Predictors of hybrid organizational identity: evidence from the Turkish theatre field, 1923-1999

Official URL: http://192.168.1.20/record=b1505263 (Table of Contents)

Being an essential concept in organization research for a long time, organizational identity has received a renewed interest both theoretically and empirically since it has increasingly been interpreted as contingent, dynamic and multiple. Although the notion of hybrid identity constitutes an important part of this interest, existing research mostly considers it as a starting assumption without investigating why there are such identities in the first place. By borrowing ideas from institutional and imprinting frameworks in organization theory, this study is an attempt to extend research by examining how particular field and organization-level factors may predict hybridity of organizational identities. Focusing on the Turkish theatre field as the empirical setting, first the identity claim categories in the field were discovered via cluster analysis by using the dataset of plays performed by professional theatre companies in Istanbul and Ankara during the 1923- 1999 period. Next, analyses were conducted by using multilevel (mixed effect) models in order to test study hypotheses. Hybrid identity was measured by Simpson diversity index weighted by category contrasts. Findings reveal that the degree of identity hybridization is largely enhanced by the identity hybridity of the organization at its birth, the transition in institutional logics and the strength of the mimetic mechanisms within the field. The results emphasize that diverse identity claims are combined more under specific institutional and founding conditions.