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The growing literature on management consulting views consultants as allies of management, in temporary positions of power. This article attempts to complement this perspective by assuming a metaphor of consulting as a liminal space. Liminality is a condition where the usual practice and order are suspended and replaced by new rites and rituals. We build on the anthropological analyses of Arnold van Gennep and Victor Turner to find theoretical support for the idea of liminality as applied to the consulting activity. This article is based on our experience as consultants and observers. It collects on-the-job reflections - ours and those of other consultants we have met. These participating observations support the suggestion that consulting can be represented as a liminal space for both consultants and their client organizations.

Economic systems are undergoing a generalized effort to improve corporate governance structures and processes. Waves of scandals and increasing public scrutiny push institutional regulators and corporate boards of directors to establish and adopt new practices. Codes of good governance have emerged as a primary tool to increase the effectiveness of corporate governance systems. Building on extant views of institutional change, the authors study the process of the institutionalization of codes of governance and the role of the different actors involved in issuing the codes. They define four groups of actors: law-makers, model makers, market makers, and governance enactors. They analyze a sample of 150 codes of governance introduced in 78 countries from 1978 to 2004 to describe the following stages of institutionalization: precipitating jolts, theorization, diffusion, and reinstitutionalization. This description invites thorough investigation of the content of codes of governance and the likelihood adopting such codes in a given country.

Contents: 1. New themes in institutional analysis : topics and issues from European research / Georg Krücken, Renate E. Meyer and Peter Walgenbach -- 2. The value of institutional logics / Roger Friedland -- 3. What are institutional logics and where is the perspective taking us? / Christina Berg Johansen and Susanne Boch Waldorff -- 4. Conventions and institutional logics : invitation to a dialogue between two theoretical approaches / Ann Westenholz -- 5. From contention to mainstream : valuing and institutionalizing moral products / Nadine Arnold and Birthe Soppe -- 6. Changing the c-suite : new chief officer roles as strategic responses to institutional complexity / Silviya Svejenova and José Luis Alvarez -- 7. Refusing, connecting, and playing off conflicting institutional demands : a longitudinal study on the organizational handling of the end of nuclear power, climate protection, and the energy turnaround in Germany / Stephan Bohn and Peter Walgenbach -- 8. Constructing domains of corporate social responsibility : a politicization of corporations at the expense of a de-politicization of society? / Markus A. Höllerer, Renate E. Meyer and Michael Lounsbury -- 9. Forest and trees, institutional dynamics and artifacts : on visual organizational indicators of global and historical cultural patterns / Gili S. Drori, Achim Oberg and Giuseppe Delmestri -- 10. Professional emergence and boundary work in the Italian wine industry : "nella botte piccola c'è il vino buono" / Marco Bottura, Raffaele Corrado, Bernard Forgues and Vincenza Odorici -- 11. Organizational adaptation and inverse trajectories : two cities and their film festivals / Carmelo Mazza and Jesper Strandgaard Pedersen -- 12. Institutional analysis in a digital era : mechanisms and methods to understand emerging fields / Walter W. Powell, Achim Oberg, Valeska Korff, Carrie Oelberger and Karina Kloos -- 13. Organizing vigilante lynching : a neo-institutional perspective / Thomas Klatetzki -- 14. Coping with the unintended consequences of institutional work / Mikołaj Pawlak and Adriana Mica -- 15. Institutions as adverbs? the dynamic form of institutional substances / Elke Weik -- 16. Fragmented organizations in the society of organizations / John W. Meyer -- Index.

This paper advances a micro theory of creative action by examining how distinctive artists shield their idiosyncratic styles from the isomorphic pressures of a field. It draws on the cases of three internationally recognized, distinctive European film directors—Pedro Almodóvar (Spain), Nanni Moretti (Italy) and Lars von Trier (Denmark). We argue that, in a cinema field, managing artistic pressures for distinctiveness versus business pressures for profits drives filmmakers' quest for optimal distinctiveness. This quest seeks both exclusive (unique style) and inclusive (audience-appealing) artwork with legitimacy in the field. Our theory of creative action for optimal distinctiveness suggests that film directors increase their control by personally consolidating artistic and production roles, by forming close partnerships with committed producers, and by establishing their own production companies. Ironically, to escape the iron cage of local cinema fields, film directors increasingly control the coupling of art and business.