Outside

Inside

The packaging

Did institutions matter in producing these outcomes?

YES!

Looking behind the curtain Categories, status and the burden of proof

in organizational fields

Giuseppe Delmestri & Beth Goodrick

WU Vienna & Florida Atlantic University

Historical Analysis

• 2 cases in 2 countries: beginning 1900s & 1960s– Italy: • parliamentary debates• pharmacy history books• Interviews with pharmacy historians

– USA:• Court rulings• Pharmacy history books• Newspapers, pharmacy journals,

Research question

How do background assumptions affect the dynamics of categories and their associated logics within and between organizational fields?

Case 1: Chain stores (beg. 1900s)

Retail business category

Health care category

?Corporate

vs. Professional

logic

Case 1: USA (beg. 1928)

Retail business category

Health care

Pharmacists’ attempt to protect category by moving it towards the health care category

Failed

Case 1: Chain stores (beg. 1900s)

‘[Limiting ownership to pharmacists] creates an unreasonable and unnecessary restriction upon private business [and] is a clear and arbitrary invasion of the appellant’s property rights. … [M]ere stock ownership in a corporation, owning and operating a drug store, can have no real or substantial relation to the public health’ (Ruling of U.S. Supreme Court, 1928).

Case 1: Italy (1913)

Retail business category

Health care category

State protects pharmacy by emphasizing its professional character

Case 1: Chain stores (beg. 1928)

‘No legislation, unless imposing high punishments, is able to abolish greed for profit, which is natural and incoercible.” … “[F]ree trade has only one advantage: that of reducing prices. But are we sure in such a vital issue like public health, the possibility to save a couple of cents should be the basis on which we should choose which system to establish? Human life is worth more than two or three cents saved thanks to competition.’ (Italian Parliamentary Debates, 1913).

Case 1: Chain stores (beg. 1900s)

Retail business organization

Health care organization

Corporate vs.

Professional logic

Mar

ket lo

gic State logic

Background institutions place the BURDEN OF PROOF

and adjudicate visible ‘duel’

Case 2: Mass-manufacturing of medications (1960s)

– Risks transforming community pharmacists into shop keepers

– Pharmacists attempt to re-professionalize

– US: conflict professional vs. market logics– Italy: conflict professional vs. state logics

Case 2: USA (1960s)

Retail business category

Health care category

Pharmacists’ remained a special occupational category in retail, but lost organizational category status

Case 2: Italy (1968)

Retail business category

Health care

category

State protects pharmacy again by emphasizing its professional character

Contributions

• To institutional logics perspectiveRole of background in adjudicating foreground conflictsRole of nestedness: field, national and global

• Category researchOrganizational fields as industry categoriesClass membership of categories societally specific

Comments, suggestions?

Thank you for your attention