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Institutional complexity and individual responses : delineating the boundaries of partial autonomy

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Martin, Graham, Currie, Graeme, Weaver, Simon, Finn, Rachael and McDonald, Ruth (2017) Institutional complexity and individual responses : delineating the boundaries of partial autonomy. Organization Studies, 38 (1). pp. 103-127. doi:10.1177/0170840616663241

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Official URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0170840616663241

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Abstract

Research highlights how coexisting institutional logics can sometimes offer opportunities for agency to enterprising actors in organizational fields. But macro- and micro-level studies using this framework diverge in their approach to understanding the consequences of institutional complexity for actor autonomy, and correspondingly in the opportunities they identify for agents to resist, reinterpret or make judicious use of institutional prescriptions. This paper seeks to bridge this gap, through a longitudinal, comparative case study of the trajectories of four ostensibly similar change initiatives in the same complex organizational field. It studies the influence of three dominant institutional logics (professional, market and corporate) in these divergent trajectories, elucidating the role of mediating influences, operating below the level of the field but above that of the actor, that worked to constrain or facilitate agency. The consequence for actors was a divergent realization of the relationship between the three logics, with very different consequences for their ability to advance their interests. Our findings offer an improved understanding of when and how institutional complexity facilitates autonomy, and suggests mediating influences at the level of the organization and the relationship it instantiates between carriers of logics, neglected by macro- and micro-level studies, that merit further attention.

Item Type: Journal Article
Subjects: H Social Sciences > HD Industries. Land use. Labor
R Medicine > RA Public aspects of medicine
Divisions: Faculty of Social Sciences > Warwick Business School
Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH): Corporate culture, Organizational change, Great Britain. National Health Service
Journal or Publication Title: Organization Studies
Publisher: Sage Publications Ltd.
ISSN: 0170-8406
Official Date: 1 January 2017
Dates:
DateEvent
1 January 2017Published
23 August 2016Available
4 July 2016Accepted
Volume: 38
Number: 1
Page Range: pp. 103-127
DOI: 10.1177/0170840616663241
Status: Peer Reviewed
Publication Status: Published
Access rights to Published version: Open Access
Funder: Great Britain. National Health Service (NHS), National Institute for Health Research (Great Britain). Health Services and Delivery Research (NIHR HS&DR), Collaborations for Leadership in Applied Health Research and Care (CLAHRC)
Grant number: Project number 09/1001/40 (NIHR HS&DR)

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