Environmental managers as institutional entrepreneurs: The influence of institutional and technical pressures on waste management

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Abstract

Building upon institutional theory, this paper compares environmental management practices in two similar manufacturing plants that operate in different regulatory contexts. Unlike prior research that separates institutional and technical pressures, we find that environmental management decisions are a reaction to both institutional and technical pressures, which co-exist and even co-construct each other. Environmental managers, serving as boundary spanners, are exposed to these technical and institutional pressures, as well as multiple discourses with institutional fields. In this role, they sometimes act as institutional entrepreneurs, purposefully altering the framing of and discourse about environmental performance. Their strategies depend, in part, on their relative power within the organization, the relationship between technical and institutional pressures, and the salience of these pressures.

Introduction

A body of theory often evoked to explain management of environmental issues is institutional theory (Hoffman and Ventresca, 2002, Campbell, 2006). One limitation of much institutional research, however, is that it artificially separates technical and institutional environment for analytic purposes. For some of the earlier research on institutional theory, this separation may have been appropriate, as it focused primarily on industries, such as education, where institutional pressures are relatively strong. The fact is, however, for most industrial organizations both environments are prevalent. In the case of environmental management within manufacturing organizations, assessing the effect of both institutional and technical pressures is particularly important because manufacturing organizations exist within a strong technical environment (Scott, 1995). Thus, one goal of this paper is to better understand how both technical and institutional pressures play a role in a firm's environmental management and performance.

The paper also focuses on the role of the individual in managing these pressures. Several researchers have called for a greater integration of micro processes with institutional theory (Hirsch and Lounsbury, 1997, Norus, 1997). Specifically, Norus (1997) calls for a greater emphasis on the foundation of links between individuals, institutions and business firms in neoinstitutional analysis. Critical in understanding an organization's response to institutional and technical pressures, therefore, are organizational boundary spanners. This paper looks at the role of environmental managers as boundary spanners and, in some cases, institutional entrepreneurs and discusses the factors that influence their responses to external pressures.

Using an inductive approach to theory development, this paper compares the solvent management programs of two “sister” automobile assembly plants, the Chrysler minivan plant in St. Louis and the Chrysler minivan plant in Windsor, Canada. Although the two countries employ a similar legal framework, there are enough significant differences between the two regulatory systems that make it an interesting comparative case for investigating the influence of institutional and technical pressures on managerial action.

Section snippets

Theoretical development

Over the past decade, there has been an emerging body of literature that attempts to make room for rational, strategic action within institutional environments (Clemens and Douglas, 2005, Rodrigues and Child, 2003, Oliver, 1997, Oliver, 1991, Goodstein, 1994, Fligstein, 2001, Fligstein, 1997, Beckert, 1999, Dorado, 2005). The role of strategic action, however, can actually be found in the seminal articles on institutional theory, which outlined that there were two types of organizational

Methods

This research compares two Chrysler Assembly plants, St. Louis (US) and Windsor (Canada), which were rebuilt in 1995 to be similar in both product and production technologies. Fieldwork consisted approximately of one month at each plant. For both plants, entry was made into the plant through the paint department, but there was full access to the rest of the organization.

The primary mode of information gathering was interviewing over the course of the late 1990s. The first part of the fieldwork

Background

The United States is known for its long history of antagonistic, strict, command and control style of regulation (Bardach and Kagan, 1982). This style can clearly be seen in the regulation of air pollutants from automobile assembly plants. In the United States, the primary pollutant of concern is Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs), which is a significant factor in urban air pollution. Under the Clean Air Act (CAA), established in 1970 and amended in 1990, not only are regulatory limits in the

Analysis

Central in this story of waste management were the plant level PEM environmental managers, who sat at the nexus of multiple boundaries. Some of these boundaries can be distinguished by the different stakeholders, such as regulatory agencies, the local community, the plant employees, and the PEM corporate office. All of these relationships created an institutional field in which multiple discourses regarding the nature of plant shop environmental performance existed. In addition, there were

Conclusions

The paper suggests that organizational responses to environmental pressures are both technical and institutional. While separation of these two types of environmental pressure may have been useful in the initial stages of institutional theory, it is no longer sufficient. In this study, in contrast to what is assumed in much institutional theory, we found that the technical and institutional pressures need not conflict with one another. In some cases, responses to institutional pressures can

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    Funding for this research was provided by the MIT International Motor Vehicle Program and the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation under Award No. 2005–5–14 IC. The author would like to thank Lotte Bailyn, Maureen Scully, Tom Kochan, Mark Ventresca, David Levy, two anonymous reviewers, and the journal editor for their ideas and comments. Thanks also go to Chrysler Corporation and its employees for their cooperation and assistance.

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