Rethinking Collective Action: The Co-Evolution of the State & Institutional Entrepreneurs in Emerging Economies
Forthcoming in Organization Studies
44 Pages Posted: 16 May 2015 Last revised: 9 Sep 2016
Date Written: May 16, 2015
Abstract
Why do groups form to influence policy outcomes? Classic notions of collective action tell us that a small number of homogeneous individuals are more likely to form a group and thus achieve preferred policy outcomes. Yet, this is not always reflected in the empirical record as external factors, such as the state, influence the costs of organizing. While the institutional entrepreneurship literature highlights the key role these actors can play in shaping institutions and, at times, organizational fields, it does not seek to explain why change agents appear in some instances and not others. Moreover, traditional perspectives in the collective action literature either assume rationality or a passive state. This article seeks to fill this theoretical gap by drawing on the literature on coevolution, which helps explain the variation in group formation by underscoring how the state and new industries shape one another. Drawing from the case of microfinance in Brazil and Mexico, this research asserts that the formation of microfinance associations is a function of actors’ ability to access the state, which results in distinct processes: co-evolution by isolation or co-optation. This process has subsequent implications for institutional change, policy outcomes and, ultimately, the distribution of power and prospects of development within emerging economies.
Keywords: Co-evolution, collective action, microfinance, institutional entrepreneurship
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