Suchergebnisse

In From Social Movement to Moral Market, Paul-Brian McInerney explores what happens when a movement of activists gives way to a market for entrepreneurs. This book explains the transition by tracing the brief and colorful history of the Circuit Riders, a group of activists who sought to lead nonprofits across the digital divide. In a single decade, this movement spawned a market for technology assistance providers, dedicated to serving nonprofit organizations. In contrast to the Circuit Riders' grassroots approach, which was rooted in their commitment to a cause, these consultancies sprung up as social enterprises, blending the values of the nonprofit sector with the economic principles of for-profit businesses. Through a historical-institutional analysis, this narrative shows how the values of a movement remain intact even as entrepreneurs displace activists. While the Circuit Riders serve as a rich core example in the book, McInerney's findings speak to similar processes in other "moral markets," such as organic food, exploring how the evolution from movement to market impacts activists and enterprises alike

As they assemble organizations from different economic sectors, intersectoral collaborations are co-constituted by institutional pluralism. However, the intimacy and inequality of these arrangements also constrain an organization's ability to respond strategically to the concomitant institutional pluralism. Members of the organization experience pluralism as a tension I call moral ambivalence, that is, they simultaneously hold opposing judgments about their actions or the situations in which they find themselves. Moral ambivalence leads actors to engage in institutional work, pragmatic compromises directed toward coping with the competing institutional rules they face. This institutional work produces hybrid actions that, in turn, help the organization maintain internal cohesion and prevent negative outcomes. The article traces the sources of institutional pluralism to organizational imprinting from for-profit partners and institutional pressures from other members of the field. Data come from an ethnography of a single nonprofit organization that collaborates with several large for-profit organizations.

Many technologies in our everyday lives are expressions of deliberate and protracted political struggles among interested groups. While some technologies are inherently political, other technologies become politicized through competition among different groups and organizations. How do seemingly apolitical technologies become politicized? In this article, the author examines the case of the "circuit riders," a progressive technology movement in the United States that promotes information technology use among nonprofit and grassroots organizations, to show how a particular technology is politicized through field-level interactions. Applying and contributing to actor—network theory, the author finds that translation takes place as an organizational process by which actors associate the ideals of the technology in question with their political ideals and then attempt to enroll other actors to accept the resultant associations. Successful association depends on both discursive and organizational practices.

Although scholars have examined the different pathways to participation in social movements, far less research has looked at the endurance of activists once they mobilize. This article specifically explores the relationship between the pathways to mobilization and retention. Our data show that both social ties and individual motivations play a role in mobilizing participants of social movements. Contrary to what one might expect, we find that those activists who were mobilized with personal connections were less likely to be working for the organization a year later versus those who came to the organization as strangers. We find instead that self-starters—those canvassers who entered the canvass through their own volition—stayed on longer. Although those canvassers who came to the job through network ties were less likely to be working for the organization a year later, they were more likely to be engaged in other civic and political groups and they were more likely to be leaders of these groups.

Although scholars have examined the different pathways to participation in social movements, far less research has looked at the endurance of activists once they mobilize. This article specifically explores the relationship between the pathways to mobilization and retention. Our data show that both social ties and individual motivations play a role in mobilizing participants of social movements. Contrary to what one might expect, we find that those activists who were mobilized with personal connections were less likely to be working for the organization a year later versus those who came to the organization as strangers. We find instead that self-starters -- those canvassers who entered the canvass through their own volition -- stayed on longer. Although those canvassers who came to the job through network ties were less likely to be working for the organization a year later, they were more likely to be engaged in other civic and political groups and they were more likely to be leaders of these groups. Adapted from the source document.

A growing body of research has emerged on "mixed-form" markets—markets for goods and services in which for-profit, nonprofit, and government providers coexist. This article seeks to understand the dynamics between nonprofit and for-profit organizations operating within the same market. The authors propose a five-step theoretical framework that includes both nonprofit and for-profit actors to capture what is fundamentally a temporal process: market identification; market growth; increasing cost for goods/services; increasing price for goods/services; and cross-sector competition. The authors use data from extended qualitative investigations in distinct service markets to analyze the unique contributions and capacities of each organizational form, and the transformation of market structure over time. The authors conclude that the dynamic interplay between nonprofit and for-profit forms within markets produces three possible outcomes: stratified, displaced, and defended markets.