Organisation and Society
Perusall: Annotations may include: 1) a brief summary of the arguments of the author in
a given section of the paper, 2) if certain arguments or concepts are unclear, clarifying
questions and tentative answers, and 3) a reaction in a few sentences to other students’
questions, answers to questions, and summaries. Reactions may be corrections, answers
to questions, or illustrating examples.
Lecture 1: Introduction (16 november)
No mandatory literature
Growing economic power of large firms
- Market capitalization for top 50 firms (% world GPD)
Organizations in our life
- health
- education
- work
- spirituality
- leisure
- Rights & legislation
- safety
- consumption
Aim of this course
- Gain insight into social processes in organizations which impact society.
- Key outcomes: persistence, change, embeddedness, and inequality
Learning goals of the course
After completion of the course, you are able to…
- describe organizational processes that lead to persistence, change,
embeddedness, and inequality;
- outline theories and mechanisms which connect organizations and their
members with these outcomes;
- explain societal and organizational phenomena related to persistence, change,
embeddedness, and inequality by applying the learned theories and mechanisms
1
,Outline of the course
Learning goals today
- Understanding the concept of organizations
- How to explain societal/organizational outcomes through social mechanisms
- Understanding how organizations can be both sites and drivers of social action
How to do define organizations?
- Purposeful collective of people
o Goal and (relatively) continous existence
- Has internal structure (formal and informal)
- Has external boundaries
o Distinguish itself from environment
o Distinguish members and external stakeholders
Organizations are diverse
Social mechanism approach
2
, - Example: gender inequality in wages
- Social mechanism approach: identifying actors, activities and relations
- We focus on social mechanisms!
o What do we mean by ‘social mechanism’?
▪ A constellation of actors and activities that regularly bring about a
particular outcome
▪ We identify the actors, activities, and relations that jointly produce
the outcome to be explained
Alternative mechanisms: different implications!
Organizations are both sites and drivers of action – organizations as sites/contexts
- Organizations
o Individual action → outcomes
o Example: working from home (Covid-19)
- Society
o Organizational action → outcomes
o Example: corporate diversity and social responsibility practices
3
, Lecture 2: Persistence: Institutions & decoupling (18 november)
Boxenbaum, E., & Jonsson, S. (2017). Isomorphism, Diffusion and Decoupling: Concept
Evolution and Theoretical Challenges. In R. Greenwood, C. Oliver, T. B. Lawrence, & R. E.
Meyer (Eds.), The SAGE Handbook of Organizational Institutionalism (2. ed., pp. 77-101).
SAGE Publications.
Required: PDF Page 9 (from ‘Decoupling’)-Page 12 (until Discussion)
Turco, C. (2012). Difficult decoupling: Employee resistance to the commercializa-tion of
personal settings. American Journal of Sociology, 118 (2), 380–419.
Required: PDF Page 1 – Page 8, Page 10 – Page 31 (focus on main findings from the case
study), Page 31 (from ‘Discussion’) – Page 34
Program
- 1) Inconsistency in organizations
- 2) Institutional explanation
- 3) Decoupling as solution?
- 4) When does decoupling happen?
- 5) Your Perusall questions and comments
Paradox
- Coordination and control are throught be critical for the success of modern
organizations
- Yet, we cannot say that coordination is routine, rules and procedures are always
followed, and actual activities conform to the prescriptions of formal structure
Organizational inconsistencies
- structural elements are only loosely linked to each other and to activities,
- rules are often violated
- decisions are often un-implemented
- if implemented, they have uncertain consequences
- technologies are of problematic efficiency
- evaluation and inspection systems are subverted or
- vague as to provide little coordination
Intuitive (short) answer
- Organizations adopt elements that do not “work well” or are not “fitting each”
other
- These instances can be simple mistakes, but it occurs so often (and is so costly),
so is there a social pattern?
- Theoretical (long) answer: process of institutionalization
Institutional theory
- “ Institutions comprise regulative, normative, and cultural-cognitive elements
that together with associated activities and resources, provide stability and
meaning to social life” (Scott, 2011)
Institutionalization
4
Perusall: Annotations may include: 1) a brief summary of the arguments of the author in
a given section of the paper, 2) if certain arguments or concepts are unclear, clarifying
questions and tentative answers, and 3) a reaction in a few sentences to other students’
questions, answers to questions, and summaries. Reactions may be corrections, answers
to questions, or illustrating examples.
Lecture 1: Introduction (16 november)
No mandatory literature
Growing economic power of large firms
- Market capitalization for top 50 firms (% world GPD)
Organizations in our life
- health
- education
- work
- spirituality
- leisure
- Rights & legislation
- safety
- consumption
Aim of this course
- Gain insight into social processes in organizations which impact society.
- Key outcomes: persistence, change, embeddedness, and inequality
Learning goals of the course
After completion of the course, you are able to…
- describe organizational processes that lead to persistence, change,
embeddedness, and inequality;
- outline theories and mechanisms which connect organizations and their
members with these outcomes;
- explain societal and organizational phenomena related to persistence, change,
embeddedness, and inequality by applying the learned theories and mechanisms
1
,Outline of the course
Learning goals today
- Understanding the concept of organizations
- How to explain societal/organizational outcomes through social mechanisms
- Understanding how organizations can be both sites and drivers of social action
How to do define organizations?
- Purposeful collective of people
o Goal and (relatively) continous existence
- Has internal structure (formal and informal)
- Has external boundaries
o Distinguish itself from environment
o Distinguish members and external stakeholders
Organizations are diverse
Social mechanism approach
2
, - Example: gender inequality in wages
- Social mechanism approach: identifying actors, activities and relations
- We focus on social mechanisms!
o What do we mean by ‘social mechanism’?
▪ A constellation of actors and activities that regularly bring about a
particular outcome
▪ We identify the actors, activities, and relations that jointly produce
the outcome to be explained
Alternative mechanisms: different implications!
Organizations are both sites and drivers of action – organizations as sites/contexts
- Organizations
o Individual action → outcomes
o Example: working from home (Covid-19)
- Society
o Organizational action → outcomes
o Example: corporate diversity and social responsibility practices
3
, Lecture 2: Persistence: Institutions & decoupling (18 november)
Boxenbaum, E., & Jonsson, S. (2017). Isomorphism, Diffusion and Decoupling: Concept
Evolution and Theoretical Challenges. In R. Greenwood, C. Oliver, T. B. Lawrence, & R. E.
Meyer (Eds.), The SAGE Handbook of Organizational Institutionalism (2. ed., pp. 77-101).
SAGE Publications.
Required: PDF Page 9 (from ‘Decoupling’)-Page 12 (until Discussion)
Turco, C. (2012). Difficult decoupling: Employee resistance to the commercializa-tion of
personal settings. American Journal of Sociology, 118 (2), 380–419.
Required: PDF Page 1 – Page 8, Page 10 – Page 31 (focus on main findings from the case
study), Page 31 (from ‘Discussion’) – Page 34
Program
- 1) Inconsistency in organizations
- 2) Institutional explanation
- 3) Decoupling as solution?
- 4) When does decoupling happen?
- 5) Your Perusall questions and comments
Paradox
- Coordination and control are throught be critical for the success of modern
organizations
- Yet, we cannot say that coordination is routine, rules and procedures are always
followed, and actual activities conform to the prescriptions of formal structure
Organizational inconsistencies
- structural elements are only loosely linked to each other and to activities,
- rules are often violated
- decisions are often un-implemented
- if implemented, they have uncertain consequences
- technologies are of problematic efficiency
- evaluation and inspection systems are subverted or
- vague as to provide little coordination
Intuitive (short) answer
- Organizations adopt elements that do not “work well” or are not “fitting each”
other
- These instances can be simple mistakes, but it occurs so often (and is so costly),
so is there a social pattern?
- Theoretical (long) answer: process of institutionalization
Institutional theory
- “ Institutions comprise regulative, normative, and cultural-cognitive elements
that together with associated activities and resources, provide stability and
meaning to social life” (Scott, 2011)
Institutionalization
4
