University of Michigan s4

University of Michigan

School of Social Work

W813: Intervention in Human Service Organizations and Social Service Networks

Zeke Hasenfeld

Course Description: This course provides a critical examination of strategies of change within human service organizations and in networks of organizations in terms of their effects on effectiveness, efficiency, and responsiveness to the needs of vulnerable populations. Theories and research on organizations, specifically organization-environment relations, organization-client relations, structure, organizational change and innovation, and inter-organizational analysis and change will be applied to the formulation of intervention and change strategies. The effects of current structuring of service delivery systems on accessibility, comprehensiveness, continuity, fairness, quality, and effectiveness of care, with special emphasis on populations vulnerable through their gender or ethnicity, will be detailed. Models and empirical studies of change within organizations and in networks of organizations aimed at improving the delivery of services will be analyzed and research issues and knowledge gaps will be identified. Relevant ethical and value issues will be examined.

Course Structure: This is an interactive seminar in which we jointly explore the literature and discuss its content and implications to the study of organizational change. To do so, we’ll use memos and discussion questions.

Course Requirements

Memos: For each class session, students will choose two readings on which she will write memos. Memos are one to two pages long and provide an opportunity for the student to concisely discuss an interesting implication of the reading and to develop theory further. I suggest the following format for a memo. 1) Begin by stating a theoretical proposition from the article/chapter. A proposition is a statement about a causal relationship between two concepts. A very specific proposition is a hypothesis. 2) Discuss how that proposition might be extended or applied to human service organizations. You might talk about how a theory might not apply to certain situations. You might also talk about how a different theoretical perspective makes us question the original proposition. 3) Talk about the implications of extending the proposition. Does a different human service context challenge the premises of the theory? Can you build on the proposition and make it more general/more specific? What interesting implications does this have for a different theory? In an excellent memo you will come up with a new proposition/hypothesis to test.

The point of doing memos is to force you to think creatively. Rather than learning theories and spitting them out in summaries, this class will challenge you to think beyond what you read and try to create something new. Ideally, you will use the memos as sounding boards for ideas that you might explore further in a research project. You should not treat memos as summaries of the readings.

In addition to writing the memos, you will present and discuss them in class. The class is invited to comment on your ideas. I hope that students will feel free to openly question and make suggestions to the memo writer. In other words, ideas presented in a memo are open to challenge. The discussion part of the memo writing is intended to give you feedback and help you to sharpen your analytical and theory-building skills.

Discussion Questions: For each reading think of a question you would like to discuss in class. You will then post them to the course’s forum the night before class. A good discussion question is thought-provoking. Try to avoid questions that would simply require someone in the class to summarize something from the reading. “Why” or “how” questions are good. You might also try to make connections between the current reading and something we’ve discussed in an earlier class. I think you’ll get the idea as we go along. For each class session, every student is expected to post at least 3 questions.

Research proposal: At the end of the seminar each student should finish an eight to ten page research proposal. The research proposal should pose a research question or hypothesis about change in human service organizations. It should then select two competing theoretical frameworks as guides to the study. You should not use the research proposal to summarize the material covered in class. Lay out your competing theoretical argument in the first 4-5 pages of the proposal, and then show how each would guide the conduct of the research project. We will use the last couple of sessions of the seminar to talk about your research proposals. Each student will have time to present their proposal and field questions from the class.

Session 1: Introduction

Hasenfeld, Y. (2010). The attributes of human service organizations. In Human Services as Complex Organizations (2nd ed.) Sage Publications.

Garrow, E and Y. Hasenfeld (2010) Theoretical approaches to humans service organizations In Human Services as Complex Organizations(2nd ed.) Sage Publications.

Hasenfeld, Y. (2000). Organizational Forms as Moral Practices: The Case of Welfare Departments. The Social Service Review, 74(3), 329-351.

Session 2: Social Policy and Organizational Change

Schneider, A., & Ingram, H. (1993). Social Construction of Target Populations: Implications for Politics and Policy. American Political Science Review, 87, 334-347.

Hitlin, S., Vaisey, S., & Steensland, B. (2010). Moral Classification and Social Policy Handbook of the Sociology of Morality (pp. 455-468): Springer New York.

Morgen, S., Acker, J., & Weigt, J. M. (2010). Stretched thin: poor families, welfare work, and welfare reform. Ithaca: Cornell University Press. Chapters 1-5.

Sessions 3-4: An Ecological Perspective

Hannan, M. T. (2005). Ecologies of Organizations: Diversity and Identity. Journal of Economic Perspectives, 19(1), 51-70.

Aldrich, H. (2006). Organizational evolution and entrepreneurship (2nd ed.). Thousand Oaks, DC: Sage Publications.

Ruef, M. (2000). The Emergence of Organizational Forms: A Community Ecology Approach. American Journal of Sociology, 106(3), 658-714.

Baum, J. A. C., & Oliver, C. (1996). Toward an institutional ecology of organizational founding. Academy of Management Journal, 39, 1378-1427.

Hsu, G., & Hannan, M. T. (2005). Identities, Genres, and Organizational Forms. Organization Science, 16(5), 474-490.

Session 5: An Institutional Logics Perspective

Friedland, R., & Alford, R. R. (1991). Bringing society back in: Symbols, practices, and institutional contradictions. In W. W. Powell & P. J. DiMaggio (Eds.), The New Institutionalism (pp. 232-263). Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Thornton, P., & Ocassio, W. (2008). Institutional Logics. In R. Greenwood, C. Oliver, R. Suddaby & K. sahlin (Eds.), The SAGE handbook of organizational institutionalism (pp. 99-129). Los Angeles: SAGE.

Zilber, T. (2002). Institutionalization as an interplay between actions, meanings, and actors: The case of a rape crisis center in Israel. Academy of Management Journal, 45, 234-254.

Scott, W. R., Reuf, M., Mendel, P. J., & Carrona, C. A. (2000). Institutional change and healthcare organizations: from professional dominance to managed care. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Session 6: Institutional Entrepreneurship

Hardy, C., & Maguire, S. (2008). Institutional Entrepreneurship. In R. Greenwood, C. Oliver, R. Suddaby & K. Sahlin (Eds.), Organizational Institutionalism (pp. 198-217). Los Angeles: Sage.

Maguire, S., Hardy, C., & Lawrence, T. B. (2004). Institutional Entrepreneurship in Emerging Fields: HIV / AIDS Treatment Advocacy in Canada. ACADEMY OF MANAGEMENT JOURNAL, 47(5), 657-680.

Rao, H., & Giorgi, S. (2006). Code Breaking: How Entrepreneurs Exploit Cultural Logics to Generate Institutional Change. Research in Organizational Behavior, 27, 269-304.

Hallett, Tim. 2010. "The Myth Incarnate." American Sociological Review 75(1):52-74.

Session 7: A Political Economy Perspective

Wamsley, G. L., & Zald, M. N. (1976). The Political Economy of Public Organizations. Bloomington, Indiana: Indiana University Press.

Benson, J. K. (1975). The interorganizational network as a political economy. Administrative Science Quarterly, 20 Issue:2, 229-249 .

Hasenfeld, Y. (1980). Implementation of change in human service organizations: A political economy perspective. Social Service Review, 54, 508-520

Pfeffer, J., & Moore, W. L. (1980). Power in University Budgeting: A Replication and Extension. Administrative Science Quarterly, 25(4), 637-653.

Gronbjerg, K. A. (1998). Markets, politics, and charity: Nonprofits in the political economy. In W. W. Powell & E. Clemens (Eds.), Private Action and the Public Good (pp. 137-150). New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.

Session 8: Agency and Structure

Giddens, Anthony. 1984. The Constitution of Society: Outline of the Theory of Structuration. University of California Press. Berkeley, CA. Chapter 1.

Sewell, William H , Jr. 1992. "A Theory of Structure: Duality, Agency, and Transformation." American Journal of Sociology 98:1-29.

Emirbayer, Mustafa, and Ann Mische. 1998. "What Is Agency?" American Journal of Sociology 103:962-1023.

Orlikowski, Wanda J. 2000. "Using technology and constituting structures: A practice lens for studying technology in organizations." Organization Science 11:404-428.

Feldman, M. S. 2000. "Organizational routines as a source of continuous change." Organization Science 11(6):611-629.

Barley, Stephen R., and Pamela S. Tolbert. 1997. "Institutionalization and structuration: Studying the links between action and institution." Organization Studies 18:93-117.

Sandfort, Jodi R. 2003. "Exploring the structuration of technology within human service organizations." Adminstration&Society 34:605-631.

Session 9: An Organizational Field Perspective

Borgatti, Stephen P., and Pacey C. Foster. 2003. "The Network Paradigm in Organizational Research: A Review and Typology." Journal of Management 29(6):991-1013.

Hargadon, Andrew B. 2002. "Brokering knowledge: Linking learning and innovation." Research in Organizational Behavior 24:41-85.

Provan, Keith G., Kun Huang, and H. Brinton Milward. 2009. "The Evolution of Structural Embeddedness and Organizational Social Outcomes in a Centrally Governed Health and Human Services Network." Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory 19(4):873-893.

Emirbayer, Mustafa, and Victoria Johnson. 2008. "Bourdieu and organizational analysis." Theory and Society 37(1):1-44.

Oakes, Leslie S., Barbara Townley, and David J. Cooper. 1998. "Business Planning as Pedagogy: Language and Control in a Changing Institutional Field." Administrative Science Quarterly 43:257-292.

Session 10-11: Power and Organizational Change - A critique

Clegg, S., Courpasson, D., & Phillips, N. (2006). Power and organizations. London: SAGE.

Session 12: A Feminist Perspective

Acker, Joan. 2006. "Gender and Organizations." Pp. 177-194 in Handbook of the Sociology of Gender, edited by Janet Saltzman Chafetz. Springer US.

Martin, Patricia Yancey. 1990. "Rethinking Feminist Organizations." Gender & Society 4:182-206.

Hyde, Cheryl. 1992. "The Ideational System of Social Movement Agencies: An Examination of Feminist Health Centers." Pp. 121-144 in Human Services as Formal Organizations, edited by Yeheskel Hasenfeld. Sage Publications.

Aschraft, Karen Lee. 2001. "Organized dissonance: Feminist bureaucracy as hybrid form." Academy of Management Journal 44:1301-1322.

Martin, Patricia. 2010.”Rape Crisis Centers: Helping Victims, Changing Society." In Y. Hasenfeld (ed.) Human Services as Complex Organizations (2nd ed.) Sage Publications.

Session 13: Social Movement Organizations

Snow, David A., and Sarah Anne Soule. 2010. A primer on social movements. W. W. Norton.

Cress, Daniel M., and David A. Snow. 2000. "The outcome of homeless mobilization: The influence of organization, disruption, political mediation, and framing." American Journal of Sociology 105:1063-1104.

Levitsky, Sandra R. 2008. "“What Rights?” The Construction of Political Claims to American Health Care Entitlements." Law & Society Review 42(3):551-590.

Hasenfeld, Yeheskel, and Benjamin Gidron. 2005. "Understanding multi-purpose hybrid voluntary organizations: The contributions of theories on civil society, social movements and non-profit organizations." Journal of Civil Society 1:97-112.

Osterman, Paul. 2006. "Overcoming Oligarchy: Culture and Agency in Social Movement Organizations." Administrative Science Quarterly 51(4):622-649.

Zald, Mayer N., Calvin Morrill, and Haygreeva Rao. 2010. "The Impact of Social Movements on Organizations: Environment and Responses." Pp. 253-279 in Social Movements and Organization Theory, edited by Gerald E. Davis, Doug McAdam, W. Richard Scott, and Mayer N. Zald. Cambridge University Press.