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Accepting Organizational Theories

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Abstract

In this paper we aim to contribute to the recent debate on non-empirical theory confirmation by analyzing why scientists accept and trust their theories in the absence of clear empirical verification in social sciences. Given that the philosophy of social sciences traditionally deals mainly with economics and sociology, organization theory promises a new area for addressing a wide range of key questions of the modern philosophy of science and, in particular, to shed a light on the puzzling question of non-empirical theory assessment, acceptance, corroboration and development. Although institutional theory of organizations cannot be directly tested and evaluated via empirical data, this theory nevertheless became a dominant theory of organization-environment relations and most organizational researchers routinely use it as a standard theoretical framework for making sense of empirical findings. We analyze the trajectory of institutional theory development and proliferation and argue that it enjoys its current status of the standard theory of organizational sociology because (1) it is flexible enough to account for most organizational processes and phenomena; (2) it has suppressed existing alternative theories that are less flexible; (3) because scientists do not tend to look for alternatives for once winning theory and (4) due to the dysfunctional requirement to “develop theory” in top journals in organization and management studies. Finally, we argue that “a too-much-plasticity effect”, has a negative impact on institutional theory in the long run. It is explained why, despite the dominant position in organizational research, institutional studies cannot be regarded as a normal science while the progress of this theoretical problem is rather an illusory effect then a growth of knowledge.

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Notes

  1. For example, a special issue in one of the journals devoted to the philosophy of science considers this problem: “The fact that whole communities of physicists have devoted so much time and effort to evaluating theories that are largely disconnected from experiments and empirical testing suggests that existing philosophical accounts of the epistemology of physics, based as they are on a broadly empiricist conception of physics, are no longer completely apt, or are at least somewhat out of date” (Eva and Hartmann 2021: 1).

  2. Collins, for example, reverted this question about the sociological factors in a scientific enterprise by arguing that “no-one cares about the large majority of scientific results—whether they are right or wrong makes no difference to anyone” (1993: 233).

  3. For many scientists, mathematicians and philosophers of science the beauty of theories is a sign that these theories are likely to be true. It is believed that aesthetic factors influence the formulation, pursuit, acceptance and maintenance of theories (Mamchur 1987; Engler 2002, 2005; McAllister 1998; O’Loughlin and McCallum 2019; Breitenbach 2020). Criteria such as simplicity, symmetry, inner perfection, economy and unification in theory building are thus seen as no less important than empirical considerations (Engler 2005).

  4. Richard Feynman famously claimed that “the test of all knowledge is experiment… and… experiment is the sole judge of scientific “truth.” (1965: 1) and Thomas Young back in the 19th century began one of his most important papers with the claim that “he invention of plausible hypotheses, independent of any connection with experimental observations, can be of very little use in the promotion of natural knowledge” (1802: 12).

  5. And vice versa—Dyson accused S Matrix theory in lacking mathematical beauty: “I find S matrix theory too simple, too lacking in mathematical depth, and I cannot believe that it is really all there is. If the S-matrix theory turned out to explain everything, then I would feel disappointed that the Creator had after all been rather unsophisticated” (1964:134).

  6. In the 21st century organization theory migrated from sociology faculties to business schools becoming a much wider thing than just sociology of organizations, absorbing some former business disciplines and heavily influencing others.

  7. Hannan and Freeman (1977) chose the same strategy in promoting their theory of population ecology of organizations. In particular, the opening passage in their paper declares that “A population ecology perspective on organization-environment relations is proposed as an alternative to the dominant adaptation perspective” (1977:929). That is, they offered a deterministic view on organizational adaptation and survival in contrast to contingency theory’s voluntaristic orientation (Hrebiniak and Joyce 1985). In contingency theory adaptation and fit were a matter of managerial choice while population ecology claimed the existence of strong inertial forces against individual organizational change and asserted a population adaptation through birth and death.

  8. Kraatz and Zajac (1996) conducted an empirical study where they found that contrary to institutional isomorphism thesis, U.S. liberal arts colleges—one of the most institutionalized fields—went through “illegitimate” institutional change. This case of falsification did not eventually result in theory abandonment. As Davis (2010) noted, institutional theory proves to be a moving target and is too vague even for being falsified.

  9. Ironically, organizational theories explain self-success.

  10. Researchers in the once promising and exciting field of organizational routines studies also mixed and blurred all predictions so now organizational routines are the source of both change and stability. Arguably, a theory that “predicts” that routines can be a source of change and stability and resistance, being flexible and inflexible, enabling and constraining and dynamic and static is useless. But this strategy allows expanding the research program and seeing virtually anything as routines that can be changed. Proponents of this program benefit and publish dozens of new versions of the same paper while the field stagnates.

  11. Schoonhoven noted that “contingency theory is not a theory at all, in the conventional sense of theory as a well-developed set of interrelated propositions… it is more an orienting strategy or metatheory, suggesting ways in which a phenomenon ought to be conceptualized” (1981:350).

  12. Contingency research represented, according to Donaldson, “the largest single normal science research stream in the study of organizational structure” (1996: 58).

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Aksom, H. Accepting Organizational Theories. glob. Philosophy 33, 31 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10516-023-09655-5

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