Inter-organizational collaboration and the dynamics of institutional fields

While many aspects of the collaborative process have been discussed in the management literature, the connection between collaboration and the dynamic s of institutional fields has remained largely unconsidered. Yet, collabora tion is an important arena for inter-organizational interaction and, theref ore, a potentially important context for the process of structuration upon which institutional fields depend. In this paper, we argue that institution alization and collaboration are interdependent; institutional fields provid e the rules and resources upon which collaboration is constructed, while co llaboration provides a context for the ongoing processes of structuration t hat sustain the institutional fields of the participants.