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  • GPSFs and institutionalisation online version

    Rights statement: This material has been published in Professional Networks in Transnational Governance by / edited by Leonard Seabrooke and Lasse Folke Henriksen. This version is free to view and download for personal use only. Not for re-distribution, re-sale or use in derivative works. © Cambridge University Press 2017

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Global professional service firms and institutionalization

Research output: Contribution in Book/Report/Proceedings - With ISBN/ISSNChapter

Published
Publication date2017
Host publicationProfessional Networks in Transnational Governance
EditorsLeonard Seabrooke, Lasse Henriksen
Place of PublicationCambridge
PublisherCambridge University Press
Pages219-232
Number of pages14
ISBN (electronic)9781316855508
ISBN (print)9781107181878
<mark>Original language</mark>English

Abstract

In this chapter we seek to highlight the importance of advancing the work that does exist on GPSFs in the institutionalization of transnational governance regimes through a more careful consideration of the identities, projects and effects of the firms in question. We contend that in their attempts to develop new markets, services and more efficient internal organizational models, GPSFs exercise far reaching institutional effects as they challenge governance regimes, disrupt/create jurisdictions, and transform identities, practices and systems of regulation in the professions themselves. They do this, we suggest, through three strategies associated with scope of control, defining scales of knowledge resources, and the production of ecologies of linked interests. These strategies involve developing strategic alliances with a range of other field actors such as academia, regulatory bodies, International Organisations, national governments and professional associations as part of linked ecologies (Abbott, 2005). As such, GPSFs exemplify the process of professional strategy > organizational opportunities > issue control that Seabrooke and Henriksen (this volume) claim is central to the transnational realm. This chapter provides, then, a contribution to on-going attempts to ‘revisit theories of professionalism, which did not fully anticipate the shift of professional work to the context of large organizations’ (Suddaby et al., 2007: 25). It also complements the following chapter by Boussebaa, outlining the institutionalizing effects of neo-colonial networks.

Bibliographic note

This material has been published in Professional Networks in Transnational Governance by / edited by Leonard Seabrooke and Lasse Folke Henriksen. This version is free to view and download for personal use only. Not for re-distribution, re-sale or use in derivative works. © Cambridge University Press 2017