Institutional Organizational Analysis Change and Transformation
CBS PhD School
Faculty
Professor Tammar Zilber
Department of Organization, CBS & Hebrew University of Jerusalem
Professor Renate Meyer
Department of Organization, CBS & WU Vienna
Professor Eva Boxenbaum
Department of Organization, CBS
Susanne Boch Waldorff
Department of Organization, CBS
Prerequisites
The PhD student must be working on a research project that lends itself to an organizational institutional analysis. Naturally, the idea is not to push students into becoming institutional theorists, but to make them reflect upon their projects from this theoretical perspective.
Phd students are required required to present a five-pages (maximum) written presentation in which they relate the curriculum literature in the course to their project. The presentation must include specific references to the literature applied. Deadline for submission of course paper is 23 August 2025. This written presentation will be shared with other students and students will present their project in the course and will receive feedback on it.
The student presentation should provide material for discussion in minor groups during the course, and the student must be willing to participate in discussions of other presentations.
It is a precondition for receiving the course diploma that the student attends the entire course.
Aim
The goal of the course is to give participants a broad overview of organizational institutionalism including its development over time and its application to different empirical phenomena. Students will also develop their capacity to use the approach in their own empirical work.
Course Content
The course focuses on the school within institutional theory that is rooted in sociology. We trace the development of the theory from its conception to its most recent developments and applications in organizational analysis. We explore historical change and transformations in the meaning of organizational structures and practices and analyze how institutions are constructed and diffused; how institutional elements are incorporated into and translated in organizations as well as how institutional change and institutional entrepreneurship influence specific organizational fields.
We discuss diverse methodological approaches to the study of institutionalization processes – macro- as well as micro approaches – and explore the applicability of institutional theory and methods to the empirical projects of course participants.
Teaching style
Lectures with workshops, dialogues and student discussions.
Lecture plan
Sept. 22 (13-17)
Foundations of new institutional theory
Empirical findings on diffusion and decoupling
Sept. 23 (9-17, possibly dinner)
Institutional fields and transformations
Institutional change and multiple institutional logics
Project discussions
Sept. 24 (9-17)
Translation of ideas
Institutional work and entrepreneurship
Project discussions
Sept. 25 (9-17)
Methods in institutional analyses
Critiquing organizational institutional analysis
Project discussions
Sept. 26 (9-14)
New directions in organizational institutional analysis
Using institutional theory in organizational practice
Wrap-up and evaluations
Optional add-on: Oct. 7 (13-16)
Project discussions (online)
Learning objectives
Participants get insights into the historical development of organizational institutionalism and into the most recent approaches to organizational stability, change and transformation. The participants also learn how to use the theory in empirical work, especially in their own projects.
Exam
N/A
Course Literature (preliminary)
Alvesson & Spicer (2019). ‘Neo-institutional theory and organization studies: A mid-life crisis?’ Organization Studies, 40(2), 199-218.
Battilana, Leca & Boxenbaum (2009). ‘How actors change institutions: Toward a theory of institutional entrepreneurship’. Academy of Management Annals, 3, 65-107.
Berg Johansen & Waldorff (2017). ‘What are institutional logics - and where is the perspective taking us?’ In Kruecken, Mazza, Meyer, & Walgenbach (Eds.): New Themes in Institutional Analysis: 51-76.
Boxenbaum & Jonsson (2017). ‘Isomorphism, diffusion and decoupling: concept evolution and theoretical challenges’. In Greenwood, Oliver, Lawrence, & Meyer (Eds.), The Sage Handbook of Organizational Institutionalism, 2nd ed.: 79-104.
Brandtner, Powell, & Horvath (2023). ‘From iron cage to glass house: Repurposing of bureaucratic management and the turn to openness’. Organization Studies,10.1177/01708406231200727.
Czarniawska & Joerges (1996). ‘Travel of ideas’. In Czarniawska & Sevon (Eds.), Translating Organizational Change: 13-47.
DiMaggio & Powell (1983). ‘The Iron cage revisited: Institutional isomorphism and collective rationality in organizational fields’ (chapter 3 in Powell & DiMaggio, 1991)
Drori (2019). ‘Hasn’t institutional theory always been critical?!’ Organization Theory, 1(1), doi 2631787719887982.
Drori (2025 forthcoming). ‘Institutional stress: Academic freedom under attack by democratic backsliding.’ Organization Studies
Friedland & Alford (1991). ‘Bringing society back in: Symbols, practices and institutional contradictions’ (chapter 10 in Powell & DiMaggio, 1991).
Galleli & Amaral (2025). ‘Bridging institutional theory and social and environmental efforts in management: A review and research agenda.’ Journal of Management, 01492063251322429.
Grafström, Jonsson & Klintman (2023). ‘Embracing the academic–practice gap: Knowledge collaboration and the role of institutional knotting’. Management Learning, pp.1-24.
Gümüsay & Amis (2020). ‘Engaging with grand challenges: An institutional logics perspective.’ Organization Theory, 1(3).
Jancsary, Meyer, Höllerer, & Boxenbaum (2018). ‘Institutions as multimodal accomplishments: Towards the analysis of visual registers’. In: Research in the Sociology of Organizations (Multimodality, Meaning, and Institutions) 54A, 87-117.
Jancsary, Meyer, Höllerer & Barberio (2017). ‘Toward a structural model of organizational-level institutional pluralism and logic interconnectedness’. Organization Science, 28(6), 1150-1167.
Lawrence, Leca & Zilber (2013). ’Institutional work: Current research, new directions and overlooked issues’. Organization Studies, 34(8), 1023-1033.
Lawrence & Suddaby (2006). ’Institutions and institutional work.’ In Clegg, Hardy, Nord, & Lawrence (Eds.), SAGE Handbook of Organization Studies, 2nd ed.: 215-254.
Lechterman & Mair (2024). ‘Social enterprises as agents of social justice: A Rawlsian perspective on institutional capacity’. Organization Studies, 45(9), 1301-1323.
Leibel, Hallett & Bechky (2018). ‘Meaning at the source: The dynamics of field formation in institutional research’. Academy of Management Annals, 12(1), 154-177.
Leixnering, Meyer & Doralt (2022). ’The past as prologue: Purpose dynamics in the history of the aktiengesellschaft’. Research in the Sociology of Organizations, 78, 97-120.
Meyer, J. & Rowan (1977). ‘Institutional organizations: Formal structure as myth and ceremony’ (chapter 2 in Powell & DiMaggio, 1991)
Meyer, R. (2008). ‘New sociology of knowledge: Historical legacy and current strands’ In Greenwood, Oliver, Suddaby, & Sahlin (Eds.), The Sage Handbook of Organizational Institutionalism: 519-538.
Meyer, Jancsary, & Höllerer (2021). “Zones of Meaning, Leitideen, Institutional Logics” in Research in the Sociology of Knowledge, 70, 161-186
Munir (2019). ‘Challenging institutional theory’s critical credentials’. Organization Theory, 1(1), doi 2631787719887975.
Powell (1991). ‘Expanding the scope of institutional analyses’ (chapter 8 in Powell & DiMaggio, 1991).
Røvik (2016). ‘Knowledge transfer as translation: Review and elements of an instrumental theory’. International Journal of Management Reviews, 18, 290-310.
Strang & Meyer, J. (1993). Institutional conditions for diffusion. Theory and Society, 22(4), 487–511.
Wedlin & Sahlin (2017). ’The imitation and translation of management ideas’. In The SAGE Handbook of Organizational Institutionalism (2nd ed.): 102-127.
Wooten & Hoffman (2017).’Organizational fields: Past, present and future’ In The Sage Handbook of Organizational Institutionalism, 2nd ed.: 55-74.
Wæraas & Nielsen (2016). ‘Translation theory “translated”: Three perspectives on translation in organizational research.’ International Journal of Management Reviews, 18, 236–270.
Zilber (2020). ‘The methodology/theory interface: Ethnography and the microfoundations of institutions’. Organization Theory, 1(2), 1-27.
Zilber (2024). ’Narrating institutional logics into effect: Coherence across cognitive, political, and emotional elements.’ Administrative Science Quarterly, 69, 172-221.