Howard E. Aldrich

Department d'Economia de l"Empresa

Univeritet Autonoma de Barcelona

May, 1998

This course takes an evolutionary approach to explaining organizational change. We review recent literature, judging it against the criterion of how well it accounts for the origin, persistence, transformation, and death of organizations.

Check out my home page for research projects and papers:

http://www.unc.edu/~healdric/.

You can reach me at: howard_aldrich@unc.edu

Overview of the Field

IF you want a general overview of the sociology of organizations field, you should consult the following books:

(1) Charles Perrow. 1986. Complex Organizations: A Critical Essay. (An iconoclastic look at the history of Organizational Theory in America.)

(2) W. Richard Scott. 1998. Organizations, Rational, Natural, and Open Systems.

(3) Lex Donaldson, 1995. American Anti-Management Theories of Organization. (Lex has something critical to say about all of the theories we cover in this seminar.)

Course Format

During the first day of class, I will break the class into three or four person teams.

Your team's responsibility in its class session: A team's first priority is to generate "questions of the day." In the class session for which your team is responsible, you will provide a context for the discussion by answering the following questions (not necessarily in this order):

(1) In what ways are these readings linked to what we have read previously?

(2) What is your critical evaluation of the readings?

(3) Can you think of an empirical project that would be a logical next step from these readings?

Note: Teams should NOT "make a presentation" of the readings themselves. No speeches, no lectures. Everyone will have done the readings, and everyone will participate in helping us understand what the readings mean for our investigation of organizational change.

Source Books on Evolution and Organizations:

Carroll, Glenn R. (ed.). 1988. Ecological Models of Organization. Cambridge, MA: Ballinger.

Singh, Jitendra V. (ed.). 1990. Organizational Evolution. Beverly Hills, CA: Sage.

Hodgson, Geoffrey.1993. Economics and Evolution. Cambridge, UK: Polity Press.

Baum, Joel and Jitendra Singh (eds.) 1994. Evolutionary Dynamics of Organizations. New York: Oxford University Press.

Carroll, Glenn R. and Michael T. Hannan (eds.). 1995. Organizations in Industry: Strategy, Structure, and Selection. New York: Oxford University Press.

05/18 Monday 16:00-17:45 Evolutionary Organization Theory: The Aldrichian View

H.E. Aldrich. Forthcoming. Organizations Evolving, Chapters 1 and 2.

05/18 Monday 18:15-20:00 Transactions Cost Economics and the Embeddedness View

Mark Granovetter. 1985. "Economic Action and Social Structure: The Problem of Embeddedness." American Journal of Sociology, 91: 481- 510.

Oliver E. Williamson 1981. "The Economics of Organization: The Transaction Cost Approach." American Journal of Sociology, 87: 548-577.

Oliver E. Williamson, Chapter 4, "Transaction Cost Economics and Organization Theory," in Neil Smelser and Richard Swedberg, editors, Handbook of Economic Sociology, Princeton University Press, pp. 77-107.

05/19 Tuesday 16:00-17:45 The Classic Foil to a Selection Model: Resource Dependence

Jeffrey Pfeffer and Gerald R. Salancik, The External Control of Organizations. 1978. Chapters 1-3, pp. 1-61.

W. Graham Astley and Edward J. Zajac, "Beyond Dyadic Exchange: Functional Interdependence and Sub-unit Power." Organization Studies, 11, 4: 481-501.

05/19 Tuesday 18:15-20:00 "Sociology" becomes "Institutional" in OT

John W. Meyer, and Brian Rowan. 1977. "Institutionalized Organizations: Formal Structure as Myth and Ceremony." American Journal of Sociology, 83: 340-363.

Paul J. DiMaggio and Walter W. Powell. 1983. "The Iron Cage Revisited: Institutional Isomorphism and Collective Rationality in Organizational Fields." American Sociological Review, 48: 147-160.

Pamela Tolbert and Lynne Zucker. 1996. "Institutional Analyses of Organizations: Legitimate but not Institutionalized," In Stewart R. Clegg, Cynthia Hardy, and Walter Nord (eds.), Handbook of Organization Studies. London: Sage.

05/20 Wednesday 16:00-17:45 Foundings of New Organizations

H.E. Aldrich. "Emergence: New Organizations; Boundaries; and The Emergence of a Community of Practice." Organizations Evolving, Chapters 3, 4, and 5.

05/20 Wednesday 18:15-20:00 What Goes On Inside Boundaries: Organizations as Programs & Routines

James G. March and H. Simon. 1958. Organizations. New York: Wiley, Chapter 6.

Nelson, Richard R .and Sidney Winter. 1982. An Evolutionary Theory of Economic Change. Cambridge, MA: Belknap, Chapters 4-5.

05/21 Thursday 16:00-17:45 New Populations & Their Origins

H.E. Aldrich. Forthcoming. "Emergence: New Populations." Organizations Evolving, Chapter 8

Lori Rosenkopf and Michael L. Tushman. 1994. "The Coevolution of Technology and Organization." Pp. 403-424 in Joel A.C. Baum and Jitendra V. Singh (eds.), Evolutionary Dynamics of Organizations. New York: Oxford University Press.

05/21 Thursday 18:15-20:00 Reproducing Populations

H.E. Aldrich. Forthcoming. "Reproducing Populations" Organizations Evolving, Chapter 9.

Phillip Anderson and Michael Tushman. 1990. "Technological Discontinuities and Dominant Designs: A Cyclical Model of Technological Change." Administrative Science Quarterly, 35: 604-633.

05/22 Friday 16:00-17:45 Transformation and Communities

H.E. Aldrich. "Transformation: Content & Process; and Transformation: An Evolutionary Framework; Community Evolution." Organizations Evolving, Chapters 6, 7, and 10.

05/22 Friday 18:15-20:00 Concluding Thoughts

Andrew H. Van de Ven and Ian Poole, 1995. "Explaining Development and Change in Organizations." Academy of Management Review, 20, 3: 510-540.

Lex Donaldson, Chapter 1, "Anti-Management Paradigms in Organization Theory," American Anti-Management Theories of Organization, pp. 1-31.