WORLD SOCIETY: THE WRITINGS OF JOHN W. MEYER This page intentionally left blank World Society: The Writings of John W. Meyer Editors ¨ GEORG KRUCKEN AND GILI S. DRORI 1 3 GreatClarendonStreet,Oxfordox26dp OxfordUniversityPressisadepartmentoftheUniversityofOxford. ItfurtherstheUniversity’sobjectiveofexcellenceinresearch,scholarship, andeducationbypublishingworldwidein Oxford NewYork Auckland CapeTown DaresSalaam HongKong Karachi KualaLumpur Madrid Melbourne MexicoCity Nairobi NewDelhi Shanghai Taipei Toronto WithoYcesin Argentina Austria Brazil Chile CzechRepublic France Greece Guatemala Hungary Italy Japan Poland Portugal Singapore SouthKorea Switzerland Thailand Turkey Ukraine Vietnam OxfordisaregisteredtrademarkofOxfordUniversityPress intheUKandincertainothercountries PublishedintheUnitedStates byOxfordUniversityPressInc.,NewYork #OxfordUniversityPress2009 Themoralrightsoftheauthorshavebeenasserted DatabaserightOxfordUniversityPress(maker) Firstpublished2009 Allrightsreserved.Nopartofthispublicationmaybereproduced, storedinaretrievalsystem,ortransmitted,inanyformorbyanymeans, withoutthepriorpermissioninwritingofOxfordUniversityPress, orasexpresslypermittedbylaw,orundertermsagreedwiththeappropriate reprographicsrightsorganization.Enquiriesconcerningreproduction outsidethescopeoftheaboveshouldbesenttotheRightsDepartment, OxfordUniversityPress,attheaddressabove Youmustnotcirculatethisbookinanyotherbindingorcover andyoumustimposethesameconditiononanyacquirer BritishLibraryCataloguinginPublicationData Dataavailable LibraryofCongressCataloginginPublicationData Dataavailable TypesetbySPIPublisherServices,Pondicherry,India PrintedinGreatBritain onacid-freepaperby MPGBiddlesLtd.,King’sLynn,Norfolk ISBN 978–0–19–923404–2 1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2 Contents ListofFigures vii ListofTables viii Foreword ix PART I: OVERVIEW 1. WorldSociety:ATheoryandaResearchPrograminContext ByGiliS.DroriandGeorgKru¨cken 3 2. ReXections:InstitutionalTheory andWorldSociety ByJohnW.Meyer 36 PART II: CONCEPTS AND PROCESSES 3. Rationalization OntologyandRationalizationintheWesternCulturalAccount 67 4. MythandRitual InstitutionalizedOrganizations:FormalStructureasMyth andCeremony 89 5. Actorhood The‘‘Actors’’ofModernSociety:TheCulturalConstruction ofSocialAgency 111 6. DiVusion InstitutionalConditionsforDiVusion 136 7. Globalization Globalization:SourcesandEVectsonNationalStatesandSocieties 156 PART III: APPLICATIONS 8. TheNation-State WorldSocietyandtheNation-State 173 9. Education TheWorldInstitutionalizationofEducation 206 10. Environment TheStructuringofaWorldEnvironmentalRegime, 1870–1990 222 vi Contents 11. Management GlobalizationandtheExpansionandStandardization ofManagement 251 12. Science WorldSocietyandtheAuthorityandEmpowermentofScience 261 13. HumanRights WorldSociety,theWelfareState,andtheLifeCourse:An InstitutionalistPerspective 280 14. TheIndividual TheProfusionofIndividualRolesandIdentitiesinthe PostwarPeriod 296 15. Law ModernLawasaSecularizedandGlobalModel:Implications fortheSociologyofLaw 320 16. TheEuropeanUnion TheEuropeanUnionandtheGlobalizationofCulture 344 17. Universities TheUniversityinEuropeandtheWorld:TwentiethCentury Expansion 355 PART IV BibliographyofJohnW.Meyer’sWritings 373 Index 383 List of Figures 4.1. Theoriginsandelaborationofformalorganizationalstructures 94 4.2. Organizationalsurvival 101 4.3. TheeVectsofinstitutionalisomorphismonorganizations 107 8.1. Theworldasaggregatedaction 178 8.2. Theworldasenactmentofculture 179 10.1. Cumulativecountsofinternationalenvironmentalactivities,1870–1990 224 10.2. Smoothedhazardratesforinitiationofinternationalenvironmentalactivities, 1870–1990 225 10.3. Indicatorsofinternationalscienceactivity,1880–1990 234 12.1. FactorsaVectingtheglobalexpansionofscience 265 12.2. Theglobalexpansionofscience:Aninstitutionalperspective 276 14.1. Theproblemsofindividualization 297 17.1. Worldtertiarystudents,1815–2000 357 17.2. Tertiaryenrollmentper10,000capita,regionalaverages,1900–2000 358 Table 10.1. Maximumlikelihoodestimatesofthehazardrateatwhichinternational environmentalassociations,treaties,andintergovernmental organizationsareformedintheworld 242 Foreword It is institutional theory that introduced us, Georg and Gili: we met on a panel discussion of institutional theory, at the October 1996 meeting of the Society for SocialStudiesofScience(4S),heldatBielefeldUniversity.Ourconversationabout institutionaltheoryhasnotendedsince.Todevelopourinstitutionalistthinking,we bothdrawinspirationfromJohnW.Meyerandourworkonthisbookisatributeto this inspiration. We thank John for years of mentoring and cooperative work. We addthankstoJohnforthemanyconversationsthatledustocomposingthiswork. Theworkonthisbook–theselectionofchaptersandinparticularthecompos- ition of Chapter 1 – beneWtted greatly from conversations with, and editorial comments from, several dear colleagues. We thank Elaine Coburn, Anita Engels, Hokyu Hwang, Woody Powell, Chiqui Ramirez, Marc Schneiberg, and Marc Ventresca.TheirwisereXectionsandsharpideaswereinvaluabletothedevelopment ofthisprojectandtothewritingofChapter1. We thank Sabine Rechner-Ralle and Yujing Yue for their meticulous work to reconcilethevariousoriginaltextsintothisuniformandcoherentcompilation. WethanktheeditorsatOxfordUniversityPressfortheirsupportofthisproject. Inparticular,wenotetheencouragementprovidedbyDavidMussonandMatthew Derbyshire throughout the process and we thank them their conWdence in the importance of the project. We also thank Kate Walker, Joy Mellor, and others withOxfordUniversityPressfortheircarefulattentiontotheeditingandproduction of this book. Last, we thank the three anonymous reviewers who provided us with helpfulsuggestionsatthestartofthisproject. We thank the various publishers of John W. Meyer’s work who graciously permitted the reprinting of the material in this compilation. Full citation of the original publications is noted in each chapter, but at the request of the copyright holders we note the following: Chapters 3 and 7 were originally published in the volumeInstitutionalStructure:ConstitutingState,Society,andtheIndividualandthe journalInternationalSociology,respectively,andarereprintedwithpermissionfrom Sage. Chapters 4 and 8 were originally published in American Journal of Sociology. Chapters5and14originallyappearedinthejournalSociologicalTheory.Chapter6 was originally published as ‘Institutional Conditions for DiVusion’, in Theory and Society, vol. 22 (1993), pp. 487–511, and is reprinted with kind permission of Springer Science and Business Media. Chapter 9 was originally published as ‘The WorldInstitutionalizationofEducation’inSchriewer,Ju¨rgen(ed.):DiscourseForma- tioninComparativeEducation(ComparativeStudiesSeries,vol.10),Frankfurt/M., Berlin, Bern, Bruxelles, New York, Oxford, Wien: Peter Lang 2000, pp.111–132. Chapter10wasoriginallypublishedas‘TheStructuringofaWorldEnvironmental Regime, 1870–1990’ in International Organization, and is reprinted with the permission of Cambridge University Press. Chapter 11 was originally published as