Reform as Routine: Organizational Change in the Modern World Book

Preface vii

Acknowledgements ix

1 The Reforming Organization 1

The construction of organizations 1

Reforms: frequency, contents, and consequences 6

Reforms along fundamental institutions 10

Reform dynamics 14

Homogeneity and heterogeneity of forms 18

2 Beliefs Creating Reform: The Case of Markets and Organizations 21

Beliefs and practice 21

Markets and organizations 24

Allocation of responsibility 31

Bases and problems of legitimacy 33

Reforms 38

3 Constructing Organizations: The Example of Public Sector Reform 43

Reforms that construct organizations 45

Constructing identity 46

Constructing hierarchy 50

Constructing rationality 51

Reforms in packages or in strings 54

Degrees of organization: actors, agents, and arenas 56

Organizatory reform as completion 63

Incentives for constructing organizations 67

Conclusions 70

4 Politicization and 'Company-ization' - On Institutional Affiliation and Confusion in the Organizational World 72

The political organization and the company 73

Politicization, company-ization, and associationization 81

Processes of institutional confusion 84

Weak institutions 89

5 Organizational Reforms as Routines 91

The supply of problems 92

The supply of solutions 96

The supply of forgetfulness 98

The risks of reform 100

Avoiding reform 101

6 The Standardization of Organizational Forms as a Cropping-up Process 105

Standardization processes 107

A cropping-up model of organizational forms 112

Model dynamics 119

Interaction between reforms and discourse 123

Some additional questions 125

7 Reform and Power 127

Reformers as agents 127

Reform as image building 134

8 TheHopeful Organization 140

The hope for the true organization 141

Mechanisms of hope 143

Maintaining hope 152

References 55

Index 167