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A theory of the cultural evolution of the firm: the intra-organizational ecology of memes
Organization Studies, Oct, 2003 by John Weeks, Charles Galunic
Systemic Elements and Social Phenomena
The first premise, then, is that memes (or whatever other unit of selection we might propose in a theory of the cultural evolution of firms) are small and analytically divisible. The second premise concerns the interdependence of these analytically divisible elements and arises from taking firms seriously as cultural entities. The meaning of any single element of culture, whether it be a belief, a value, a behavioral pattern, or a symbol, depends to a large degree on the context of other cultural elements around it. We need to be precise, therefore, when we talk about the selection of memes. Selection favors those memes that have a replicating advantage in the current environment. This environment includes first and foremost the other memes in the culture. The biological analogy is useful again because exactly the same issue arises with genes. 'For example, if the gene-pool is dominated by genes that make animals seek dry places, this will set up selection pressures in favor of genes for an impermeable skin. But alleles for a more permeable skin will be favored if the gene-pool happens to be dominated by genes for seeking damp places' (Dawkins 1982: 111). What is more, there is no guarantee that if we were to transplant a gene found in one species to another it would have the same effect or any benign effect at all. The same is true when we pull memes from their context and replicate them in new contexts, as those who study the problem of recontextualization of knowledge have shown (for example, Nonaka and Takeuchi 1995).
The consequences of the presence of any particular meme, then, depends on the context of the other memes around it. But these dependencies are not always symmetrical. Some memes are more fundamental than others. Lakoff and Johnson (1999: 60), for example, show that a relatively small set of primary metaphors ('More is Up', 'Change is Motion', 'Categories are Containers', and so on) structure our conceptual system and form the bases of new metaphorical combinations. Memes that are deeply embedded in the culture in the sense that they appeared early in the course of historical development and form the building blocks out of which other memes have been fashioned are relatively impervious to change because of systemic effects: sometimes to change one belief or one behavior would require that we change almost all of what we think and say and do (see Balkin 1998: 89). Culture builds on itself, and it does so like Levi-Strauss' (1966: 17) bricoleur: making use of the materials at hand. Memes are recycled and recombined, informing and constraining the creation of new memes. Some are implicated more than others.
In firms, these fundamental memes are akin to what Schein (1992) calls basic assumptions. They are deeply held assumptions about the nature of reality and truth, about time and space, and about the nature of human nature, human activity, and human relationships (Schein 1992: 95-96). When these assumptions are widely shared in a culture, they tend to be taken for granted and therefore pass unnoticed. They structure the way firm members think of the mission and goals of the firm, its core competencies, and the way things are done in the firm. Often borrowed and reinterpreted from some part of the wider context in which the firm is located, they are central to the identity of the firm and the identity that the firm affords its members. The concept of meme must be robust enough to include these taken-for-granted assumptions if it is to serve usefully as the unit of selection in a theory of the cultural evolution of the firm.
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