Managing network resources: alliances, affiliations and other relational assets

Abstract

The study of inter-organizational relationships has come to the forefront of economic-geographical research during the past two decades. It all began with the heated debate during the late 1980s and the early 1990s on the alleged emergence of a post-Fordist mode of flexible industrial organization primarily through the process of vertical disintegration of formerly hierarchically organized giant firms and their spin-off/outsourcing activities. This debate witnessed the rise of the network form of industrial organization that has subsequently dominated research agendas in many subfields of economic geography, ranging from studies of regional development and innovation systems to industrial clusters and global production networks. It is within this intellectual context that Ranjay Gulati's latest book is very much welcomed and evaluated. I have had the pleasure of reading Gulati's work from the beginning of his fast-track academic career. His twin 1995 seminal papers in the Academy of Management Journal and Administrative Science Quarterly were most impressive as they broke new grounds in moving research priority and focus in management and organization studies away from individual firms and institutions to relationships between and among them. His early research helped galvanize many subsequent developments in the study of inter-organizational relationships in these fields. For the past 10 years, he has further produced a dozen or so high impact articles in top management journals that have advanced significantly the study of inter-organizational relationships, particularly networks and their role in providing resources and positive externalities to participating firms.