Thornton: Institutional logics and institutional change in organizations: transformation in accounting, architecture and publishing

19 important questions on Thornton: Institutional logics and institutional change in organizations: transformation in accounting, architecture and publishing

The article of Thornton integrates two related areas of study: the theory and methods of analysis on 'institutional logics' and 'historical-event sequencing'. Explain this:

- Institutional logics explain how the content of culture influences organizational change
- Historical-event sequencing reveals the underlying patterns of cultural transformation.
> This dual perspective is applied to cases of institutional stability and change in accounting, architecture and higher-education publishing.

Missing from previous research is an understanding of how institutions motivate organizations to adapt one of these governance forms (markets, hierarchies, networks) over another. What does Thornton examines?

How the governance of firms in accounting/architecture/publishing has been influenced by the institutional logics of the market/state/corporation by focusing on three mechanisms: institutional entrepreneurs, structural overlap and historical-event sequencing.

What are the overall findings of Thornton? They reveal how...

-Accounting was influenced by state regulation (producing a punctuated equilibrium model)
-Architecture by professional duality (cyclical model)
-Publishing by market rationalization (evolutionary model of institutional change in organizational governance)

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On which literature gap is addressed by Thronton, and how?

Previous research emphasize one aspect of institutional change and stability to the exclusion of another: focusing on either the consequences of a shift in the cultural content of inst. logics ór on how the content of culture itself has changed. Thornton combines the research on institutional logics and historical-event sequencing.

What does Thornton examines while combing the two aspects?

To examine institutional stability and change in organizational governance (dependent variable) in accounting, architecture, publishing.

Previous research also misses an understanding of how institutional logics at the wider societal level motivate organizations to adopt one of the organizational governance (markets/hierarchies/networks) over another. What does Thornton explores?

The connection between organizational governance and broader interpretative schemes (which in theory reveal the values and beliefs underlying intentions, aspirations, and purposes that shape organizing principles and strategy of action for organizations.

Linking research on institutional logics and event sequencing provides an opportunity for Thornton. Which one?

To further explore these concerns and gain insights to advance our ability to understand competing theories of institutional change and organiational governance.

How does Thornton define organizational governance?

As the mechanisms that firms use to coordinate economic activity.

What is institutional logics according to Thornton?

A theory/method to understand the influences of societal-level culture on the cognition and behavior of individual and organizational actors.

Thornton suggests that change occurs through at least three mechanisms. Which one? Explain them?

1. Institutional entrepreneurs: individual/organizational actors who creatre opportunities for innovation and institutional and organizational change by exploiting cultural discontinuities.
2. Structural overlap: when individual roles and organizational structures and functions that were previously distinct are force into association (f.e. mergers and acquisitions).
3. Historical-event sequencing: the occurrences that dislocate, rearticulate, and transform structures (f.e. shifts of resources).
> Inst. entrepreneurs and str. overlap provide the opportunity and means for recombination of cognitive schema and cultural models, which are then amplified by others in the sequencing of historical events.

Summarize Thorntons thoughts regarding institutional entrepreneurs, structural overlap and historical-event sequencing?

Institutional entrepreneurs, structural overlap and historical-event sequencing are the motors of institutional and organizational change. Event sequencing provides the temporal framework to understand how structural overlap provides access to different institutional logics and how institutional entrepreneurs who turn analogies/discontinuities into actions that maintain stability or initiate change.

Which data sources are used bu Thornton?

They relied on historical and contemporary directories, books, articles and new releases. The selected cases which identified industries with knowledge-based assets as the fastest growing sectors of the economy: accounting, architecture, publishing. Those 3 represent the diceristy of industries with knowledge based assets.

What is the overall conclusion of Thornton regarding accounting? Formulate hypothesis 1.

The shifts in institutional logics followed the pattern of moving from dominant influences of the market to the professions to the corporation to the state depending on what governance mechanisms were perceived by public opinion to be a failure in protecting the interests of corporate investors.
H1: Industries with higher public policy implications and higher displacement of professional control by that of the corporation are more likely to lose professional and corporate jurisdiction to the state and are more likely to exhibit a punctuated equilibrium pattern of institutional change in organizational governance.

What is the overall conclusion of Thornton regarding architecture? Formulate hypothesis 2.

The shift in institutional logics followed the pattern of cycling between the hybrid logics of artist-entrepreneur and engineer-manager.
H2: Industries that actively co-opt public policy implications under professional control, with lower displacement of professional control by that of the corporation and the market, and with conflicting factions of the profession, are more likely to exhibit a cyclical pattern of institutional change in organizational governance.

What is the overall conclusion of Thornton regarding publishing? Formulate hypothesis 3.

Overall, the shifts in institutional logics followed the pattern of family to the quasi-professions to the corporation to the market.
H3: Industries with lower public policy implications, but with lower degrees of professionalization and higher displacement of professional control by that of thje market, are more likely to exhibit an evolutionary pattern of institutional change in organizational governance.

What is meant with the evolutionary model of Thornton regarding publishing?

The evolutionary process of market rationalization was largely uninterrupted by the influences of the state/family/professions.

Name a theoretical implication of the research of Thornton:

The extended the analysis of institutional change in organizations by integrating the work on institutional logics and historical-event sequencing. to develop a theory and method of analysis to study organizational governance.  They applied this dual perspective to examine how societal-level culture affects the governance and strategic behavior of organizations in three industries.

Formulate the core of what Thornton studied: (course slides)

How institutions at the wider societal level motivate organizations to adopt a governance form over another. The governance of firms is influenced by the institutional logics of the professions, the market, the state and the corporation.

The first three changes are explained earlier and shown in the images. What is meant with additive and substitutive change?

First order: An additive change is a small adjustment or improvement, Second order: Substitutive is a major transition, but the end state is clear
Third order: Substitutive transformation, without knowing what the end state will be.

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