The Spread of Ideas in a Network—The Garbage-Can Model

The main goal of our work is to show how ideas change in social networks. Our analysis is based on three concepts: (i) temporal networks, (ii) the Axelrod model of culture dissemination, (iii) the garbage can model of organizational choice. The use of the concept of temporal networks allows us to show the dynamics of ideas spreading processes in networks, thanks to the analysis of contacts between agents in networks. The Axelrod culture dissemination model allows us to use the importance of cooperative behavior for the dynamics of ideas disseminated in networks. In the third model decisions on solutions of problems are made as an outcome of sequences of pseudorandom numbers. The origin of this model is the Herbert Simon’s view on bounded rationality. In the Axelrod model, ideas are conveyed by strings of symbols. The outcome of the model should be the diversity of evolving ideas as dependent on the chain length, on the number of possible values of symbols and on the threshold value of Hamming distance which enables the combination.

Key Questions for Forming Partnerships: A Review and Research Agenda

Partnerships receive significant attention in public administration scholarship, with the mass of this literature focusing on whether partnerships work, how to make them work, or how they fit into existing institutions (Provan and Milward, 2001; Vigoda, 2002; McGuire, 2006; Thomson and Perry, 2006; Andrews and Entwistle, 2010; McQuaid, 2010; O’Toole, 2015). Although partnership has been used variously by different scholars, in general, partnerships refer to formal arrangements between two or more organizations that are characterized by defined responsibilities, obligations, and/or governance structure, as compared to other forms of cooperative behaviors which may be more informal, unorganized, or involve few obligations. In general, existing scholarship on partnership formation argues that partnerships are a function of resource-exchanges, available partners, or fragmented authorities, and assumes a pragmatic managerial approach to these arrangements (Grady and Chen, 2006; Feiock and Scholz, 2009). However, scholarship is limited in linking these mechanisms together and explaining how organizations go from isolated and autonomous to integrated and interdependent. As such, it is difficult to determine how initial decisions in the partnership process eventually lead to success or failure in collaboration. Furthermore, much of this scholarship is written with a solely academic audience in mind, making difficult for practitioners, non-academics, or non-subject area experts to consume. To remedy this, we use Cohen, March, and Olsen’s (1972) Garbage Can Theory (GCT) of organizational choice as a guiding framework to identify key issues that affect partnerships formation and tie this disjointed set of literature together. We then synthesize these issues into three key questions that can be operationalized by practitioners: 1) is there a problem that cannot be managed unilaterally?; 2) what new capacities are needed?; and 3) what partnership opportunities are there? From this perspective, forming partnerships unfolds in organized anarchies, where decision-makers must sort through ambiguous problems, solutions, and participants in order to determine if partnership is the right choice for their organization. In general, the purpose of this discussion is to identify and examine key issues that likely affect partnership choices made by practitioners and that can provide guidance to those who are considering engaging in collaboration or partnership. Finally, we discuss links between partnership formation and broader understandings of collaborations and networks.

Organizational Effects of Intellectual Property (Macro Level)

This chapter describes how the level of IP protection impacts firms’ choices in organizing the innovation and commercialization process, which in turn influences the structure of the innovation market as a whole. Weak-IP regimes induce firms to adopt “hierarchical” structures that mitigate expropriation risk by locating innovation and commercialization activities within substantially integrated supply chains. Strong-IP regimes restore organizational choice and enable innovators to adopt “entrepreneurial” structures that rely on contractual relationships among firms that specialize in particular innovation or commercialization functions. If hierarchical structures cannot sufficiently mitigate expropriation risk, then innovation markets will adopt “bureaucratic” structures that rely on tax-based or philanthropic funding. Even when markets adapt to weak-IP regimes by adopting hierarchical structures, or hybrid hierarchical and semi-bureaucratic structures, that support robust R&D investment, efficiency losses will arise to the extent that entry by entrepreneurial innovators is suppressed and the selected mix of innovation projects is distorted.

Decision-making in crisis management of a serious digital incident: A garbage can approach

Managing crisis challenges the ability to make numerous decisions under great uncertainty. This study address the decision-making process, and how the mix of involved individuals, prior knowledge, and available decision-makers forms the decisions made during a crisis. A large-scale exercise with a cyberattack scenario was chosen as the study’s case. The organization studied have highly skilled crisis management personnel; however, they are not used to manage a large-scale cyber-attack scenario. The garbage can model (GCM) of Organizational Choice with a few modifications is used as the analytical framework in the study.

A Context-Choice Model of Niche Entrepreneurship

Entrepreneurship research has gravitated towards a singular focus on the Silicon Valley model as the standard model of entrepreneurship. By contrast, some entrepreneurship scholars have more recently suggested embracing entrepreneurship as diverse and colorful. We build on this latter stream of literature by analyzing the diversity of entrepreneurship from complementary institutional arrangements inherent in national economies. Drawing from Robert’s (2004) model of complementarities between context and organizational choice variables, we analyze the contextualization of diverging entrepreneurship models. Our findings indicate that some economies are complementary to a specialized niche strategy, while others instead promote a scalable mass-market manifestation of entrepreneurship.

Agenda Setting and Bounded Rationality

This chapter reviews the existing scholarship on agenda setting, focusing on two aspects of human choice. The first aspect centers on behavioral analyses of choice, especially cognitive limits to rationality (e.g., limits to the human attention span, the process of satisficing, and the use of heuristics), directed at understanding how individuals prioritize action. The second aspect focuses on organizational choice, with an emphasis on the impacts of information processing, search processes, and organizational structure. The chapter examines linkages between micro and macro processes, showing how studies of organizations and broader political systems based on a model of comprehensive rationality fail. Focusing on behavioral foundations allows for a more accurate and holistic explanation of issue prioritization (agenda setting) in complex organizations based on behavioral models of choice. The chapter concludes with suggestions for future directions of research.

The Governance of International Courts and Tribunals

Niels Blokker addresses a central, common legitimacy challenge to the governance of international courts and tribunals (ICs) themselves. How can various international organs—such as the General Assembly or the Assembly of States Parties—serve to secure the ICs’ requisite independence whilst ensuring their accountability? The governing institutions must secure this balance in each case, but do so in different ways. Blokker demonstrates some of the dilemmas arising in the context of ICs in balancing independence and accountability. An important question is what would be the best organizational choice(s)—possibly with different answers for different ICs. He also raises the issues of what can be learnt from the international requirements as regards the governance of national courts.