Organizational Invention and Elite Transformation: The Birth of Partnership Systems in Renaissance Florence

Padgett, John F.; McLean, Paul D.

doi:10.1086/498470

Cited by 281 publications

(136 citation statements)

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“…Avoiding the problem of invention is not unusual in organization theory and more generally in social science. Padgett and McLean (2006) concur that most of the literature on innovation is primarily focused on innovation diffusion, rather than invention, with the latter usually assumed to be the result of random variation or the brainchild of isolated genius. To overcome the dichotomy between the invention of new practices and their diffusion, some institutional theorists reject the implicit view of passive adopters detachedly accepting fully formed innovations and treating them as unalterable.…”

Section: The Emergence Of Institutions and The Role Of Analogiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Role of Analogy in the Institutionalization of Sustainability Reporting

Etzion

Ferraro

2010

Organization Science

335

319

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We study institutional entrepreneurship in an emergent field by analyzing the case of the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) and its efforts to purposefully institutionalize the practice of sustainability reporting. We suggest that analogies affect institutionalization processes through two mechanisms. In early stages of institutionalization, analogy operates primarily as a normative mechanism and adoption is driven mainly by an instrumental logic. This emphasis on similarity to existing institutions stresses conformity and promotes legitimacy. Yet, analogies can also have a cognitive effect on institutional design, especially once initial acceptance from the environment has been secured, by directing attention towards incongruences between the emergent institution and its analogical source. Institutional entrepreneurship can spur innovation and departure from existing institutions by highlighting limitations of the analogical source and providing a compelling value-rational argument underscoring the worth of the new institution. This theoretical contribution helps explain how analogies to existing institutional practices can both provide legitimacy to novel institutions and constitute the basis for a creative process of institutional design.3 Institutional entrepreneurship is a delicate balancing act between two conflicting tasks. On the one hand institutional entrepreneurs must disguise the radical nature of their enterprise in order to engage supporters and evade the wrath of incumbents, while on the other they cannot adhere too closely to existing practices, for by doing so, they will not be able to further any meaningful change (Aldrich and Fiol 1994). Institutional entrepreneurs need to become skilled cultural operatives, fashioning stories in order to attract resources. In this work it is essential to "balance the need for legitimacy by abiding by societal norms about what is appropriate with efforts to create unique identities that may differentiate and is relatively well-studied. However, the role of analogy in shaping institutional design has not been explored in depth. Tropes like simile, analogy and metaphor can help gather political support and legitimacy, but they also lead to analytical closure (Oswick, Keenoy and Grant 2002). Remaining within the confines of a clearly defined analogy cannot lead to evolution to profoundly different institutions (Hoffman and Ventresca 1999). Furthermore, the analogy cannot be discarded at later stages (Ocasio and Joseph 2005) when deeper institutional change is being advocated, as cognitive lock-in has already limited external constituents' receptivity to alternative scenarios. How, then, do analogies shape the construction and evolution of proto-institutions? 4In this article we address the role of analogies in institutional change by presenting a longitudinal case-study of the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) and its strategies to promote and institutionalize sustainability reporting practices. GRI, a non-profit organization headquartered in Amsterdam, ...

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Section: The Emergence Of Institutions and The Role Of Analogiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Role of Analogy in the Institutionalization of Sustainability Reporting

Etzion

Ferraro

2010

Organization Science

335

319

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“…The 1427 catasto measured and reported net wealth from all revenue 26 I have not published data on this yet, but the partnership structure of cambio banks also did not change at the time of the Black Death, in spite of the loss of a huge percentage of the bankers themselves. See Padgett and McLean, 2006, for a study of major changes in the partnership structure of cambio banks and merchant banks immediately after the Ciompi revolt. That study analyzed the emergence of the sistema di aziende first discussed in depth by Melis, 1962. streams, by household.…”

Section: Demography Of Florentine Familiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…As shown in figure 8b, the international merchant-banking industry, located for the most part in the Arte della Calimala, shows an even more dramatic drop: about 60-80% of partners in international merchant-banking companies were paternal kin until the Ciompi revolt in 1378, after which suddenly only 35-40% were. This sharp organizational change was due to the invention of the partnership system, analyzed in Padgett and McLean, 2006. Unfortunately no data prior to 1382 exist to document partnership structures in the wool-and silk-manufacturing industries from their beginnings. 84 But data from that date forward are consistent with the fourteenth-century withdrawal of family from business partnership in those industries as well.…”

Section: Internal Structure Of Florentine Familiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…I have no explanation for this anomaly, which goes directly contrary to the more solidly documented trend in cambio-banking at that same time. 86 See references and analysis in Padgett and McLean, 2006. were not far more prevalent than they are today. But family-business percentages of the magnitudes of the early 1300s had disappeared.…”

Section: Internal Structure Of Florentine Familiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Open Elite? Social Mobility, Marriage, and Family in Florence, 1282–1494^*

Padgett

2010

Renaiss. Q.

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This article statistically analyzes quantitative data from numerous sources in order to assess changes in marriage patterns, family structure, and rates of social mobility during the period from 1282 to 1494. During this period, three systems of social stratification coexisted — wealth, political office, and age of family — but these contending status systems were not consistent in their rankings of families. Each status system was conservative in the sense that elite families at the top of that hierarchy married each other in order to stabilize their position. But because of inconsistency in rankings, contradiction within the elite opened up the Florentine marriage system to widespread upward social mobility by new men. In their own families, successful new men aggressively imitated their economically and politically declining status superiors. Sharp class divisions thereby blurred into continuous and negotiable status gradients. These open-elite patterns of social mobility, present throughout the early Florentine Renaissance, were most extreme during the Albizzi regime, immediately following the Ciompi Revolt.

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“…Padgett and McLean (2006), for example, develop a multiple network approach to study the genesis of the banking form over some eighty years in Renaissance Florence. Powell et al (2005) apply a dynamic network approach to understand the emergence of biotechnology, following ties between more than two thousand organizations over a twelve year period.…”

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confidence: 99%

Opening Closure: Intercohesion and Entrepreneurial Dynamics in Business Groups

Stark

Vedres

2008

SSRN Journal

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MPIfG Discussion Papers are refereed scholarly papers of the kind that are publishable in a peer-reviewed disciplinary journal. Their objective is to contribute to the cumulative improvement of theoretical knowledge. The papers can be ordered from the institute for a small fee (hard copies) or downloaded free of charge (PDF). AbstractEntrepreneurial groups face a twinned challenge: recognizing new ideas and implementing them. Recent research suggests that connectivity reaching outside the group channels new ideas, while closure makes it possible to act on them. By contrast, we argue that entrepreneurship is not about importing ideas but about generating new knowledge by recombining resources. In contrast to the brokerage-plus-closure perspective, we identify a distinctive network position, intercohesion, which is found at the overlap of cohesive group structures.

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Organizational Invention and Elite Transformation: The Birth of Partnership Systems in Renaissance Florence

Cited by 281 publications

References 38 publications

The Role of Analogy in the Institutionalization of Sustainability Reporting

The Role of Analogy in the Institutionalization of Sustainability Reporting

Open Elite? Social Mobility, Marriage, and Family in Florence, 1282–1494^*

Opening Closure: Intercohesion and Entrepreneurial Dynamics in Business Groups

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Organizational Invention and Elite Transformation: The Birth of Partnership Systems in Renaissance Florence

Cited by 281 publications

References 38 publications

The Role of Analogy in the Institutionalization of Sustainability Reporting

The Role of Analogy in the Institutionalization of Sustainability Reporting

Open Elite? Social Mobility, Marriage, and Family in Florence, 1282–1494*

Opening Closure: Intercohesion and Entrepreneurial Dynamics in Business Groups

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Product

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Open Elite? Social Mobility, Marriage, and Family in Florence, 1282–1494^*