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Institutional Change and Organizational Diversity: The Effects of Collective Action on Worker-Recovered Businesses

Carruth, Paul
http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1483656651672824

Abstract Details

2017, Doctor of Philosophy, Ohio State University, Sociology.
How do new organizational forms emerge and proliferate? This is a central question in organizational theory and economic sociology, as well as in our understanding of societal change more broadly. New organizational forms provide templates of practices and structures that embody social identities and cultural values in different ways from prior forms. The development of new organizational forms can therefore enhance a society’s repertoire of organizational solutions to social problems and serve as vehicles for cultural change. However, sociological depictions of organizational populations typically highlight the cognitive, normative, and regulative factors that constrain deviations from pre-existing organizational forms. There is a growing consensus in organizational research that we need more attention to the development of new organizational forms, focusing particularly on the role of social movements in shaping organizational development. I draw on and advance this agenda through analyses of the unique case of the worker-recovered businesses movement in Argentina. Worker-recovered businesses refer to a population of firms that went bankrupt or were abandoned by their owners, but were taken over by their former employees and managed as cooperative enterprises. I construct a rich dataset from numerous sources on worker-recovered businesses and their social environments between 1989 and 2007 for all Argentinian provinces, including data on social movement activity, political contexts, and economic conditions. I use these data to study the historical and structural contexts that influenced the founding rates of these novel economic organizations. I undertake three empirical analyses of the influence of prior social movement and community activity on later worker-recovered businesses. First, I investigate whether a social movement targeting the state produces “spillover” effects on the worker-recovered businesses movement. I argue that an unemployed-workers movement provided cognitive cues and cultural information for worker-recovered businesses protagonists that facilitated organization-building collective action. Second, I consider how legacies of collective action influence the emergence of alternative organizations. I find that prior movement struggles provide cultural lessons that later challengers adapt to solve new problems. Finally, I explore the influence of community organizations on the founding rate of worker-recovered businesses. I find that pre-existing infrastructures of community organizations provided the institutional logics and social capital that underpin the transformation of failed businesses into a cooperative enterprise. This dissertation contributes to the burgeoning literature integrating social movement theory, economic sociology, and organizational analysis. The findings provide insights into how protest cycles and social structures influence the emergence and growth of new organizational forms. More generally, this dissertation suggests that the cultural and relational residue of collective action in other domains enhances a population’s capacity to build alternative forms of economic organization. The results therefore contribute to an understanding of the historical, cultural, and structural dimensions of social change.
Rachel Dwyer (Advisor)
138 p.
Sociology

Recommended Citations

Citations

  • Carruth, P. (2017). Institutional Change and Organizational Diversity: The Effects of Collective Action on Worker-Recovered Businesses [Doctoral dissertation, Ohio State University]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1483656651672824

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • Carruth, Paul. Institutional Change and Organizational Diversity: The Effects of Collective Action on Worker-Recovered Businesses. 2017. Ohio State University, Doctoral dissertation. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1483656651672824.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • Carruth, Paul. "Institutional Change and Organizational Diversity: The Effects of Collective Action on Worker-Recovered Businesses." Doctoral dissertation, Ohio State University, 2017. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1483656651672824

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)

osu1483656651672824
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© 2017, all rights reserved.
This open access ETD is published by The Ohio State University and OhioLINK.