Overview

Collective action by firms is a central phenomenon in society, seen for example in standards setting, multi-stakeholder initiatives, and in relation to climate change, environmental and human rights issues. This incisive book reveals how firms set up specific devices, referred to by the authors as FCADs (Firms' Collective Action Devices), of which trade associations and chambers of commerce are the traditional forms, and investigates how firms organize themselves collectively, and their impact on the economy and democracy. Delving deeply into previously under-explored aspects of collective actions by firms, using the concepts of meta-organization and heterarchy, the book combines and expands on insights from history, political science, economics, sociology, management and organization theory. It demonstrates empirically how FCADs function on the basis of compromise and consensus, and analyzes their forms of action, their organizational dynamics and their recent evolution. This rigorous and pluridisciplinary evaluation of how businesses organize collectively will appeal to researchers and PhD students in organization studies and business management, as well as those in other disciplines who are interested in firms' collective action. It will also be a useful resource for business practitioners, public servants and politicians in contact with firms' collective action, and NGO members.

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9781839106675

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'In times when a small number of powerful corporations rule the global economy, it is easy to overlook the fact that firms act collectively through large organizations to protect their interests or define the rules of the game. What are the historical roots of these collective action organizations? What are the political and economic implications of their operations? How do they operate internally? How can we analyze them? Dumez and Renou systematically answer these questions in this groundbreaking study.' -- Marcelo Bucheli, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, US

Author Information

Hervé Dumez Institut Interdisciplinaire de l’Innovation (i3), CRG-École polytechnique, CNRS, IP-Paris and Sandra Renou, Université Paris-Est Créteil - IUT de Créteil-Vitry, France

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