External Market Threats and Entrepreneurial Collective Action in the Emergent U.S. Wood Pellet Industry
Year: 2016
Type: preprint
Abstract: Free riding can be a serious threat to collective action, yet this issue has not been fully examined in entrepreneurs’ collective efforts to legitimate new markets. This paper probes under what conditions entrepreneurs are more or less likely to work together in order to promote a coherent collective identity in response to external threats. We propose that external threats cause entrepreneurs to choose less-costly types of collective efforts, and that these effects are moderated by contextual factors that shape perceived costs of collective action, such as group size and free-riding counterforces. Using the emergent U.S. wood pellet market as an empirical context, our study shows that environmental activists’ targeting of forest-product manufacturers is associated with increased similarity of what pellet firms claim to be (less-costly tactics) but decreased similarity of what they actually do (more-costly tactics). Implications for new market legitimation, social-movement, and sustainability research are discussed.
Source: SSRN Electronic Journal
Authors: Shon R. Hiatt, Sangchan Park
Language: English
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W2410881923