Tolbert and Zucker (1983)

Below is the summary of and comment on Pamela S. Tolbert and Lynne G. Zucker (1983) “Institutional Sources of Change in the Formal Structure of Organizations: The Diffusion of Civil Service Reform, 1880-1935,” Administrative Science Quarterly, 28 (1), 22-39.

Summary

This paper analyzes the diffusion and institutionalization of change in formal organization structure. Theoretical goal of this paper is to specify the boundaries between the rational and the institutional approaches to organizations clearly and confirm the central role of history in understanding organizations. Both approaches emphasize different aspects to understand the underlying diffusion of an innovation in the formal structure of organizations. The rational approaches point to the need for effectiveness or efficiency that may follow adoption. The institutional approaches point to the legitimacy of the organization in the wider social structure.

To reconcile the two approaches, the authors analyzed the adoption of civil service procedures by municipal governments from 1880 to 1935. Using available data, this paper answers two questions: What is the effect of explicit hierarchical legitimation of a reform, and What is the effect of rapid and widespread legitimation of a reform on its subsequent adoption? To answer the first question, the authors compare the effect of hierarchical control by the state with the effect of non mandated spread of reform on the rate of diffusion. To answer the second question, authors explore the change in the ability to predict adoption on the basis of particular organizational characteristics from the early periods to the later periods.

The first analysis reveals that civil service procedures were adopted much more rapidly by cities when the state mandated them and the process of adoption was directed by a single source. In contrast, when no state-level legitimation occurred, civil service procedures were adopted gradually, diffusing largely through social influence among cities.

The finding from the second analysis is much more important for the authors. They found that internal organizational factors predicted adoption of civil service procedures at the beginning of the diffusion process, but did not predict adoption once the process was well underway. They interpreted this finding as follows: As an increasing number of organizations adopt a program or policy, it becomes progressively institutionalized, or widely understood to be a necessary component of rationalized organizational structure. Also, they insisted that the legitimacy of the procedures themselves serves as the impetus for the later adopters. This finding means that early adopters of innovation are driven by rational reason, effectiveness or efficiency, but late adopters are by the legitimacy.

Comments

I enjoyed this classic paper well. It has both theoretical and empirical contribution. As for theoretical contribution, the authors succeeded to examine two theoretical approaches in the same empirical study. Although two streams of organization theory seem incompatible, both explanations are probably plausible for practitioners. They sometimes adopt innovations willingly to improve their internal process of the organization, and sometimes incorporate them into their formal structure to maintain their legitimacy. The authors explained clearly about this difference by the timing of adoption: an early adoption of innovation is driven by the adopters’ rational reason to improve their efficiency and/or effectiveness, and a late adoption by the pressure from their institutional environment.

As for empirical contribution, this paper figured out a unique technique to describe the institutionalization process empirically. To show the increasing power of the institutionalization through the diffusion process, the authors observed the predicting power of the model explaining adoption of civil service procedures by organizational characteristics such as percentages of foreign born and illiterate people, and city age and size. According to their analysis, the predicting power continued to weaken through the diffusion process. The authors interpreted it as the evidence of the legitimation and the institutionalization of innovation.

However, I may cast some doubt upon their empirical expression of the legitimation and the institutionalization. They did not show any direct evidence. Why could they insist that the civil service was institutionalized by showing the weaken power of the model? They seemed to assume that diffusion without rational reason meant legitimation and institutionalization of the innovation. But are rational and institutional reason either-or? It is possible to think that irrational cities adopt the civil service without feeling the legitimating pressure. They also assume that cities are rational enough to perceive how the innovation is institutionalized and to think that they should adopt it once if institutionalized. It is not necessarily clear what “rational” means in this paper.

This paper is nevertheless a successful research on a diffusion process in modernized society constituted by active agents in institutionalized context. We still can use the technique adopted by the authors to analyze diffusion process observed in our contemporary society. It is fair to say that the problem mentioned above cannot be solved easily as far as we deal with historical case. If we analyze recent diffusion process, we can observe it more directly. For example, we can adopt an interview method to grasp adopters’ and non-adopters’ intention and perception about innovation. By comparing interview and available data, we can gain deeper insight on institutionalization process.