ACTORS AND ACTORHOOD IN NEO-INSTITUTIONAL THEORY: A TOPIC MODEL ANALYSIS

A recent point and counter point published by the Journal of management Studies highlights what we know so far, and what are the controversies that regards the issue of actorhood and the concept of actor in neo institutional theory. The focus on actors, which characterized the last years of the discipline, paved the way for the development of the ideas of institutional entrepreneurship, inhabited institutions, institutional work, and a new interest in the micro-processes of institutional theory. Nonetheless, it also risks reversing a fundamental tenet of neo institutional theory, which wanted to avoid an over emphasis on individualism, and the reification of actors. We use Topic Modeling to analyze neo-institutional literature dealing with actors and actorhood. We describe the evolution of the academic debate, the streams of research that are already closed and the heated ones, thus signaling which are the promising area to be researched. Also, we describe how topics are differently mobilized in papers published in different top scientific journals, and which topics gets cited most.