Institutions as Collectively Accepted Norms

Noriaki Okamoto ()
Additional contact information
Noriaki Okamoto: Rikkyo University

Chapter Chapter 2 in Institutional Change and Performativity, 2024, pp 9-43 from Springer

Abstract: Abstract Formal institutions constitute and regulate corporate accounting. Accounting standards are a typical example of such formal institutions. This chapter explores the nature of the institution rather than taking it for granted. First, it highlights the essential characteristics of institutions by drawing on earlier work in institutional theory, which has long taken institutions themselves as the object of study. A central issue in understanding institutions is the ontological foundation of institutions, and if this point is not clarified, the construction of a theory of institutional dynamics would be challenging. This chapter does not argue that institutions emerge as a by-product of individual behaviors in society; rather, it assumes that institutions do exist in society and exert significant influence on individual and organizational behaviors. This chapter therefore draws on the insights of social ontology to argue that there is normativity in the nature of social institutions that acts on individuals beyond their personal desires. What, then, is the nature of normativity? It is collective acceptance, and a discourse that is more widely and collectively accepted is accompanied by greater normativity. From this perspective, this chapter classifies the normativity that constitutes social institutions. It particularly argues that belief-based observable social norms play a significant role in institutional reality. In other words, rule-makers or standard setters, referred to in this book as operative members, make decisions about institutions under uncertainty. Their decisions are influenced by collective social norms, which are not always explicit and are usually discovered by analysts such as social scientists.

Keywords: Institutional theory; Social ontology; Collective acceptance; Social norms; Observable social norms (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2024
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

There are no downloads for this item, see the EconPapers FAQ for hints about obtaining it.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:spr:sprchp:978-3-031-53393-8_2

Ordering information: This item can be ordered from
http://www.springer.com/9783031533938

DOI: 10.1007/978-3-031-53393-8_2

Access Statistics for this chapter

More chapters in Springer Books from Springer
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().