Trinity ofChange Agency …atmaso/verkkokirjasto/v/6_H12_agency_b.pdfTwitter:@Sotarauta TUT established as ‘a university for industry’ (1965 as a filial and 1972 as a university)

www.sotarauta.infoTwitter: @Sotarauta

Innovative entrepreneurship

Trinity of Change AgencyConnects three types of agency originating in different fields of literature

Institutionalentrepreneurship Place leadership

Agency

(Grillitsch & Sotarauta 2019)

• Construction and utilization of regional development is dependent on TCA?

• These call for / necessitate each other in processes of regional path development

Opportunity spaces


Schumpeterian innovative

entrepreneurship

Trinity of Change AgencyConnects three types of agency originating in different fields of literature

Institutionalentrepreneurship Place leadership

Agency

(Grillitsch & Sotarauta 2019)

Opportunity spaces


The constraints put in place by institutions should not be over-

estimated (or underestimated) in any study of agency

The best of the actors stretch the constraints they face and navigate

through complex events, networks and institutional arrangements

Image credit: New York Times


• In local/regional development, it is crucial… o to identify the ‘big issues’ locking us to

the past

o to identify the ‘big issues’ providing us with new opportunities – seeds for new paths

o to understand that engagement, participation etc. etc. should not be seen as end results in themselves but steps towards something

• Rationale: Find the new and institutionalize ito Easier said than done



Institutions• Recurrent patterns of behavior (habits,

conventions, and routines) (Morgan 1997)

• Socially constructed rule systems or norms that produce routine-like behavior (Jepersson, 1991)

• Regulative, normative and cultural-cognitive institutional pillars (Scott 2001)

• Rules of the game (North 1990)


Institution• Laws • Various standards• Organization and industry specific rules • Industry specialization and structure• Governance structure• Financial system • The research and development

structure • R&D investment routines • Training and competence building

system


Institutions exert an influence on the character and evolutionary trajectory of regional economies

that is often subtle, sometimes dominant, but undeniably pervasive

(Gertler 2010)


Regulative pillar Normative pillar Cultural-cognitive pillar

Basis of compliance Expedience Social oblication Shared understanding

Indicators Rules, laws, sanctions Certification, accreditation Common beliefs

Basis of legitimacy Legally sanctioned, rule-based sanctions and rewards

Morally governed Recognizable, culturally supported

Three pillars of institutional theory (Scott 2001)


A case in point

How did university industry interaction become institutionalized in Tampere?


TUT established as ‘a university for

industry’ (1965 as a filial and

1972 as a university)

One of the key ingredients of any knowledge city are high quality

higher education institutions that provide education and carry out scientifically high quality but also economically and socially relevant

research The Government

stressed the purity of science

TUT continuedworking with the

firms

80’sTechnology center and tech transfer

1990’s and 00’svarious

developmentprogrammes both

nationally and locally

Tampere university today

… International

science or collaboration

with industries or both


Top-down institutional influence Bottom-up institutional agency

Normative pillars Higher education valued but Tampere not seen as a place to locate a new university

University industry collaboration deemed harmful

City leaders having an explicit objective to have a university in the city

University of Technology explicitly established as a university for industry

Two universities usurped by tapping into the resources of the capital but with a ploy to make both universities own

Regulative pillars Centralised HEI policy, autonomy of universities low

Strict rules against university industry collaboration

A need to navigate the top-down regulations by challenging them and construction local rules for interaction between firms and the university

Institutional influence in Tampere (from 60’s to 70’s)


Top-down institutional influence Bottom-up institutional agency

Cognitive-culturalpillars

The purity of science emphasised Local leaders believed a university is crucial for the city development in the long run. University industry collaboration defined as the core function of the university of technology

Agency The government and related ministries

City government with selected stakeholders

The leaders of the university in collaboration with leaders of local industries

Institutional influence in Tampere (from 60’s to 70’s)


Meta-strategies in Tampere (1960’s to 2020’s)Not actual planned or deliberate strategies but long-term ‘tidal’ strategies that can be identified in retrospecto Working against the institutional tide with an opportunistic institutional

strategy

o Adapting to a turning institutional tide with an institutional protection strategy

o Going with the institutional tide and exploiting the innovation hype with an institutional expansion strategy and

o Launching an institutional offensive


Today: institutional conflict“Universities must interact with the surrounding society…“ (MoE)

BUT, the core funding system does not support these ambitions

BUT, long tradition in engagement

-> increased tension between research excellence and civic engagement


Regulative pillar Normative pillar Cultural-cognitive pillar

Basis of compliance Engagement is important for the country and its regionsAcademic excellence is an imperative

Some feel engagement is a social oblicationMany focus on academic excellence

Some do both

Shared understanding fragmented – a tension between academic excellence and engagement

Some tensions between disciplines

Indicators Law: engagement is compulsoryUniversity funding system does not support

Many for academic excellence, contested ones for engagement

Common beliefs are many –both about means and ends

Basis of legitimacy No sanctions, no real rewards for engagement –many rewards for academic excellence

Many are morally governed, the others are not – RRI changing the landscape

Continuous debate

Institutional conflict between academic excellence and societal engagementA quick institutional analysis


Institutional entrepreneurs

• have an interest in particular institutional arrangements

• mobilize resources and competences to create new institutions or transform the existing ones

• initiate divergent changes and actively participate in the implementation of these changes

• take the lead in change efforts

• challenge existing rules and practices and institutionalize the alternative rules and practices they are championing

• are often constrained by the very same institutions they aim to change (embedded agency)

(DiMaggio, 1988; see also Battilana, 2006; Battilana et al. 2009; Sotarauta & Pulkkinen 2011; Garud & Karnøe, 2003)

www.sotarauta.infoTwitter: @SotarautaInstitutionalisation

• A process of a new practice, activity, norm, belief, or some other institution, becoming established part of an existing system, organization or culture (Sotarauta & Mustikkamäki, 2015)

• Institutionalized practice has attained a high degree of resilience (Scott 2001)

• …like a rule in collective thought and social action (Scott 2001)

• The formation of such collective actors who defend the emergence of a new institution are an essential part of the institutionalization process (d’Ovidio & Pradel 2012)

IdeaIdea

Social

structure


Process of change

Results of change

Continuity Discontinuity

Incremental Reproduction by adaptation

Gradual transformation

Abrupt Survival and return

Breakdown and replacement

Institutional change(Streeck & Thelen 2005)


A case in point

How did human regenerative medicinebecome institutionalized in Tampere?


I - Seeds of change(1997-2000)

Prof. Hovatta joins Regea

UTA professorTUT professor

Reg devorganisations

Informal discussions

II – Belief formation(2001-2004)

III – Launch ofactivity

(2004-2007)

IV – Institutionalization(2008-)

Existing expertise

Businessplan

No business

Tissue bank

Research project

Regea (2005)

Endowed professorship

(City of Tampere)

Breakthrough treatments(2006/2007)

Situation now• Commercialization / Spark

Finland (2017)• Changing university hospital

routines?• New science institutionalized,

industry not

Excitement,collective

interpretation(excl research community) Leadership

of UTA and Univ. hospital

Globalexpectations

Diminish

Planninggroup

discussions with all relevant parties


• IE is a collective and processual form of agency (Ritvala and Kleymann2012; Drori & Landau 2011; Hung and Whittington 2011)

• IE is often an unplanned, highly personal and intuitive form of agency (Ritvala and Kleymann 2012)

• IEs ‘softly’ frame the conditions for future development (Kulve 2010)

• IEs are important in the long run as they bridge macro level (policy) and micro level (academic research) in a process of cogeneration (Karlsen et al 2012)

• IEs operate in the nexus of existing visions that produce continuity and new visions that push for institutional change (Drori & Landau 2011)

• All this calls for relational, contextual and systemic understanding of institutional entrepreneurship

Empirical observations


• Institutional entrepreneurs devise and effectuate institutional change through…o Collective action, shared goals oGroup tensions, challenging other

actors, fighting, bullyingo Framing

• Belief formation• Knowledge justification• Political tactics• Professionalization • Theorization• Making decisions and channeling

resources

• Different strategies in different phases of a process


• The concept of institutional entrepreneurship adds to our knowledge

o How social actors work to change the institutions that govern their own activity

o The ways power is exercised in these processes

o How actors strategise, mobilise and co-ordinate tangible and intangible resources for institutional change

o The ways risk and opportunity are taken not only for business but also for changing the rules of the game

o Institutionalisation as an ongoing multi-actor and multi-scalar process

Conclusions


• Institutional change is creeping by nature

• Agency is not to be located in the attributes of individual actors but in the relationships connecting actors in an innovation system and institutional change of it

• Policy-makers have a role in institutional change but not a linear one -> the study of agency reveals the roles

Documents

Trinity ofChange Agency …atmaso/verkkokirjasto/v/6_H12_agency_b.pdfTwitter:@Sotarauta TUT established as ‘a university for industry’ (1965 as a filial and 1972 as a university)