The Iron Cage Revisited: Institutional Isomorphism and Collective Rationality in Organizational Fields
Item
Title
The Iron Cage Revisited: Institutional Isomorphism and Collective Rationality in Organizational Fields
Abstract/Description
What makes organizations so similar? We contend that the engine of rationalization and bureaucratization has moved from the competitive marketplace to the state and the professions. Once a set of organizations emerges as a field, a paradox arises: rational actors make their organizations increasingly similar as they try to change them. We describe three isomorphic processes--coercive, mimetic, and normative--leading to this outcome. We then specify hypotheses about the impact of resource centralization and dependency, goal ambiguity and technical uncertainty, and professionalization and structuration on isomorphic change. Finally, we suggest implications for theories of organizations and social change.
Author/creator
Date
In publication
Volume
48
Issue
2
Pages
147-160
Resource type
Background/Context
Medium
Print
Background/context type
Conceptual
Open access/free-text available
Yes
Peer reviewed
Yes
ISSN
0003-1224
DOI
Citation
DiMaggio, P. J., & Powell, W. W. (1983). The Iron Cage Revisited: Institutional Isomorphism and Collective Rationality in Organizational Fields. American Sociological Review, 48(2), 147–160. https://doi.org/10.2307/2095101
Resource status/form
Published Text
Scholarship genre
Theoretical
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