Multiple Institutional Logics in Organizations: Explaining Their Varied Nature and Implications

“Thornton et al. (2012) explain this apparent contradiction by suggesting that several institutional logics coexist in the institutional field, cooperating or competing, reinforcing each other or producing incoherences—a view supported by Besharov and Smith (2014).”

“In addition, future research also needs to bridge different levels of analysis (e.g., individual, organizational, and field levels) to account for how factors at each of these levels affect the way SE handles multiple institutional logics (Battilana & Dorado, 2010; Besharov & Smith, 2014).”

“While some logic may be reconciled, organizations can accommodate conflicting institutional logics that may contradict them‐ selves and compete with one another (Besharov and Smith 2014).”

“More recently, scholars have begun to acknowledge that cultural heterogeneity is inevitable in organizations and that it influences organizational performance in various ways (e.g., Battilana and Dorado, 2010; Besharov and Smith, 2014).”

“Scholarship on hybrid organizations is on the rise, as more organizations claim to focus on both financial and social goals (Battilana and Dorado, 2010), and scholars acknowledge that ‘organizations are often messy things, with mixed agendas and bruising politics’ (Ashforth and Reingen, 2014: 475; Besharov and Smith,…”

“degree to which multiple logics are each treated as equally valid and relevant to organisational functioning, create the potential for logic blending within organisations (Besharov and Smith 2014).”

“Following Besharov and Smith (2014), it could be argued that the exercise of members’ agency can lead to logic compatibility in that consistency in goals (in this case showing compassion) is more important than “the means by which goals are to be achieved” (p.”

“The second version stresses that tensions endure (Besharov & Smith, 2014).”

“diagrams may signify openness; despite this, in most cases we categorized cartesian diagrams as bounded (e.g., in Ashforth, Rogers, Pratt, & Pradies, 2014 or Besharov & Smith, 2014).”

“However structured, dyadic assumptions can certainly simplify matters in a way that facilitates analysis, yet in doing so may also potentially impede how we understand the multifaceted and holistic nature of HOs (Besharov & Smith, 2014).”

“” Prior research has recognized the increasing prevalence of multiple logics within organizations (Besharov & Smith, 2014; Smets, Jarzabkowski, Burke, & Spee, 2015).”

“When the underlying values and norms of the different logics cohere or complement each other, actors can work relatively undisturbed (Lawrence, 2008; Besharov & Smith, 2014).”

“In the domain of institutional theory, increasing evidence shows that the organizational field is characterized by the coexistence of two or more competing logics (Besharov & Smith, 2014; Reay & Hinings, 2009; Thornton & Ocasio, 2008).”

“Previous theorizing has pointed out the importance of understanding multiple institutional logics within organizations or professional fi elds (Besharov & Smith, 2014).”

“Moreover, unlike other entrepreneurs, social entrepreneurs characteristically seek to mobilize resources in multi-institutional fields to affect social impact (Besharov & Smith, 2014; Mair et al., 2015).”

“This analytical distinction enables a more fine-grained analysis than the previous research taking the field or industry wide approach (e.g., Battilana & Dorado, 2010; Besharov & Smith, 2014; Greenwood et al., 2011; Pache & Santos, 2010).”

“Finally, closer consideration of how the instantiations of multiple logics in organizations change over time would be valuable (cf. Besharov & Smith, 2014).”

“Following prior research that leverages illustrative examples to support theoretically developed models (Besharov & Smith, 2014; Montgomery et al., 2012; Pache & Santos, 2010), we use three examples to bring our theoretical model to life: social impact bonds, impact investing funds, and impact…”

“This contributes to emerging literature about how SEs manage their hybridity (e.g. Batillana and Lee 2014; Santos, Pache, and Birkholz 2015; Powell, Gillett, and Doherty 2019) and institutional logics (e.g. Besharov and Smith 2014; Battilana et al. 2015).”

“We posit the conditions of a fragmented institutional field, which interacts dynamically with different types of manufacturing environmental practices (Fligstein and McAdam 2011; Scott 2013; Besharov and Smith 2014).”

“Institutional hybridization, on the other hand, explains how firms cope with institutional pressures from different agents (Besharov & Smith, 2014).”

“Empirical evidence suggests that hybrid organisations manage these tensions by manoeuvring the market-oriented and mission-driven logics (cf. Palm and Lilja, 2017) and as a consequence pursue seemingly divergent strategic orientations, i.e. exploration and exploitation (Besharov and Smith, 2014).”

“…competing logics in hybrid organizations being manifest in organizational forms (Pache & Santos, 2013), laws and regulations (Im & Sun, 2015), demands from resource providers (Besharov & Smith, 2014), networks and associations (Moody, 2008), and professional training (Battilana & Dorado, 2010).”

“Recent studies point out the existence of a hybrid organization as being a more permanent phenomenon (Besharov & Smith, 2014; Mair, Mayer, & Lutz, 2015).”

“Besharov and Smith (2014), and Song et al. (2018) concluded that the implementation of BT is one of the major decisions of the enterprises, which is not only affected by the development conditions and stages of the enterprises, but also affected by other important factors such as the nature of the…”

“A further, related direction is to consider the broader influence of institutions on moral and volunteer identities, given that institutions prescribe kinds of ideals, values, and moral judgments (Besharov & Smith, 2014; Fan & Zietsma, 2017; Roulet & Pichler, 2020; Voronov & Weber, 2015).”

“They are forced to engage with multiple logics from across their operating zones, many of which may contain competing prescriptions which may not be easily reconciled (Bascle, 2016; Besharov & Smith, 2014; Kostova & Zaheer, 1999).”

“At the organizational level (focus of this paper), it is well understood that organizations often face multiple logics that could be complementary and in some cases conflicting (Thornton et al., 2012; Besharov & Smith, 2014).”

“Given that institutional environments in modern society have become more dynamic, complex, and pluralistic (Besharov & Smith, 2014), organizations should increase their ability to manage multiple logics so as to survive and succeed in a constantly changing environment.”

“Institutional logics are normative concepts that regulate individual and organisational behaviour (Besharov and Smith, 2014; Smets et al., 2015).”

“Scholars and practitioners often portray the social enterprise as a ‘hybrid’ organizational form (Battilana and Lee, 2014; Besharov and Smith, 2014; Doherty et al., 2014) which break new ground between the traditional private, public and non-profit sectors, and thus pose challenges to classical…”

“Conventional hybrid organizations are effectual in their pursuits because mission centrality (whether social or environmental) is their raison d’être (Battilana and Dorado, 2010; Besharov and Smith, 2014; Peredo and Chrisman, 2006; Sanders and McClellan, 2014).”

“Besharov and Smith (2014) provide an entry point into this analysis.”

“…commercial logic that emphasizes efficiency, profitability and competitive rivalry versus a service or social welfare logic that aims to maximize a program of supportive intervention to produce results for the beneficiary (Battilana and Dorado 2010, Cooney and Garrow 2010, Besharov and Smith 2014).”

“Furthermore, existing research offers little guidance regarding how multiple logics are actualized in practice (McPherson & Sauder, 2013), and the heterogeneity in how multiple logics manifest in practice (Besharov and Smith, 2014).”

“How multiple institutional logics manifest inside organizations depends on the centrality of multiple logics to organizational functioning and whether they provide contradictory or compatible prescriptions for action (Besharov & Smith, 2014).”

“Institutional logics may also com - pete with each other in specific organizations (Besharov & Smith, 2014; Pache & Santos, 2013), and may thus hinder or foster the integration of risk into management control.”

“It is also viewed as a “commercial arm” that emerges from within NPOs (Weisbrod, 1998; D. Young & Brewer, 2016), which is often driven by the desire to blend social logic with commercial logic in pursuit of a social mission (Besharov & Smith, 2014; Fitzgerald & Shepherd, 2018; Graddy-Reed, 2018).”

“Institutional plurality generates spaces for institutional innovation and change (Battilana et al., 2015; Cartel et al., 2019; Tracey et al., 2011; York et al., 2016), creating conditions for hybrid organizations to flourish (Besharov & Smith, 2014; Mair et al., 2015).”

“Variation in compatibility and centrality of logics is driven by various factors across the levels of the institutional field (e.g., accredited institutions), organization (e.g., hiring processes) and individuals (e.g., interdependence from or with logics) (Besharov & Smith, 2014).”

“The tension between these two logics and organizational responses to the tension have been examined (e.g. Besharov and Smith 2014; Cooney 2006; Onishi 2019; Pache and Santos 2013).”

“Although early scholarship on institutional logics largely adopted a Weberian view of society as divided into incommensurate spheres each with its own unique logic, more recent research acknowledges that organizations can be the site of multiple logics (Besharov and Smith 2014).”

“The wider literature on conflicting institutional logics provides other typologies, for instance of the nature or outcomes of conflict between logics (e.g. Besharov & Smith, 2014; Pache & Santos, 2013).”

“organisations, new ventures born with these blended values are less exposed to the contestation dynamics that emerge in an established organisation when a contradictory logic is introduced (Besharov and Smith, 2014).”

“With organizational behaviour or practices, we refer to relative stable sets of material practices and beliefs that delimit and characterize certain types of organizations (Besharov and Smith 2014; Meyer and Rowan 1977).”

“In addition, Besharov and Smith ’ s (2014) framework demonstrates that both the nature and extent of con fl ict depends, in part, on the type of logic multiplicity within different categories of organizations.”

“Secondly, we investigate organisational responses within the context of uneven logic relationships (i.e., community-oriented practices) where the business logic is central, and the social logic is peripheral to organisational functioning (Besharov & Smith, 2014).”