Building theories of organizations is challenging: theories are partial and "folk" categories are fuzzy. The commonly used tools--first-order logic and its foundational set theory--are ill-suited for handling these complications. Here, three leading authorities rethink organization theory. Logics of Organization Theory sets forth and applies a new language for theory building based on a nonmonotonic logic and fuzzy set theory. In doing so, not only does it mark a major advance in organizational theory, but it also draws lessons for theory building elsewhere in the social sciences. Organizational research typically analyzes organizations in categories such as "bank," "hospital," or "university." These categories have been treated as crisp analytical constructs designed by researchers. But sociologists increasingly view categories as constructed by audiences. This book builds on cognitive psychology and anthropology to develop an audience-based theory of organizational categories. It applies this framework and the new language of theory building to organizational ecology. It reconstructs and integrates four central theory fragments, and in so doing reveals unexpected connections and new insights.

Preface xi



Chapter 1: Language Matters 1
1.1 Languages for Theory Building 1
1.2 Using Dynamic Logic 5
1.3 Partial Memberships: Fuzziness 12
1.4 Organizational Ecology 18
1.5 Unification Projects 21


PART 1. AUDIENCES, PRODUCERS, AND CODES 27
Chapter 2: Clusters and Labels 29
2.1 Seeds for Categories and Forms 32
2.2 Domains 34
2.3 Similarity 37
2.4 Similarity Clusters 41
2.5 Labels 47
2.6 Extensional Consensus 52
2.7 Complex Labels 56


Chapter 3: Types and Categories 59
3.1 Schemata 60
3.2 Types 65
3.3 Intensional Semantic Consensus 67
3.4 Categories 69
3.5 Intrinsic Appeal and Category Valence 71


Chapter 4: Forms and Populations 78
4.1 Test Codes and Defaults 79
4.2 Taken-for-Grantedness 82
4.3 Legitimation and Forms 84
4.4 Populations 85
4.5 Density Dependence Revisited 89
4.6 Delegitimation 96


Chapter 5: Identity and Audience 100
5.1 Identity As Default 101
5.2 Multiple Category Memberships 107
5.3 Code Clash 109
5.4 Identities and Populations 110
5.5 Structure of the Audience 111


PART 2. NONMONOTONIC REASONING: AGE DEPENDENCE 121
Chapter 6: A Nonmonotonic Logic 123
6.1 Beyond First-Order Logic 124
6.2 Generalizations 127
6.3 Nonmonotonic Reasoning 130
6.4 A Precis of the Formal Approach 133
6.5 Chaining Probabilistic Arguments 142
6.6 Closest-Possible-Worlds Construction 143
6.7 Falsification 145


Chapter 7: Integrating Theories of Age Dependence 150
7.1 Capability and Endowment 152
7.2 First Unification Attempt 157
7.3 Obsolescence 161
7.4 Second Unification Attempt 163


PART 3. ECOLOGICAL NICHES 169
Chapter 8: Niches and Audiences 171
8.1 Tastes, Positions, and Offerings 174
8.2 Category Niche 177
8.3 Organizational Niche 178
8.4 Fundamental Niche 183
8.5 Implications of Category Membership 186
8.6 Metric Audience Space 187


Chapter 9: Niches and Competitors 191
9.1 Fitness 191
9.2 Realized Niche 193
9.3 Niche Overlap 194
9.4 Niche Width Revisited 198
9.5 Convexity of the Niche 203
9.6 Environmental Change 206


Chapter 10: Resource Partitioning 209
10.1 Scale Advantage 210
10.2 Market Center 214
10.3 Market Segments and Crowding 215
10.4 Dynamics of Partitioning 220
10.5 Implications of Category Membership 226


PART 4. ORGANIZATIONAL CHANGE 229
Chapter 11: Cascading Change 231
11.1 Identity and Inertia 232
11.2 Organizational Architecture 235
11.3 Cascades 236
11.4 Architecture and Cascades 239
11.5 Intricacy and Viscosity 246
11.6 Missed Opportunities 248
11.7 Change and Mortality 253


Chapter 12: Opacity and Asperity 256
12.1 Limited Foresight: Opacity 256
12.2 Cultural Opposition: Asperity 261
12.3 Opacity, Asperity, and Reorganization 265
12.4 Change and Mortality 268


Chapter 13: Niche Expansion 271
13.1 Expanded Engagement 271
13.2 Architectural and Cultural Context 276
13.3 Age and Asperity 278
13.4 Distant Expansion 279
13.5 Expansion and Convexity 281


Chapter 14: Conclusions 286
14.1 Theoretical Unification 287
14.2 Common Conceptual Core 289
14.3 Inconsistencies Resolved 291
14.4 Theoretical Progress 293
14.5 Empirical Implications 298


Appendix A. Glossary of Theoretical Terms 305
Appendix B. Glossary of Symbols 313
Appendix C. Some Elementary First-Order Logic 321
Appendix D. Notation for Monotonic Functions 331
Appendix E. The Modal Language of Codes 334
Bibliography 339
Index 355