Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-gvvz8 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-27T06:21:59.906Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

7 - The Limiting Effects of Analytical Individualism:

Examples from Macrosocial Change (2007)

from Part III - The Institutional Level of Analysis

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 March 2021

Ronald L. Jepperson
Affiliation:
University of Tulsa
John W. Meyer
Affiliation:
Stanford University, California
Get access

Summary

Discusses empirical examples showing how the preference for individual-level explanation – that is, for psychological, social-psychological, and microeconomic explanation – has limited the explanation of a wide range of macrosocial outcomes: of European economic history, of postindustrial development, of world economic development and globalization generally.

Type
Chapter
Information
Institutional Theory
The Cultural Construction of Organizations, States, and Identities
, pp. 170 - 195
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2021

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Anderson, P. (1974). Lineages of the Absolutist State, London: New Left Books.Google Scholar
Bates, R., Greif, A., Levi, M., Rosenthal, J., & Weingast, B. R.. (1998). Analytic Narratives, Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Bell, D. (1973). The Coming of Post-Industrial Society, New York, NY: Basic Books.Google Scholar
Bendix, R. (1960). Max Weber: An Intellectual Portrait, Garden City, NY: Anchor.Google Scholar
Bendix, R. (1964). Nation-Building and Citizenship, New York, NY: John Wiley & Sons.Google Scholar
Block, F. (1990). Postindustrial Possibilities: A Critique of Economic Discourse, Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Boli, J. (1989). New Citizens for a New Society, Elmsford, NY: Pergamon.Google Scholar
Boli, J. & Thomas, G., eds. (1999). Constructing World Culture: International Nongovernmental Organizations since 1875, Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.Google Scholar
Braudel, F. (1977). Afterthoughts on Material Civilization and Capitalism, Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press.Google Scholar
Brenner, R. (1977). The Origins of Capitalist Development: A Critique of Neo-Smithian Marxism. New Left Review, 104, 2592.Google Scholar
Butterfield, H. (1950). The Origins of Modern Science, 1300–1800, London: G. Bell and Sons.Google Scholar
Cameron, R. (1989). A Concise Economic History of the World, Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Chabbott, C. & Ramirez, F.. (2000). Development and Education. In Hallinan, M., ed., Handbook of the Sociology of Education. New York, NY: Plenum, pp. 163–87.Google Scholar
Chaves, M. & Sutton, J.. (2004). Organizational Consolidation in American Protestant Denominations, 1870–1990. Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, 43(1), 4166.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Coleman, J. S. (1986). Social Theory, Social Research, and a Theory of Action. American Journal of Sociology, 91(6), 1309–35.Google Scholar
Coleman, J. S. (1990). Foundations of Social Theory, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Collins, R. (1980). Weber’s Last Theory of Capitalism: A Systematization. American Sociological Review, 45(6), 925–42.Google Scholar
Collins, R. (1986). Weberian Sociological Theory, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Collins, R. (1999). Macrohistory, Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
DeLong, J. B. Forthcoming. What Do We Really Know about Economic Growth? In Boskin, M., ed., Economic Growth. Stanford, CA: Hoover Institution.Google Scholar
Drori, G., Meyer, J. W., Ramirez, F. O. & Schofer, E.. (2003). Science in the Modern World Polity: Institutionalization and Globalization, Palo Alto, CA: Stanford University Press.Google Scholar
Duby, G. (1980). The Three Orders: Feudal Society Imagined, Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Eisenstadt, S. N. (1987). Centre Formation and Protest Movements. In Eisenstadt, S. N., Roniger, L., & Seligman, A., eds., Centre Formation, Protest Movements and Class Structure in Europe and the United States. London: Frances Pinter, pp. 723.Google Scholar
Eisenstadt, S. N. (1999). Fundamentalism, Sectarianism, and Revolution, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Engerman, S. L. (2000). Max Weber as Economist and Economic Historian. In Turner, S., ed., The Cambridge Companion to Weber. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, pp. 256–71.Google Scholar
Frank, D. & Meyer, J. W.. (2002). The Contemporary Identity Explosion: Individualizing Society in the Post-War Period. Sociological Theory, 20(1), 86105.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fulbrook, M. (1983). Piety and Politics, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Gellner, E. (1990). Plough, Sword, and Book, Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Giddens, A. (1986). The Constitution of Society: Outline of a Theory of Structuration, Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Goody, J. (1983). The Development of the Family and Marriage in Europe, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Gorski, P. S. (2003). The Disciplinary Revolution, Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Granovetter, M. & Tilly, C.. (1988). Inequality and Labor Processes. In Smelser, N., ed., Handbook of Sociology. Newbury Park, CA: Sage, pp. 175221.Google Scholar
Hicks, J. (1969). A Theory of Economic History, Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Hirschman, A. (1977). The Passions and the Interests, Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hoff, K. & Stiglitz, J. E.. (2000). Modern Economic Theory and Development. In Meier, G. M. & Stiglitz, J. E., eds., Frontiers of Development Economics. New York, NY: Oxford University Press, pp. 389459.Google Scholar
Huff, T. (1995). The Rise of Early Modern Science: Islam, China and the West, Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Jepperson, R. L. (1991). Institutions, Institutional Effects, and Institutionalism. In Powell, W. W. & DiMaggio, P. J., eds., The New Institutionalism in Organizational Analysis. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, pp. 143–63.Google Scholar
Jepperson, R. L. (2002). Political Modernities: Disentangling Two Underlying Dimensions of Institutional Differentiation. Sociological Theory, 20(1), 6185.Google Scholar
Jones, E. L. (1981). The European Miracle, New York, NY: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Jones, E. L. (1987). The European Miracle, 2nd edn, New York, NY: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Landes, D. S. (1998). The Wealth and Poverty of Nations, New York, NY: W. W. Norton & Company.Google Scholar
Macfarlane, A. (1988). The Cradle of Capitalism: The Case of England. In Baechler, J., Hall, J. A., & Mann, M., eds., Europe and the Rise of Capitalism. Oxford: Basil Blackwell, pp. 185203.Google Scholar
Maddison, A. (2001). The World Economy: A Millennial Perspective, Paris: Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mann, M. (1979). Idealism and Materialism in Sociological Theory. In Freiberg, J. W., ed., Critical Sociology. New York, NY: Irvington Publishers, pp. 97120.Google Scholar
Mann, M. (1986). A History of Power from the Beginning to A.D. 1760. Vol. I of The Sources of Social Power. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mann, M. (1988). European Development: Approaching a Historical Explanation. In Baechler, J., Hall, J. A., & Mann, M., eds., Europe and the Rise of Capitalism. Oxford: Basil Blackwell, pp. 619.Google Scholar
Mann, M. (1993). The Rise of Classes and Nation States, 1760–1914. Vol. II of The Sources of Social Power. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Marx, K. & Engels, F.. [1845–46] 1978. The German Ideology. In Tucker, R. C., ed., The Marx-Engels Reader, 2nd edn. New York, NY: W. W. Norton & Company, pp. 146200.Google Scholar
McNeill, W. (1963). The Rise of the West, Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Merton, R. (1973). The Sociology of Science, Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Meyer, J. W. (1986). The Self and the Life Course: Institutionalization and Its Effects. In Sorensen, A., Weinert, F., & Sherrod, L., eds., Human Development and the Life Course. Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum, pp. 199216.Google Scholar
Meyer, J. W. (2002). Globalization, National Culture, and the Future of the World Polity. Hong Kong Journal of Sociology, 3, 118.Google Scholar
Meyer, J. W., Boli, J., Thomas, G., & Ramirez, F.. (1997). World Society and the Nation-State. American Journal of Sociology, 103(1), 144–81.Google Scholar
Meyer, J. W. & Jepperson, R. L.. (2000). The “Actors” of Modern Society: The Cultural Construction of Social Agency. Sociological Theory, 18(1), 100–20.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Meyer, J. W. & Ramirez, F.. (2000). The World Institutionalization of Education. In Schriewer, J., ed., Discourse Formation in Comparative Education. Frankfurt: Peter Lang, pp. 111–32.Google Scholar
Meyer, J. W., Ramirez, F., Rubinson, R., & Boli-Bennett, J.. (1977). The World Educational Revolution, 1950–1970. Sociology of Education, 50(4), 242–58.Google Scholar
Meyer, J. W., Ramirez, F., & Soysal, Y.. (1992). World Expansion of Mass Education, 1870–1970. Sociology of Education, 65(2), 128–49.Google Scholar
Mokyr, J. (1992). The Lever of Riches, Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Mokyr, J. (1999). Eurocentricity Triumphant. The American Historical Review, 104(4), 1241–6.Google Scholar
Mokyr, J. (2002). The Gifts of Athena, Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Muench, R. (1994). Sociological Theory: From the 1850s to the 1920s, Chicago, IL: Nelson-Hall.Google Scholar
North, D. C. (1981). Structure and Change in Economic History, New York, NY: W. W. Norton & Company.Google Scholar
Parsons, T. (1937). The Structure of Social Action, New York, NY: McGraw-Hill.Google Scholar
Parsons, T. (1947). Introduction. In Parsons, T., ed., Max Weber: The Theory of Social and Economic Organization, New York, NY: Free Press, pp. 386.Google Scholar
Parsons, T. (1951). The Social System, New York, NY: Free Press.Google Scholar
Polanyi, K. [1944] 1957. The Great Transformation, Boston, MA: Beacon Press.Google Scholar
Polanyi, K. (1977). The Livelihood of Man, New York, NY: Academic Press.Google Scholar
Ramirez, F. & Meyer, J. W.. (2003). Expansion and Impact of the World Human Rights Regime: Longitudinal and Cross-National Analyses over the Twentieth Century. National Science Foundation proposal (2002–2004).Google Scholar
Schofer, E. & Meyer, J. W.. (2004). The Worldwide Expansion of Higher Education in the Twentieth Century. American Sociological Review, 70(6), 898920.Google Scholar
Scott, W. R. (2001). Institutions and Organizations, 2nd edn, Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.Google Scholar
Stinchcombe, A. (2004). The Preconditions of World Capitalism: Weber Updated. The Journal of Political Philosophy, 11(4), 411–36.Google Scholar
Strayer, J. (1973). The Medieval Origins of the Modern State, Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Toulmin, S. (1992). Cosmopolis: The Hidden Agenda of Modernity, Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Wallerstein, I. (1974). Capitalist Agriculture and the Origins of the European World-Economy in the Sixteenth Century. Vol. I of The Modern World System. New York, NY: Academic Press.Google Scholar
Walzer, M. (1965). The Revolution of the Saints, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Weber, M. [1904/5] 1996. The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, Los Angeles, CA: Roxbury Publishing Company.Google Scholar
Weber, M. [1920] 1996. Max Weber’s Introduction to the Sociology of Religion. In The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism. Los Angeles, CA: Roxbury Publishing Company, pp. 1331.Google Scholar
Weber, M. [1923] 1950. General Economic History, Glencoe, IL: The Free Press.Google Scholar
Weber, M. [1920] 1996. Max Weber on Law in Economy and Society, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Werner, K. F. (1988). Political and Social Structures of the West. In Baechler, J., Hall, J. A. & Mann, M., eds., Europe and the Rise of Capitalism. Oxford: Basil Blackwell, pp. 169–84.Google Scholar
Wuthnow, R. (1987). Meaning and Moral Order, Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Wuthnow, R. (1989). Communities of Discourse: Ideology and Social Structure in the Reformation, the Enlightenment, and European Socialism, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Zaret, D. (1985). The Heavenly Contract, Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure no-reply@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×