Zhongyuan Sun

Reading lists Stream 4Search all readings

Resource dependence and power

Interdependence, power and how organizations manage their environments.

Of its 39 readings, 19 are assigned in two or more sources and listed first, with the number of sources beside each (in bold for the core readings, in 4 or more); the 20 listed in only one source are folded under each heading.

In the theory tree: grows out of 3 Contingency and configurational theory.

Drawn from: Pollock (Tennessee); Sullivan (HKUST); Dobbin (Harvard); Marquis (HBS); Wan (CUHK); Yiu (CUHK); Lu, Li, Park, Yang & Yan (CityU); Fiss (USC); Lounsbury & Zhao (Oxford Bibliographies); Clough (UBC); Anteby (Boston University); Zuckerman (MIT); Yue (USC); Peng (UT Dallas); Maoret (IESE); Amit (Wharton). Full details of the sources are on the reading lists page.

By decade

Before 1950: 0 readings<19501950s: 0 readings1950s1960s: 5 readings1960s1970s: 5 readings1970s1980s: 7 readings1980s1990s: 8 readings81990s2000s: 7 readings2000s2010s: 6 readings2010s2020s: 1 reading2020s
Most date from the 1990s; half were published in 1992 or later.

Core readings

In 4 or more sources.

  1. Pfeffer, J., & Salancik, G. (1978). The External Control of Organizations: A Resource Dependence Perspective. Harper and Row.12
  2. Casciaro, T., & Piskorski, M. J. (2005). Power Imbalance, Mutual Dependence, and Constraint Absorption: A Closer Look at Resource Dependence Theory. Administrative Science Quarterly, 50(2), 167–199. https://doi.org/10.2189/asqu.2005.50.2.1679
  3. Emerson, R. M. (1962). Power-Dependence Relations. American Sociological Review, 27(1), 31. https://doi.org/10.2307/20897168
  4. Hillman, A. J., Withers, M. C., & Collins, B. J. (2009). Resource Dependence Theory: A Review. Journal of Management, 35(6), 1404–1427. https://doi.org/10.1177/01492063093434695
  5. Santos, F. M., & Eisenhardt, K. M. (2009). Constructing Markets and Shaping Boundaries: Entrepreneurial Power in Nascent Fields. Academy of Management Journal, 52(4), 643–671. https://doi.org/10.5465/amj.2009.436698924

Also assigned

In 2 to 3 sources.

  1. Lawrence, P. D., & Lorsch, J. W. (1967). Organization and Environment: Managing Differentiation and Integration. Harvard Business School Press.3
  2. Baker, W. E. (1990). Market Networks and Corporate Behavior. American Journal of Sociology, 96(3), 589–625. https://doi.org/10.1086/2295733
  3. Xia, J. (2011). Mutual dependence, partner substitutability, and repeated partnership: the survival of cross‐border alliances. Strategic Management Journal, 32(3), 229–253. https://doi.org/10.1002/smj.8733
  4. Blau (1964). Exchange and Power in Social Life.2
  5. Pfeffer, J. (1981). Power in Organizations. Ballinger.2
  6. Woodward, J. (1984 [1958]). Management and Technology. In D. S. Pugh (Ed.), Organization Theory: Selected Readings (2nd ed., pp. 52–66). Penguin.2
  7. Mintz, B., & Schwartz, M. (1985). The Power Structure of American Business. University of Chicago Press.2
  8. Pfeffer, J., & Davis-Blake, A. (1987). Understanding organizational wage structures: A resource dependence approach. Academy of Management Journal, 30(3), 437–455. https://doi.org/10.2307/2560082
  9. Palmer, D., Barber, B. M., Zhou, X., & Soysal, Y. (1995). The Friendly and Predatory Acquisition of Large U.S. Corporations in the 1960s: The Other Contested Terrain. American Sociological Review, 60(4), 469. https://doi.org/10.2307/20962882
  10. Hayward, M. L. A., & Boeker, W. (1998). Power and Conflicts of Interest in Professional Firms: Evidence from Investment Banking. Administrative Science Quarterly, 43(1), 1. https://doi.org/10.2307/23935892
  11. Kim, H., Hoskisson, R. E., & Wan, W. P. (2004). Power dependence, diversification strategy, and performance in keiretsu member firms. Strategic Management Journal, 25(7), 613–636. https://doi.org/10.1002/smj.3952
  12. Guler, I. (2007). Throwing Good Money after Bad? Political and Institutional Influences on Sequential Decision Making in the Venture Capital Industry. Administrative Science Quarterly, 52(2), 248–285. https://doi.org/10.2189/asqu.52.2.2482
  13. Lester, R. H., Hillman, A., Zardkoohi, A., & Cannella, A. A., Jr. (2008). Former Government Officials as Outside Directors: The Role of Human and Social Capital. Academy of Management Journal, 51(5), 999–1013. https://doi.org/10.5465/amj.2008.347896752
  14. Wry, T., Cobb, J. A., & Aldrich, H. E. (2013). More than a Metaphor: Assessing the Historical Legacy of Resource Dependence and its Contemporary Promise as a Theory of Environmental Complexity. Academy of Management Annals, 7(1), 441–488. https://doi.org/10.5465/19416520.2013.7818622

Further readings

20 more, listed in one source
  1. Pugh, D. S., Hickson, D. J., Hinings, C. R., Macdonald, K. M., Turner, C., & Lupton, T. (1963). A Conceptual Scheme for Organizational Analysis. Administrative Science Quarterly, 8(3), 289. https://doi.org/10.2307/2390971
  2. March, J. G. (1966). The Power of Power. In D. Easton (Ed.), Varieties of Political Theory (pp. 39–70). Prentice-Hall.
  3. Pfeffer, J., & Salancik, G. R. (1974). Organizational Decision Making as a Political Process: The Case of a University Budget. Administrative Science Quarterly, 19(2), 135. https://doi.org/10.2307/2393885
  4. Aldrich, H. E., & Pfeffer, J. (1976). Environments of Organizations. Annual Review of Sociology, 2(1), 79–105. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev.so.02.080176.000455
  5. Pfeffer, J., & Salancik, G. R. (1978). Social control of organizations; Altering organizational interdependence: Controlling the context of control. In Chapters 3 and 6 in The External Control of Organizations: A Resource Dependence Perspective. Harper & Row.
  6. Aldrich, H. E. (1979). Organizations and Environments. Prentice-Hall.
  7. Burt, R. S. (1980). Autonomy in a Social Topology. American Journal of Sociology, 85(4), 892–925. https://doi.org/10.1086/227093
  8. Tolbert, P. S. (1985). Institutional Environments and Resource Dependence: Sources of Administrative Structure in Institutions of Higher Education. Administrative Science Quarterly, 30(1), 1. https://doi.org/10.2307/2392808
  9. Pfeffer, J. (1987). A resource dependence perspective on intercorporate relations. In M. S. Mizruchi & M. Schwartz (Eds.), Intercorporate relations: The structural analysis of business (pp. 25–55). Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/cbo9780511570841.002
  10. Boyd, B. (1990). Corporate linkages and organizational environment: A test of the resource dependence model. Strategic Management Journal, 11(6), 419–430. https://doi.org/10.1002/smj.4250110602
  11. Davis, G. F., & Powell, W. W. (1992). Organization-Environment Relations. In Handbook of Industrial and Organizational Psychology (2nd ed., Vol. 3, pp. 315–375). Consulting Psychologists Press.
  12. Burns, L. R., & Wholey, D. R. (1993). Adoption and Abandonment of Matrix Management Programs: Effects of Organizational Characteristics and Interorganizational Networks. Academy of Management Journal, 36(1), 106–138. https://doi.org/10.2307/256514
  13. Goodstein, J. D. (1994). Institutional Pressures and Strategic Responsiveness: Employer Involvement in Work-Family Issues. Academy of Management Journal, 37(2), 350–382. https://doi.org/10.2307/256833
  14. Ingram, P. L., & Simons, T. (1995). Institutional and Resource Dependence Determinants of Responsiveness to Work-Family Issues. Academy of Management Journal.
  15. Sherer, P. D., & Lee, K. (2002). Institutional change in large law firms: A resource dependence and institutional perspective. Academy of Management Journal, 45(1), 102–119. https://doi.org/10.2307/3069287
  16. Drees, J. M., & Heugens, P. P. M. A. R. (2013). Synthesizing and Extending Resource Dependence Theory: A Meta-Analysis. Journal of Management, 39(6), 1666–1698. https://doi.org/10.1177/0149206312471391
  17. Rogan, M., & Greve, H. R. (2015). Resource Dependence Dynamics: Partner Reactions to Mergers. Organization Science, 26(1), 239–255. https://doi.org/10.1287/orsc.2014.0897
  18. Aven, B. L. (2015). The Paradox of Corrupt Networks: An Analysis of Organizational Crime at Enron. Organization Science, 26(4), 980–996. https://doi.org/10.1287/orsc.2015.0983
  19. McEvily, B., Zaheer, A., & Kamal, D. K. F. (2017). Mutual and Exclusive: Dyadic Sources of Trust in Interorganizational Exchange. Organization Science, 28(1), 74–92. https://doi.org/10.1287/orsc.2016.1102
  20. Lashley, K., & Pollock, T. G. (2020). Dancing with Giants: How Small Women- and Minority-Owned Firms Use Soft Power to Manage Asymmetric Relationships with Larger Partners. Organization Science, 31(6), 1313–1335. https://doi.org/10.1287/orsc.2019.1353