Seeck, Hannele 
ORCID: 0000-0001-6209-651X and Kuokkanen, Anna
(2015)
Institutional work in translation of human relations and scientific management in Finland 1917–1979.
Academy of Management Proceedings, 2015 (1).
ISSN 0065-0668
Abstract
This paper examines institutional work on national level translation of management ideas. We studied institutional work in translation of Human Relations and Scientific Management in Finland 1917–1979. We examined Finnish government platforms (n=61), management magazines from the years 1917–1979 (n=177) and the histories of labour unions. Our study indicates the importance of political institutional work and shows that strong political work on one management model prevents the institutionalization of other models, and hence illustrates the importance of political work in both creation and maintenance phases of the institutionalization of a management model. It also seems that in the Finnish case the ‘theorisation’ of Human Relations was not clear or internationally grounded, unlike in the case of Scientific Management, and this in part resulted in the weak institutionalization of Human Relations. We believe that a joint examination of the concepts of translation and institutional work enable us to further understand why a certain idea is adopted in a particular way in a particular context. The study also contributes to the understanding of mimicry, which uses existing patterns of action – in this case, rationalization – in order to articulate and legitimize new model of management; and relabeling, as the ideas of Human Relations were often introduced in the language of Scientific Management. Key words: institutional work; translation, Scandinavian Institutionalism, Human Relations, Scientific Management, Finland.
| Item Type: | Article |
|---|---|
| Official URL: | https://journals.aom.org/journal/amproc |
| Additional Information: | © 2015 Academy of Management |
| Divisions: | Media and Communications |
| Subjects: | H Social Sciences > HD Industries. Land use. Labor > HD28 Management. Industrial Management |
| Date Deposited: | 23 Mar 2023 15:12 |
| Last Modified: | 14 Sep 2024 09:29 |
| URI: | http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/id/eprint/118491 |
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