北京师范大学
教育研究中的比较―历史方法
Lecture 5
Approach to Comparative-Historical Method (2):
New Institutionalism in Comparative Perspective
A. Social Institutions as Contextuality in Comparative Studies
1. As Mattei Dogan underlines, comparative method is essential in studies of social
phenomena, which are "contextual and relativistic" in their economic, political
social, and cultural environment. (Dogan, 2006; p.309)
2. One of these contexts, in which all social phenomena are embedded, is its
institutional context. This embeddedness can best be illustrated in Berger and
Luckmann's thesis on the "world-openness" of human existence.
3. Berger and Luckmann (1966) make the distinction between the "open-world"
existence of human beings and the "closed-world" existence of non human animals.
a. "All non-human animals, as species and as individuals, live in closed worlds
whose structures are predetermined by the biological equipment of the several
animal species.” (1966, p.65) In other words, every non-human species has
"largely fixed relationship to its environment." (p.65)
b. "By contrast, man's relationship to his environment is characterized by worldopenness. Not only has man succeeded in establishing himself over the greater
part of the earth's surface, his relationship to the surrounding environment is
everywhere very imperfectly structured by his own biological constitution."
(p.65)
4. The "double environmental interrelationship" in human existence
a. Berger and Luckmann contend that the constitution of the "world openness" of
human existence is contributed by the fact that human beings are developing and
living in an environment, which “is both natural and human one." (p. 66) That is,
human being’s existence "not only interrelates with a particular natural
environment, but with a specific cultural and social order." And it is exactly this
"double environmental interrelationship", which contributes to human’s
“immense plasticity in its response to the environment force at work on it.”
(p.66)
b. In relation to natural aspect of the environment, Berger and Luckmann indicate
that human beings’ biological constitutions and “instinctual organization may be
described as underdeveloped, compared with that of other higher mammals.”
(p.66) However, human beings are not only endowed with biological
constitution and instinctual organization but are also born and acculturated into
particular social and cultural orders. It is exactly this social and cultural aspect of
human environment, which provides human being the flexibility and plasticity in
adapting to great varieties of natural environment, i.e. the world-openness.
c. “One may say that the biological intrinsic world-openness of human existence is
always, and indeed must be, transformed by social order into a relative worldcloseness.” (p.69) Berger and Luckmann underline that "to understanding the
causes for … the emergence, maintenance and transmission of a social order one
must undertake an analysis that eventuates in a theory of institutionalization."
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4. In recent decades, the new institutionalist movement in different disciplines of
the social sciences have developed a rich arsenal of conceptual instruments and
analytical tools which are readily available for researchers to use as “operational
concepts” and “mediating devices in comparative-historical enquires.
B. Academic Origins of New Institutionalism
1. One of initiative of the new institutionalist perspective is the reaction to prevailing
perspectives in political sciences in the 1960s. One is the “old institutionalism”,
which focuses their studies of the political institutions on formal-legal structure of
the government, e.g. the legislative, executive and juridical structures. The other is
the political behavior approach, which applies the behaviorism in psychology and
concentrate o analyzing the political behaviors of individual political actors, such as
voters. In reaction to them, new institutionalism focuses on the political meanings,
symbols and cultures that constitute the regularity and durability underwriting the
political institution and its structures.
2. Another initiative of the new institutionalist perspective is the reaction to the
methodological individualism found in economics, which manifest in theories of
rational choice and preference. In reaction to these, new institutionalism put its
emphasis on meanings and cultures, i.e. the logic of appropriateness, underlying
human behaviors and choice. Hence, the new institutionalism reinstates the
methodological collectivism (or more specifically methodological institutionalism)
in economics by accounting for economic actions with social units such as firms,
classes, status groups, ethnic groups, nation, and so on rather than individuals’
preferences and choices.
3. In sociology, the rise of new institutionalism is mainly in reaction to the legalrational system model prevailing in organization studies and the structuralfunctionalism dominating the marco-sociological studies, such as development
studies. Based on the social phenomenological perspective made popular by Berger
and Luckmann in their work The Social Construction of Reality (1967), new
institutionalists emphasize the informal structure of organization and the subjective
elements underlying patterned actions and enduring practices.
B. Conception of Institution: The Contextual Embeddedness
1. Douglass C. North stipulates that “institutions are rules of the game in a society or
more formally, are the humanly devised constraint that shape human interaction. In
consequence they structure incentives in human exchange, whether political, social
or economic.” (North, 1990, p. 3)
2. James March and Johan Olsen’s defines that “An institution is a relatively enduring
collection of rules and organized practices, embedded in structures of meaning and
resources that are relatively invariant in the face of turnover of individuals and
relatively resilient to the idiosyncratic preferences and expectations of individuals
and changing external circumstances.” (March and Olsen, 2006, p.3) According, in
institutions
a. “There are constitutive rules and practices prescribing appropriate behavior for
specific actors in specific situations.
b. There are structures of meaning, embedded in identities and belongings:
common purposes and accounts that give direction and meaning to behavior,
and explain, justify and legitimate behavioral codes.
c. There are structures of resources that create capabilities for action.” (ibid, my
numbering)
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3. John Campbell’s states that “Institutions …consist of formal and informal rules,
monitoring and enforcing mechanisms, and systems of meaning that define the
context within which individuals, corporations, labor unions, nation-states and other
organizations operate and interact with each other. Institutions are settlements born
from struggle and bargaining. They reflect the resources and power of those who
made them and, in turn, affect the distribution of resources and power in society.
Once created, institutions are powerful external forces that help determine how
people make sense of their world and act in it. They channel and regulate conflict
and thus ensure stability in society.” (Campbell, 2004, p. 1)
4. Richard Scott defines that “Institutions consist of cognitive, normative, and
regulative structures and activities that provide stability and meaning to social
behavior. Institutions are transported by various carries ── cultures, structures, and
routines ── and they operate at multiple levels of jurisdiction.” (Scott, 1995, p.33)
5. Peter Berger and Thomas Luckmann indicate that “institutionalization occurs
whenever there is a reciprocal typiifcation of habitualized actions by types of actors.
Put differently, any such typification is an institution. What must be stressed is the
reciprocity of institutional typifications and the typicality of not only the actions but
the actors in institution. The typifications of habitualized actions that constitute
institutions are always shared ones. They are available to all members of the
particular social group in question, and the institution itself typifies individual
actors as well as individual actions.” (1966, p. 72)
B. The Perspectives in New Institutionalism:
1. Peter Hall and R.C.R. Taylor have distinguished three perspectives in new
institutionalism in political science:
a. Historical Institutionalism:
i. This perspective tends to see enduring human behavior-patterns as outcomes
evolve from specific historical and socio-economic contexts. Hence
“historical institutionalists tend to view have a view of institutional
development that emphasizes path dependence and unintended
consequences.” (P. 938)
ii. “Historical institutionalists define institution the formal or informal
procedures, routines, norms and conventions embedded in the organizational
structure of the polity or political economy. They can range from the rules of
a conventional order or the standard operating procedures of a bureaucracy to
the conventional governing trade union behaviour or bank-firm relations.” (P.
938)
iii. “In this perspective, the individual is seen as an entity deeply embedded in a
world of institutions, composed of symbols, scripts and routines, which
provide the filters for interpretation, of both the situation and oneself, out of
which a course of action is constructed. Not only do institutions provide
strategically-useful information, they also affect the very identities, selfimages and preferences of the actions.” (p. 939)\
b. Rational-choice institutionalism:
i. “The rational choice institutionalists in political science drew fruitful
analytical tools from the ‘new economics of organization’, which emphasizes
the importance of property rights, rent-seeking, and transactions costs, to the
operation and development of institutions. Especially influential was
Willamson’s argument that the particular organizational form can be
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explained as the result of an effort to reduce the transaction cost of
undertaking the same activity without such as institutions.” (P. 943)
ii. Rational-choice institutionalists “posit that the relevant actors have a fixed set
of preferences or tastes, …behave entirely instrumentally so to maximize the
attainment of these preferences and do so in a highly strategic manner that
presumes extensive calculation.” (Pp. 944-945)
iii. Rational-choice institutionalist tend to see politics as a series of collective
action dilemmas. The latter can be defined as instances when individuals
acting to maximizing the attainment of their own preferences are likely to
produce an outcome that is collectively suboptimal. …Typically, what
prevents the actors from taking a collectively-superior course of action is
absence of institutional arrangements that would guarantee complementary
behaviour by others. Classic examples includes the ‘prisoner’s dilemma’ and
the ‘tragedy of the commons’ and the political situations present a varieties of
such problems. (P. 945)
c. Sociological institutionalism:
i. "The sociological institutionalists tend to define institutions …not just formal
rules, procedures or norms, but the symbol systems, cognitive scripts, and
moral templates that provide the 'frames of meaning' guiding human action."
(p. 948) Accordingly, they "argue that many of the institutional forms and
procedures used by organizations were not adopted simply because they were
most efficient for the tasks at hand. …Instead, they argued that many forms
and procedures should be seen as culturally-specific practices, akin to the
myths and ceremonies derived by many societies." (p. 947)
ii. To some sociologists of new institutionalism, individual actions are construed
as role performances or prescriptive norms of behavior attached in particular
institutional contexts. "In this view, individuals who have been socialized
into particular institutional roles internalize the norms associated with these
roles, and in this way institutions are said to affect behaviour." (P. 948)
Furthermore, some sociological institutionalists "emphasize the way in which
institutions influence behaviour by providing the cognitive scripts, categories
and models that are indispensable for action, not least because without them
the world and the behaviour of others cannot be interpreted. Institutions
influence behaviour not simply by specifying what one should do but also by
specifying what one can imagine oneself in a given context." (p. 948)
iii. One of the distinctive features of the sociological institutionalism is the
explanation it offered for the endurance of institutional practices. Instead of
accounting them for rational-choices out of game situations or traditional
"dependent paths" inherited from the past, sociologists in new
institutionalism strive to reveal the legitimate bases from which reciprocal
practices among social actors derived and consensual arrangements among
reasonable agents endure.
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Source: Campbel2004, P. 11.
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Source: Campbel and Pedersen, 2001, P. 10.
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C. Conceptual Apparatuses in the Studies of Institutional Effects
1. Categorization of orders: March and Olsen account for the enduring patterns of human
practices by signifying the following institutional orders. (March and Olsen, 1984)
a. Symbolic orders: They refer to the patterns and ordering of productions, circulations
and consumptions of meanings, ideas, concepts, symbols, rituals, ceremonies, stories
and drama in social life.
b. Normative orders: They refer to the organizations and practices of rights, duties,
obligations, roles, rules, norms and regulations in social life.
c. Endogenous orders: They signify the internal mechanism and processes, which affect
things like the power distribution, distribution, the distribution of preferences, or the
management of control” within an institutions.
d. Historical orders: They refer to the essential concept of “the efficiency of historical
processes” in new institutionalism. By efficiency of historical efficiency, it refers to
the way in which history moves quickly and inexorably to a unique outcome,
normally in some sense an optimum.” (March and Olsen, 1984, p. 743) Accordingly,
the internal order of an institution will be constrained by the particular period in
history and its condition of optimum within which the institution operates.
2. The conception of institutional elements
Richard Scott suggests that “institution are viewed as made up of three component
elements” (1994, p.56) or as he later called three pillars (1995)
a. The regulative pillar: The effect or order of institutions is accounted for by ways of
emphasizing the prominence of explicit regulative processes prevailing in
institutions. They consist of “rule-setting, monitoring, and sanctioning activities”
undertaken in institutions. Hence, the institutional effects, i.e. the institutional
order, depend on “the capacity to establish rules, inspect or review others’
conformity to them, and as necessary, manipulate sanctions ──rewards or
punishments── in an attempt to influence future behavior.” (Scotts, 1995, p. 35)
b. The normative pillar: Theorists emphasize the normative pillar in accounting for
institutional effects by focusing on the “prescriptive, evaluative, and obligatory
dimensions” of social life. “Normative systems include both values and norms.
Values are conceptions of the preferred or the desirable together with the
construction of the standards to which existing structures or behavior can be
compared and assessed. Norms specify how things should be done; they define
legitimate means to pursue value ends.” (p. 37)
c. The cognitive pillar: The institutional effects can also be accounted for by
emphasizing cognitive elements in institutions, which refer to “the rules that
constitute the nature of reality and the frames through which meaning is made.” (p.
40) Constitutive rules have been identified as the foremost cognitive elements in
this perspective. By constitutive rules, it refers “rules involve the creation of
categories and the construction of typifications: processes by which ‘concrete and
subjectively unique experiences… are ongoingly subsumed under general orders of
meaning that are both objectively and subjectively real.” (p.41)
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3.
Levels of institutional analysis: “Institutional arrangements (i.e. elements) can be found
at a variety of levels in social system – in societies, in organizational fields, in
individual organizations, and in primary and small groups” (Rowan & Miskel, 1999, p.
359; Scott, 1995, p. 55-60)
a. System level – The conception of Institutional environment
i. Institutional environment: “Institutional environments are, by definition, those
characterized by the elaboration of rules and requirements to which individual
organizations must conform if they are to receive support and legitimacy”
(Scott and Meyer, 1991, p.123)
ii. Two of the most prominent institutional environments in modern society are
the nation-state and market, both of which share one of the most salient
features of modernity, namely, rationality.
b. Sector level – The conception of organizational fields
i. Organizational field: It refers to “a community of organizations that partakes of
a common meanings system and whose participants interact more frequently
and fatefully with one another than with actors outside of the field.” Hence,
“fields are defined in terms of shared cognitive or normative frameworks or a
common regulative system.” (Scott, 1995, p. 56)
ii. Isomorphism: Organizations in an a organization field tends to become
homogenous in terms of cognitive, normative and regulative aspects of the
organizations. The concept best captures this process is isomorphism.
“Isomorphism is a constraining process that forces one unit in a population to
resemble other units that face the same set of environmental conditions.”
(DiMaggio and Powell, 19991, p. 66)
iii. Two of the forces at work in modern society are efficiency and legitimacy. The
former is more likely to be related to the competitiveness of the market, while
the latter to the state.
c.
Organization level – The formal structure of the organization
i. To comply with the isomorphic constraints of the organizational field and
institutional environment, individual organizations have to structure
themselves in regulative, normative and cognitive aspects to meet with the
institutional elements of the filed and environment.
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ii. As a result, two of the ideal typical types of formal structure of the
organizations have constituted in modern society, the firm and the bureaucracy
of government agencies.
d. Human interaction level – “reciprocal typifications and interpretations of
habitualized actions”
i. Members of an individual organization, organizational field, or institutional
environment will share many commonalities in meanings, interpretations, and
typifications, i.e. common cognitive elements.
ii. They will institutionalize common languages, interacting and communicating
patterns, and routines in practices.
iii. They will also institute common “logic of appropriateness and normative
elements.
iv. Their inactions are also subjected to the regulative elements of the institution
in which they find themselves.
e. Individual level - Internalization and Identity
i. In reaction to rational choice theory, new institutionalism perceives individuals
not simply as actors governed by rational calculus of preferences and selfinterest, i.e. logic of consequences (James, 1994, p.3) but as agent having
internalized set of norms, values and rules and their agency is governed by the
logic of appropriateness of particular institutional settings.
ii. When individuals and organizations fulfill identities, they follow rules or
procedures that they see as appropriate to the situation in which they find
themselves. Neither preference as they are normally conceived nor
expectations of future consequences enter directly into the calculus.” (March,
1994, p. 57)
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4. Paul Pierson’s conception of path dependence and positive feedback
Paul Pierson summarizes the thesis of path dependence suggested by institutionalists to
account for the durability of institutional effects.
a. Path dependence indicates that “once a country or region has started down a track,
the costs of reversal are very high. There will be other choice points, but the
entrenchments of certain institutional arrangements obstruct an easy reversal of the
initial choice. Perhaps the better metaphor is a tree, rather than a path. From the same
trunk, there are many different branches and smaller branches. Although it is possible
to turn around or to clamber from one to the other ─ and essential if the chosen
branch dies ─ the branch on which a climber begins is the one she tends to follow.
(Levi, 1997; quoted in Pierson, 2004, p. 20)
b. Simply put, path dependence refers “to social possesses that exhibit positive
feedback and thus generate branching patterns of historical development.” (ibid,
p.21)
c. Accounting for path dependence (ibid, p. 24)
i. Large set-up or fixed cost: “When setup or fixed costs are high, individuals and
organizations have a strong incentive identify and stick with a single option.”
ii. Learning effects: “Knowledge gained in the operation of complex systems also
leads to higher returns from continuing use.”
iii. Coordination effects: “These occur when the benefits an individual receives from
a particular activity increase as other adopt the option. If technologies embody
positive network externalities, a given technology will become more attractive as
more people use it. Coordination effects are especially significant when a
technology has to be compatible with an infrastructure (e.g. software with
hardware, automobiles with an infrastructure of roads, repair facilities and
fueling stations).”
iv. Adaptive expectations: “It derives from the self-fulfilling character of
expectations. Projections about future aggregate use pattern lead individuals to
adapt their actions in way that help to make those expectations come true.”
5. The concept of isomorphism: New institutionalism at organizational filed level
a. Conception of isomorphism: New institutionalists stipulate that organizations in
modern rational institutional environment and/or organizational field tend to develop
similar structures, procedures and practices (organizational elements in Meyer &
Rowan's terminology). They term this process of homogenization of organization
isomorphism. "Isomorphism is a constraining process that forces one unit in a
population to resemble other units that face the same set of environmental conditions."
(DiMaggio & Powell, 1991, p.66)
b. Distinction between competitive and institutional isomorphism: DiMaggio & Powell
(1991) and Meyer & Rowan (1991) have made similar distinctions between
competitive and institutional isomorphism.
i. By competitive isomorphism, it refers to the process of homogenization of
organizations taken place in "those field which free and open competition exists."
(DiMaggio & Powell, 1991, p.66) Organizations in these fields usually possess
"clearly defined technologies to produce outputs" and therefore those "outputs can
be easily evaluated" (Meyer & Rowan, 1991, p. 54) As a result, development of
common organizational elements, i.e. isomorphism, can be attained through market
competition, competitive niche, standardized output performance and
organizational efficiency. (DiMaggio & Powell, 1991, p. 66)
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ii. By institutional isomorphism, it refers to the process of homogenization of
organizations invoked in the context of "collective organized society" (Meyer &
Rowan, 1991, p. 49) in which institutional environment of modern bureaucratic
states have replaced market mechanism to act as institutional rules of the field. As
a result, in institutional organizations, the development of common organizational
elements can not be attain by market competition and internal efficiency, instead
"they incorporate elements which are legitimated externally" and "they employ
external or ceremonial assessment criteria to define the value of structural
elements." (Meyer & Rowan, 1991, p. 49)
"For example, American schools have evolved from producing rather specific
training that was evaluate according to strict criteria of efficiency to producing
ambiguously defined services that are evaluated according to criteria of
certification." (Meyer & Rowan, 1991, p. 55)
c. Mechanism of institutional isomorphism
DiMaggio & Powell identify three mechanism through which institutional
isomorphism are achieved, maintained or changed. The thesis can be taken as analysis
apparatus to study how schools, as institutional organization, adopt to education
policy changes.
i. Coercive isomorphism: "Coercive isomorphism results from both formal and
informal pressures exerted on organizations by other organizations upon which
they are dependent and by cultural expectations in the society within which
organizations function. Such pressures may be felt as force, as persuasion, or as
invitations to join in collusion." (DiMaggio & Powell, 1991, p. 67)
Organizational restructures undertaken by HK schools in response to QualityAssurance Inspection, School Self Evaluation, External School Review, SeniorSecondary Curriculum reform, School-based Management and Incorporated
Management Committee, etc. may be analyze in light of the concept of coercive
isomorphism.
ii. Mimetic isomorphism: Apart from coercive authority, "uncertainty is also a
powerful force that encourages imitation. When organizational technologies are
poorly understood, when goals are ambiguous, or when the environment creates
symbolic uncertainty, organizations may model themselves on other organization."
(DiMaggio & Powell, 1991, p. 69)
Confronted by collective puzzlement in policy implementation, such as those
initiated by Senior-Secondary curriculum reform or more specifically the teaching
of Liberal Studies, or School-Self Evaluation, most HK schools could only imitate,
model or simply copy from other schools.
iii. Normative isomorphism: Instead of compliance with modern institutional
environments of competitive market or bureaucratic-rational state, isomorphism
may take the form of professionalization. Organizations and their operations,
which are predominately identified with a profession, such as hospitals with
doctors and schools with teachers, can incorporate cognitive, normative and
regulative bases of that profession into their organizations and apply them as
criteria in assessing the performance as well and legitimation bases of their
organization.
6. The concept of social capital: New institutionalism at interpersonal level
a. According to Berger and Luckmann, institution embeds in individuals and groups of
individuals in the form of "reciprocal typifications" and "habitualized actions." In
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recent years sociologists have initiated concepts such as social network and social
capital to depict the enduring interpersonal relationship in institutional context. For
example Lin conceptualizes that "social capital as …is rooted in social network and
social relations, and must be measured relative to its roots. Therefore social capital
can be defined as resources embedded in a social structure which are accessed and/or
mobilized in purposive action." (Lin, 2001, p.12)
b. Homophily: Lin further specifies that one of the structural foundations of social
capital is the principle of homophily. "The principle of homophily, also known as the
like-me hypothesis, is that social interactions tend to take place among individuals
with similar lifestyles and socioeconomic characteristics." (Lin, 2001a, p. 39) Lin's
the principle of homophily basically echoes Berger and Luckmann's indication that
identity as the basis of "reciprocal typification of habitualized action" in institutional
setting.
c. Portes and Sensenbrenner (1998) have specified four sources from which enduring
interpersonal co-operations, i.e. social capitals, are constituted.
i. Value introjection: It refers to "moral character" and "value imperatives"
individuals learned in the process of socialization. (Portes and Sensenbrenner,
1998, p. 129) This resource is basically in congruent with Beger and Luckmann's
conception of internalization in the process of institutionalization at individual
level.
ii. Reciprocity transactions: It "consists of an accumulation of 'chits' earned through
previous good deeds to others, backed by the norm of reciprocity." In comparison
with value introjection, in this type of social capital "individuals are not expected
to behave according to a higher group morality but rather to pure selfish end." (p.
130)
iii. Bounded solidarity: It refers to social capitals invoke from "situational
circumstances leading to the emergence of principled group-orientated
behavior. …Its classic sources are best exemplified by Marx and Engels's analysis
of the rise of proletarian consciousness and the transformation of workers into
class for themselves." (p. 130)
This type of collective sentiments grown out of common (usually socially inferior)
situations can also be found in unions, minority groups, etc.
iv. Enforceable trust: It refers of social capitals grown out of community, in which
"particularistic rewards and sanctions" are enforceable on its members in the form
of collective expectation and trusts. This type of social capitals may manifest in
informal institutional settings such as peer group pressures or solidarity within
new immigrant communities or in formal institutional setting such as community
sanction in professional associations.
D. Conceptual Apparatuses in the Studies of Institutional Change
1. Identifying types of institutional changes
a. Categorization of institutional changes
i. Evolutionary or incremental changes: It has been signified within the perspective
that "Institutions are sticky and prone to inertia and, as a result, change quite
gradually." Hence, changes undertaken by institutions has commonly been
characterized as evolutionary changes. By evolutionary changes, it refers to
"continuous change that proceeds in small, incremental steps along a single path
in certain direction." (Campbell, 2004, p. 33)
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ii. Revolutionary changes or punctuated equilibrium: Despite the institutional
inertia and resistance to change, "some scholars recognize, nonetheless, that
relatively rapid and profound institutional change does occur sometimes. They
often describe this discontinuous pattern of change as punctuated equilibrium."
(Campbell, 2004, p. 34)
iii. Punctuated evolution: Some scholars further specify that "The periods of
equilibrium occurring between punctuations are better characterized as
evolutionary rather than static." Hence, they prefer to characterize change in
institutions as punctuated evolution. That is, there are evolutionary changes in
terms of self reflection and social learning within periods of equilibrium and
equilibrium may be "punctuated occasionally by crises that involve open struggle
over the very core of the institutional status quo and the eventually result in truly
fundamental institutional transformation." (p. 34)
b. Identifying the dimensions of changes
i. Scott’s conception of three pillars
- Changes in regulative dimension of pillars
- Changes in normative dimension of institutions
- Changes in cognitive dimension of institutions
ii. Levels of abstraction
- World systemic level
- Societal level
- Discursive level
- Organizational level
- Interactive level
- Individual cognitive level
c. Identifying the time frame: Time frame refers to the duration of time within which
institutional changes are set against for investigation.
2. Explaining institutional changes
Explaining institutional changes: John Campbell (2004) has stipulated the causal
mechanism accounting for institutional changes as follows
a. Negative feedbacks and critical junctures on dependence path: As indicated above
the maintaining and sustaining of institutional patterns depends on the continuous
feedbacks from the prevailing "dependence path" of the institution. (Pierson, 2004)
However, as negative feedbacks from the dependence path appear and subsequently
accumulated to a critical point. It may then trigger fundamental changes in
institution. (Campbell, 2004, p.65-68)
b. Bricolage: It refers to innovations in combining existing repertoire of institutional
principles and practices so as to solve crises or dilemma confronting an institution.
(Campbell, 2004, p. 69) According to March and Olsen's conception, bricolage can
be categorized into
i. Substantive bricolage: It refers to innovative combination of well-established
technical principles or practices within an institution in order to bring about
adjustment or fundamental change.
ii. Symbolic bricolage: It refers to innovative combination of normative and
cognitive principles and practices so as to reconcile normative or cognitive
conflicts invoked by changes.
c. The role of institutional entrepreneurs or bricoleurs: The conception of institutional
entrepreneurs or bricoleurs can specify the agent of change in the causal explanation
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of institutional changes. The performance entrepreneurs depend basically on two
factors, namely their connectivity within the institution and the availability of
repertoires to be combined. As Campbell indicates "entrepreneurs with more diverse
social, organizational, and institutional connections tends to have more expansive
repertoires with which to work. In turn, the broader their repertoire, the more likely
they are to create a bricolage that is very creative and revolutionary rather than one
that is less creative and evolutionary, (Campbell, 2004, p.75)
e. Diffusion, translation and enactment:
i. Changes in punctuated equilibrium may not be invoked by bricoleurs from within
an institution. It may be triggered by input from other institutions. In other words,
institutional innovation or changes may diffuse and circulated among institutions.
Hence, institutional changes can be copies and learnt.
ii. However, input of changes or innovations from outside will not be copied
automatically and totally by a given institution. They must be translated and
innovatively combined with existing principles and practice.
iii. Finally, in order for any principles and practice input from without to substantiate
within a given institution, they must be internalized cognitively or normatively by
members of the institution to become part of their daily routines and practice. In
other words, changes have to be enacted by members on daily basis.
f. Normative and cognitive ideas about institutional changes
i. In accounting for institutional changes, new institutionalists play particular
attentions to how agents accept (interpret, identify, internalize, enact, etc.) new
ideas and in turn make changes in their practices, i.e. agencies.
ii. Typology of ideas about institutional change: Campbell has constructed a
framework to classify ideas into paradigms, public sentiments, programs and
frames.
iii. Typology of actors and their ideational roles: According to the classification of
ideas, Campbell has further differentiated actors within an institution into five
ideational roles
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Comparative-Historical Method in Ed Research
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Comparative-Historical Method in Ed Research
Additional References
Lin, Nan (2001) Social Capital: A Theory of Social Structure and Action. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press.
North, Douglas C. (1990) Institutions, Institutional Change and Economic Performance.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Portes, Alejandro Portes and Julia Sensenbrenner (1998) “Embeddedness and Immigration: Notes
on the Social Determinants of Economic Action. Pp. 127-153. In M. C. Brinton and V. Nee
(Eds.) New Institutionalism in Sociology. New
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Comparative-Historical Method in Ed Research