Inside Networks: A Process View on Multi-organisational Partnerships, Alliances and Networks

摘要

This book collects contributions about the functioning and disfunctioning of inter-organisational networks, an important domain of study because, as the Editors acknowledge, "Networks are all around us and we are all part of several networks" (p. xiii). The book is organised around three main areas of research about inter-firm partnerships and networks. Part I is about monitoring and control; Part II about learning and, finally, Part III is about conflict and failures in partnership and networks. All chapters are based upon papers presented at the 2004 MOPAN 'Collision and Coalition' conference, at Tilburg University in the Netherlands. The Editors recognize the recent proliferation of studies about networks and inter-organisational partnership and suggest that there are two main approaches in the literature: first, the 'social network analysis' approach and second, the 'network governance' perspective. In the Preface they seem concerned about the fact that the 'social network approach' has "strengthened the dominance of the structural account of inter-organisational networks" (p. xiii) with the important drawback of "treat(ing) network interaction and interactions in networks as a black box". Hence they feel that there is a need for approaches that "describe and explain network (inter)action and network behaviour, which can complement insights derived from the structural account in network research" (p. xiv).