[Ed note: This is the 12th of 14 posts in a virtual panel on The Future of Organizational Sociology.]

Organizational sociology, I would argue, has become increasingly sophisticated over the years; but it has done so in ways that make it less interesting to non-organizational sociologists and, hence, less able to survive outside the hothouse microclimate of a self-styled organizational studies program. From my particular vantage point in a sociology department on a campus without a business school, the problem is this: Most of my students – graduate as well as undergraduate – arrive in sociology with interests that they do not see as organizational: Globalization and development, health and medicine, environment (yes indeed Chick!), social movements, inequality, urban structure, science and technology, occasionally law. But only rarely “organizations.” I (like most readers of this blog, I suspect) see all these topics as profoundly and thoroughly organizational. But how do I make that case to the next generation of sociologists?

Of course, I can share my excitement for the ins and outs of organizational ecology and institutional theory, resource dependence and network embeddedness, even institutional economics and competitive strategy. But these conversations all too often end on an awkward note: “Wow,” says the student, “You really seem to like this stuff. So what does org theory tell us about [insert a “non-organizational” topic from the list above]?” I pause and gather my thoughts: “It tells us that organizational practices are institutionally constructed and constrained; that outcomes are shaped by cultural and political forces; that interorganizational exchanges are embedded in social networks; that organizational boundaries are porous; that workplaces are rife with interpersonal dynamics and informal structures and biases; that…” “Wait,” says the student, sounding as though I’ve just plucked away the football that he/she was about to kick, “so why should I study organizations, then, instead of studying institutions or culture or politics or networks or small-group processes?”

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[Ed note: This is the 11th of 14 posts in a virtual panel on The Future of Organizational Sociology.]

A response to the question of what is the future of organizational sociology first depends on understanding how the institutional and organization environment has changed.

In commenting on changes I make some assumptions, i.e., an open systems perspective and competition for attention occurs in an ecology of institutional space.

Below is a partial natural history of observations, not necessarily in an event sequencing order or from systematic research. I don’t know much about blogging and assume that the purpose is to be provocative to raise questions that generate discussion.

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[Ed note: This is the tenth of 14 posts in a virtual panel on The Future of Organizational Sociology.]

I was happy that the Organizations, Occupations and Work Section sponsored a panel discussion at the American Sociological Association meeting this year (2014) on this topic—one that has long been of concern to me. I’m old enough to remember when organizational sociology was a major focus of our discipline and occupied a central place in the programs of leading sociology departments. In its modern guise, this field emerged slowly in the late 1950’s, grew to prominence during 1970s, and was still strong well into the 1980s. We then witnessed the sad spectacle of the majority of graduates of these programs being snatched up by business schools, with others moving into various administrative or policy programs. These graduates continue to teach and study many aspects of organization, but their agenda has been curtailed by the context in which they operate and is often inflected by the dominance of economics in these settings. In this brief essay, I propose to respond to and amplify the comments of the some of the panel members, in particular, Howard Aldrich and Lis Clemens.

I was surprised (shocked!) to hear Howard opine that organizational sociology could have no future because it had no past! For evidence, he pointed to the fact that most of the contemporary research on organizations published in the leading sociology and management journals deals with contemporary organizations, mostly located in the U.S. I think this observation is empirically biased because it excludes the large and rich array of studies published as books and monographs. (Sociology is fortunate enough to be a two-literature field: we still write and value books as well as articles!) But, whether or not the evidence is confirmatory, it is irrelevant to the issue of concern. A review of what contemporary sociologists are currently doing tells us nothing about the past history of our area of scholarship!

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