Paul S. Adler
University of Southern California
Renewing international comparative research: A societal governance perspective
Our field has developed conceptual tools for analyzing corporate governance as it adapts to societal challenges (Klein et al., 2019), but research on its macro counterpart—societal governance (Kourula et al., 2019)—has not kept pace. This gap is a problem, first, because adaptation at the firm level is enabled and constrained by the “rules of the game” (North, 1990) that are set by the wider system within which firms (e.g., Bodrožić & Adler, 2025), and second, because different societal governance systems appear to be responding very differently to our shared challenges. How can our research contribute to learning across systems?
Comparative research on societal governance is difficult, because systems differ so markedly across sectors and countries. Dealing with this diversity is made more difficult by our reliance on governance frameworks have been shaped by research in the U.S. and Europe (Aguilera & Jackson, 2010), and the related tacit assumption that technological, organizational and public policy innovations that emerged in ‘developed’ Western countries will become models for ‘developing’ countries (see Banerjee, 2022). This tacit assumption is increasingly untenable in a rapidly changing world where important technological and governance innovations are emerging in countries such as China, India, or Brazil.
I will review some competing frameworks and propose that some ways in which our field’s long-standing interest in international comparisons can be reenergized with the goal of facilitating mutual learning across systems facing common challenges. I will describe — and invite participants to join — an international research network currently under construction that brings management scholars together with scholars from public policy/administration, sociology, and political science to pursue this goal.
Bio:
Paul Adler is currently Harold Quinton Chair of Business Policy, and Professor of Management and Organization at the University of Southern California. He studies organizations and comparative political economy. His current work focuses on the challenges posed to capitalism by the climate emergency and other crises.