prenantes de l’Universite d’Entreprise. Dans cette optique, differentes techniques (donnees secondaires, entretiens, observation et recueil de dessins) ont ete utilisees. Les resultats de cette recherche doctorale sont multiples. Ils permettent tout d’abord le devoilement d’une institution seconde de l’imaginaire organisationnel, l’Universite d’Entreprise. Celle-ci, creatrice de liens particuliers entre une organisation et les individus qu’elle emploie va favoriser l’effectivite de l’imaginaire organisationnel. Cela repose sur la formulation d’une promesse faite par l’organisation-mere aux individus. Le developpement et la mise a disposition de leur capital humain permettraient ainsi de leur offrir des perspectives de carriere. Cette promesse repose sur trois principes imaginaires qui fondent le role de l’Universite d’Entreprise : les valeurs promues par l’organisation-mere, le prestige procure par le partenaire academique et les attentes de reconnaissance que manifestent les individus. C’est sur la base de ce triptyque imaginaire que nous proposons de repenser le role institutionnel de l’Universite d’Entreprise.
14 citations
Journal Article•
TL;DR: In this article, a porte sur le travail des comptables a travers la production des evaluations actuarielles de la comptabilite a la juste valeur is presented.
Abstract: Cette these porte sur le travail des comptables a travers la production des evaluations actuarielles de la comptabilite a la juste valeur. L’observation directe de leur activite quotidienne au moyen d’une observation participante, permet d’en saisir les conditions erratiques peu etudiees par les recherches comptables. Les resultats obtenus permettent de proposer une premiere formalisation conceptuelle des conditions de la preparation des comptes dans les organisations, melant acteurs, outils et contextes. En donnant toute leur place aux preparateurs des comptes dans l’etude de la communication financiere, nos contributions suggerent de questionner les representations dominant la recherche comptable. Nos resultats decrivent comment certaines des qualites communement attribuees (neutralite, fidelite, …) a la comptabilite sont d’une importance discutable et l’assimilation de la communication financiere a un conflit d’agence difficile.
14 citations
Posted Content•
TL;DR: This paper provided a new view on the old problem of herding in the global south by foreign portfolio investors and advocated a liquidity perspective that problematizes the capacity for a herd to form because of the absence of sufficient counterparties willing to trade.
Abstract: This article provides a new view on the old problem of herding in the global south by foreign portfolio investors. It advocates a liquidity perspective that problematizes the capacity for a herd to form because of the absence of sufficient counterparties willing to trade. Drawing on ethnographic interviews with local professional investors in Malaysia (a substantively and theoretically important stock market) the findings are non-intuitive relative to the common-sense expectations of the information asymmetry and identity-based herding literatures. Although locals watch their foreign competitors closely, and therefore could imitate their trades, these small, local finance firms find few reasons to imitate these powerful international actors. Instead, locals enable crowds of foreigners because they are willing to be counterparties even when they perceive the foreigner’s trade as savvy, highly skilled, or informed. The conclusion explores implications for herding, global capital flows, and social structures that may generate liquidity in business-to-business markets. This article can also be downloaded from the Oxford Journals website.
14 citations
Dissertation•
26 Nov 2018
TL;DR: In this article, the authors analyse l'espace-temps au travers de trois pratiques-cles des agents commerciaux (la vente, l'information, and l'embarquement) of the SNCF, and propose egalement des contributions strategiques et manageriales en insistent sur a logique de fluidite, recherchee dans les parcours des voyageurs en gare.
Abstract: De plus en plus, les membres des organisations sont en situation de mobilite permanente. Ils telephonent en marchant, font des reunions a distance, ou sont presents dans des espaces de travail partages pour un temps limite. Les lieux de travail sont davantage traverses qu’ils sont occupes. La gare illustre parfaitement ces tendances autant spatiales que temporelles. La question empirique au cœur de cette these a emergee dans le contexte actuel de la SNCF qui refond largement l’espace de ses gares et repense en profondeur le role de ses agents. Elle le fait sur fond de digitalisation de ses activites historiques. Dans ce contexte, le cas des agents commerciaux represente un changement de paradigme, avec des pratiques de travail de plus en plus mobiles et « de-fixees ». Cette mise en mouvement des agents se heurte a une conception historique qui envisage la gare comme un ensemble d’espaces fermes, fixes et stables dans leurs fonctions et leurs usages. Notre constat empirique rejoint un vide conceptuel : si la theorisation des espaces « entre-deux » s’est developpee en theories des organisations, on en sait peu sur la maniere dont la transition emerge dans les pratiques de travail. En effet, on connait surtout le point de vue de ceux qui traversent ces espaces. On cherchera donc ici a eclairer le point de vue de ceux qui organisent ces transitions par leurs pratiques de travail. Dans notre these, nous pensons le caractere transitionnel de l’espace comme une experience et un processus indissociables des pratiques de travail. Notre ethnographie porte sur plusieurs grandes gares en France. Elle est completee par une longue observation-participante des directions centrales chez SNCF sur une duree de trois ans. Cette phase empirique nous a permis de mieux comprendre les metiers et les logiques d’amenagement des espaces. Nous avons analyse l’espace-temps au travers de trois pratiques-cles des agents commerciaux (la vente, l’information et l’embarquement). Nous centrons notre analyse sur les pratiques, en particulier leurs modes d’expressions corporelles, en adoptant une posture phenomenologique. Notre recherche demontre comment les pratiques sont performatives d’un espace-temps de transition. Pour que l’espace soit traverse, il necessite des gestes qui sont autant de points de rencontres pour diriger, orienter, conseiller ou rassurer les voyageurs. Nous contribuons a la litterature en theories des organisations sur l’espace organisationnel et les pratiques corporelles en conceptualisant le role des gestes-frontieres dans ces experiences comprenant des dimensions spatiales, temporelles, materielles et corporelles. Nous proposons egalement des contributions strategiques et manageriales en insistant sur une logique de fluidite, recherchee dans les parcours des voyageurs en gare.
14 citations
References
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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
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
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
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
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