Institutionalising city networking: Discursive and rational choice institutional perspectives on membership of transnational municipal networks

This article analyses participants’ reasoning for their city’s membership in transnational municipal networks and the extent to which this changes over time. Theoretically, we build on new-institutional theory and conclude that although parts of the members’ reasoning have rational components, a discursive institutional perspective improves the understanding of cities’ membership of transnational municipal networks. This perspective uncovers how important aspects of transnational municipal network participation are motivated by a different logic than that of measurable output. Cities use transnational municipal networks as sources of internal and external legitimacy, to legitimatise their position in domestic politics and their international position among other ‘global’ cities.

Bringing the Local Back In: How Schools Work Differently in Different Neighborhood Contexts

Local settings have not been central to the debate on educational inequality. If researchers have taken neighborhoods into account, they have focused on (social) compositions, peer group effects, or school access. Yet I draw on interviews and observations at two Berlin schools to suggest that neighborhoods are also important as they shape the organizational practices of teachers and other educational professionals. Combining a Bourdieusian perspective and new institutional theory, I show how local settings become important as social, symbolic, and administrative units. As such, neighborhoods structure the interplay of institutional pressures and objective power relations both within and between schools. This perspective not only allows for a better understanding of the processes producing educational inequality; it also highlights that institutional changes might play out differently in different contexts, with consequences for neighborhood inequality in the field of education and beyond.

From Compliance to Improvement: How School Leaders Make Sense of Institutional and Technical Demands When Implementing a Continuous Improvement Process

Purpose: A recurring frustration in educational research is the tendency for school leaders to implement reforms in ways that prioritize compliance over more substantive improvements to practice. Drawing on new institutional theory and sensemaking theory, this article explores the different ways leaders respond to continuous improvement (CI) reforms and why they frequently privilege external compliance over the perceived needs of their schools. Methods: This study used interviews, observations, and artifacts to analyze how six leaders across two midwestern school districts led the implementation of a CI method. Data analysis involved an iterative process of identifying emergent themes, refining themes based on existing research, and evaluating their usefulness in explaining differences within and across school leaders, in order to understand the different ways leaders responded to CI and what factors caused them to prioritize compliance over substantive improvement. Findings: Findings illuminate six different responses to CI that vary across three dimensions: whether leaders prioritize bridging or buffering, the form or the function of reform, and concerns for external legitimacy or internal improvement. Leaders’ professional identities, their beliefs about the usefulness of CI, and their perception of district regulation contributed to whether they implemented CI in a way that prioritized concerns for legitimacy over improvement. Implications: These findings trace the shallow reach of recent reform efforts to the ways leaders make sense of the complex institutional and technical demands of their role, offer an integrative typology of leaders’ different approaches to implementation, and identify factors that support more productive responses to district reform.

Assessment of negative infrastructural externalities when determining the land value

The work forms and substantiates the concept of land value, based on a new institutional theory. The infrastructural component of the cost of land in the presented concept determines, on the one hand, the efficiency of the use of natural resources, properties, demand for land on the market, on the other hand, the costs, which are determined not only by capital investments in construction of engineering infrastructure, but also by losses associated with restrictions on activities within zones with special conditions for territory use, creation of unfavorable conditions for economic activity, small contours, irregularities and others on a specific land plot, which are external negative infrastructural externalities that create losses of rights holders of land plots that are not compensated by the market, falling within the boundaries of these zones. Methods for assessing the impact of such negative infrastructural externalities on the cost of land encumbered by zones in different conditions of land market activity have been developed and tested, based on an expert-analytical approach (depressed market); the ratio of market values of land plots encumbered and unencumbered by a specific zone, and qualimetric modeling (inactive market); modeling by introducing into the model the factor of presence of zones with special conditions for territory use, based on the grouping of zones according to similar regulations for use, or by introducing the parameters of this factor (active market). Methods for taking into account spatial deficiencies and compensating for restrictions and prohibitions on activities on the territory of land plots with an individual market assessment are proposed.

Divergent Interpretations and Inter-Organizational Relations of Halal Product Guarantee Policy in Indonesia

The emergence of the issue of halal products, both in the form of food and services, has also led to competition regarding the certification of halal products. Studies on competition between certification bodies have been carried out, but these studies do not focus on the competition that occurs in Southeast Asian countries, including Indonesia which is a big market for the halal industry. In Indonesia, the implementation of the regulation of Halal Product Guarantee (HPG) in Law No. 33 2014 still raises problems, including the related issue of inter-organizational relations. This article discusses the relations between organizations based on the interpretation of each party related to the Halal Product Guarantee policy, and the consequences arising from it. This article used new institutional theory, and a semiotics approach as analysis of verbal signs and gestures raised by each of the parties. This article argued that the interpretations of each organizational actor towards the new halal certification policy in Indonesia are driven by different institutional reasons/logics, resulting in contradictions, even conflicts related to the relationship between organizations implementing the policy. The difference in meaning, especially in the connotative meaning, shows the difference in institutional logic. Thus, there is a divergence in meaning. Therefore, it is important to equate significance (meaning/interpretation) to each of the institutions related to Halal Product Guarantee in order to realize the implementation of the regulations properly.

Sistem Kelembagaan Organisasi Subak Sebagai Pengelola Sumber Daya Air Berkelanjutan

Subak Babakan Bayu is a social institution that is in the midst of growth in Bali’s tourism industry, but Subak Babakan Bayu is able to maintain its existence as an executor of ritual activities, irrigation water management, buffering food security, environmental preservation and culture in a sustainable manner. The purpose of this research is to understand the organizational system of Subak Babakan Bayu. This research is a qualitative study using an ethnographic approach. The research location was in Sangkaragung Village, Jembrana District, Jembrana Regency, Bali. Data collection techniques using observation, interviews, and documentation. The technique of determining the subject of research using purposive sampling and using data analysis techniques include domain analysis, taxonomic analysis, compound analysis, and cultural theme analysis. The theory used is the social system theory from Niklass Luhmann and the new institutional theory (new institutional theory) from William Richard Scott. The results of this study indicate that the organizational system of the Subak Babakan Bayu organization has three basic elements that make the subak institution strong, namely the regulatory system including awig-awig, and perarem. The normative system is the norm of responsibility and justice, and the cognitive cultural system that includes beliefs, traditions and rituals. In its implementation, there are some obstacles but the social system is able to heal itself so that Subak Babakan Bayu still exists.

How Strategic Conformity Interacts with Innovation: An Empirical Study on Korean Manufacturing Firms from the Perspective of Optimal Distinctiveness

Whether to have a similar or different strategy than firms in same industry is the fundamental question for firms that want to build a competitive advantage. Recent literature, such as the new institutional theory and the perspective of optimal distinctiveness, has emphasized the configuration of competing forces that make firms simultaneously similar by conforming to industry norms and different by implementing innovation, leading to high performance. The primary rationale is that firms can exploit their high status of conformity as a stock of capital to differentiate themselves when required. Upon this rationale, we conducted research to test the hypotheses for optimal distinctiveness in the strategies of manufacturing firms in Korea. The results show that Korean firms have higher performance when they are mutually involved in higher conformity and innovation. It also suggests that firms in the industry with high volatility have difficulties in managing optimal distinctiveness of strategic conformity with innovation.