By the People, for the People: Emergence and Spread of the ‘Unconference’ as New Temporary Organisational Form

Abstract

New and radically different forms of temporary organisations often have to attract audiences in organisational fields that are dominated by temporary organisations that conform to ‘taken-for-granted’ organising template. The authors argue that adopters of new temporary organisations must contend with the tensions that arise when audiences compare the new temporary organisational form to the temporary organisations that conform to the institutionalised organising template. The authors therefore argue that as new temporary organisations are introduced into new contexts, organisers often use legitimacy claims based on novelty in the context where the new temporary organisation emerged to counter the threat of illegitimacy. However, because the strength of legitimacy claims based on novelty declines in contexts that are further removed, organisers will modify the template of a new temporary organisation in these contexts. The authors examine this using the case of the so called ‘unconferences’: an alternative conference form that emerged within the software development community at the start of the millennium in conjunction with the Web 2.0 movement. The authors’ data comprise 228 distinct unconferences between 2004 – when the unconference was first launched, and 2015. The authors examine the influence of sector distance of unconferences from the original sector where it was first held, on the extent to which the pure unconference format is retained. The authors show that as adopters of the new form move away from the original sector, they are more likely to modify the unconference template. The authors conclude by identifying promising areas of research in new forms of temporary organising.

Citation

Lampel, J., Banerjee, A. and Bhalla, A. (2020), "By the People, for the People: Emergence and Spread of the ‘Unconference’ as New Temporary Organisational Form", Braun, T. and Lampel, J. (Ed.) Tensions and paradoxes in temporary organizing (Research in the Sociology of Organizations, Vol. 67), Emerald Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 61-78. https://doi.org/10.1108/S0733-558X20200000067008