THE ROLE OF COMPETING RATIONALITIES IN INSTITUTIONAL CHANGE.

Abstract

Reporting on a longitudinal case study of the introduction of business planning and perfornance measures in cultural organizations, this article uses Weber's identification of types of rationality as a means to illuminate institutional and organizational change.The study illustrates how conflict that accompanies change coalesces around different dimensions of rationality-substantive, practical, theoretical, and instrumental-that inform organization members' understandings of organizational and professional identity and management practices.The two germinal articles of neoinstitutional the-