Institutional complexity and the construction of collective action in nonprofit fields

Abstract

This dissertation contributes to our understanding of how institutional complexity within fields influences efforts to construct interorganisational collective action. Five cases of efforts to construct collective action in two nonprofit fields are studied. One field is in the Republic of Ireland and the other in South Africa. The institutional logics salient in each field are derived using inductive methods and the processes of how these institutional logics influence the five efforts to construct collective action are analysed. A social constructionist epistemology is adopted and the interpretations and frames of actors are closely studied to both understand the prevailing institutional logics and to illuminate how these logics influence interactions.