The Action Logic Of Endogenous Autonomy In Social Organizations

Autonomy is the basic attribute of social organizations.The development of social organizations cannot be separated from the important premise of autonomy.For a long time,the academic research on the autonomy of social organizations has focused on the macro-analysis framework of "strong country-weak society".It is believed that the lack of autonomy of social organizations in China should be attributed to the restriction of state power.However,since the 18 th National Congress of the CPC,the state intends to support the development of social organizations and provide them with more resources and institutional support.China’s social organizations are still in a state of insufficient autonomy and low social utility.This shows that the analytical framework of "strong country-weak society" is no longer applicable,and we should establish a new analytical framework to explain how the autonomy of social organizations develops.This study attempts to construct a theoretical analysis framework at the micro level,aiming to explore the following two issues: 1.How does the autonomy of social organizations come into being through organizational decision-making? 2.How is the autonomy of social organizations realized through organizational actions? In order to answer the above questions,the author has taken a year-long field study on the X-center.Through careful interviews and observation,I obtained a large amount of first-hand information,followed the inductive inference method,interpreted the action logic behind the phenomenon of high autonomy of the X-center,and explored the significance of the action logic of the X-center to the autonomous development of other social organizations.The study found that social organizations have an endogenous autonomy,which is the fundamental driving force for its development.The structural institutional arrangement from the "strong country" is only an objective external force and plays a part in fulfilling or limiting the autonomy of social organizations.At the same time,the autonomy of decision-making and action rationality are the keys to realize this kind of endogenous autonomy.The former emphasizes the regulating function of a selforganizing system,which transforms the problem consciousness of individual actors into the action intention conforming to the organization’s goals in the process of game and negotiation between organization members and organization decision makers.The latter emphasizes that social organizations have a rational purpose,and can satisfy the organization’s action intention by making conscious choices of specific actions to maximize the effectiveness of actions.This kind of instrumental rationality can be embodied in "institutional rationality" and "economic rationality".Different organization members show different rational preferences in the process of realizing the organization’s action intention.Due to the homogeneity of the members’ characteristics and the external environment faced by social organizations,the formation logic of endogenous autonomy in the X center has thus acquired a universality and replicability,which has certain enlightening significance for the autonomous development of other social organizations.