From Categories to Categorization: Studies in Sociology, Organizations and Strategy at the Crossroads: Volume 51

Cover of From Categories to Categorization: Studies in Sociology, Organizations and Strategy at the Crossroads
Subject:

Table of contents

(14 chapters)

Section I: Introduction

Abstract

The popularity of research into categories has grown in recent decades and shows no sign of abating. This introductory article takes stock of the research into two facets of categorization, addressing it both as a cognitive and a social process. We advocate a rebalance toward the social process of categorization, paying more heed to the entity to be categorized, the actors involved, their acts, and the context and timing, which informs these activities. We summarize the contributions to the volume in relation to these dimensions and briefly discuss avenues for future research.

Abstract

The “categorization as a theoretical tool” framework is delineated to clarify how innovation is possible even though candidates for exchange face a “categorical imperative” – pressure from their audience to adopt the conventional practices associated with existing categories. The key insight is that categorization is generally a useful tool for sorting and screening exchange opportunities. This insight is developed to suggest how the nature of the imperative varies with the audience’s objectives and the theory of value it espouses and how the strength of the imperative varies with the social challenges and opportunities for engaging in, and learning from, experiments with unconventionality.

Section II: Categorization as Politics and Strategy

Abstract

This article suggests that both producers and analysts are strategic about categorization. Producers use categorization to maintain a balance of differentiation and legitimacy, whereas analysts seek to influence categorization and clarify boundaries. Ideas are explored for software producers and Gartner, the preeminent high-technology analyst. Findings show evidence of strategic categorization. Producers move to proximate market categories in response to competition. Gartner reports on large categories and those that receive investment and stops reporting on categories that have fuzzy boundaries. Compared to analysts, producers may be more influential in category creation than previous research has acknowledged.

Abstract

Much of the current literature on category construction and maintenance has focused primarily on the disciplining effect of audiences that evaluate for conformity. This literature often characterizes categories as benign organizing devices that bring order to social life. However, categories are also contentious political and cultural productions. This is especially so, when the categories are hybrid. Employing a qualitative case study of an impact investing organization operating in Sub-Saharan Africa, we illustrate how the construction and maintenance of hybrid categories can have potentially advantageous effects for certain actors by shaping the architecture of knowledge and transferring legitimacy to otherwise illegitimate actors or nascent practices. The findings of this study highlight how some hybrid categories can be used to create and maintain unequal relations of power.

Abstract

Scholars have primarily focused on how language represents categories. We move beyond this conception to develop a discursive perspective of market categorization focused on how categories are constructed through communicative exchanges. The discursive perspective points to three under-researched mechanisms of category evolution: (1) the interaction between market participants, (2) the power dynamics among market participants and within the discourse, and (3) the cultural and material context in which categories are constructed. In this theoretical paper, we discuss how each of these mechanisms shed light on different phases of category evolution and the methods that could be used to study them.

Section III: Categorizing the Unknown

Abstract

Bitcoin is difficult to categorize and indeed has been associated with 112 different labels in the British media (e.g., “private money,” “commodity”) – most of which poorly describe bitcoin. Specifically, our analyses of 674 media articles, focusing on the relationship between labeling and categorization, identify classification inconsistencies at three levels: within clusters of labels, between labels and categories, and between category attributes. These inconsistencies hamper categorization based on attribute similarity, audience goals, and causal models, respectively. We identify four factors that nurture this categorical anarchy and conclude with a call for research on the socioeconomic revolution heralded by blockchain technology.

Abstract

We examine the translation of the concept of privacy in the advent of digital communication technologies. We analyze emerging notions of informational privacy in public discourse and policymaking in the United States. Our analysis shows category change to be a dynamic process that is only in part about cognitive processes of similarity. Instead, conceptions of privacy were tied to institutional orders of worth. Those orders offered theories, analogies, and vocabularies that could be deployed to extrapolate the concept of privacy into new domains, make sense of new technologies, and to shape policy agendas.

Abstract

This article explores how the commentary of intermediaries – third-party entities that do not have direct economic stakes in the sales of goods – can contribute to the creation of new market categories comprising preexisting but neglected and undervalued goods. Specifically, I study how the Sundance Institute facilitated the creation of a market for independent cinema in the United States, suggesting that intermediaries create market categories by defining boundaries, generating criteria of evaluation, and setting standards for measuring and establishing hierarchies of quality, which help audiences understand and value the category. The study, thus, adds nuance to our understanding of markets and categories.

Section IV: Times and Places of Categorization

Abstract

Drawing on the notion of imprinting, we develop a framework for understanding category emergence and durability by suggesting that the durability of a category reflects its emergence conditions. We propose four ideal-typical mechanisms – consensus, proof, fiat, and truce – that arise from differences in the degree of agreement and the centralization of the authority regarding category definitions. Our framework not only relates category durability to emergence but also highlights the role of category promoters and constituencies in an ongoing process of category maintenance. We discuss implications for understanding the dynamics of the categorization process in various social and product market contexts.

Abstract

This article integrates two approaches – the “categorization as a theoretical tool” and the “typicality judgment” – that both emphasize audience confusion as a mechanism through which category spanners become devalued or ignored. However, the two perspectives differ in their specification of why confusion will likely lead to devaluation or ignoring. In this study, we consider the interplay of these two approaches in the setting of corporate law market. We find that spanning product categories has a U-shaped relationship with perceived clarity of law firm identity. Although neither of the two perspectives alone can explain our findings, they can do so together.

Abstract

Studies have shown that actors who affiliate with multiple categories generally do so at their own peril. Still, category spanning is routinely observed, although it is less understood. We address this gap by a longitudinal study of category spanning among nanotube technology inventors. Our results highlight the importance of the evolving structure of category relationships, actor embeddedness within the structure, and interactions with other factors, including the attractiveness of related categories. When a category is relationally similar to others, associated inventors are more likely to engage in category spanning, whereas when a category is dissimilar, inventors are more likely to remain within it.

Cover of From Categories to Categorization: Studies in Sociology, Organizations and Strategy at the Crossroads
DOI
10.1108/S0733-558X201751
Publication date
2017-03-17
Book series
Research in the Sociology of Organizations
Editors
Series copyright holder
Emerald Publishing Limited
ISBN
978-1-78714-239-8
eISBN
978-1-78714-238-1
Book series ISSN
0733-558X