Institutional Continuity and the Dutch Construction Industry Fiddle

Abstract

The article deals with the question of how institutional continuity is realized. It presents an analysis of the continuation of the institution of pre-consultation in the Dutch construction industry over a period of nine years, after this was declared illegal as a consequence of European Union regulations. The analysis utilizes a structuration-based practice approach to institutionalization. The findings suggest that institutional continuity is a matter of a social mechanism which emerges as a consequence of the particular way in which practices are enacted, and which has the effect of repairing and/or concealing contradiction so that change is not initiated.