The Bricolage of Formalisation: Organisational Order Under Institutional Multiplicity in Artisanal and Small-Scale Mining

Abstract

Formalisation is often understood as the rational codification of activity and the extension of bureaucratic order into informal domains. This paper challenges that assumption by advancing a new conceptualisation of formalisation as institutional bricolage, a recursive process through which actors construct organisational order by recombining heterogeneous elements of law, custom, morality, and market practice. Drawing on the organisational realities of artisanal and small-scale mining, the paper advances a theory of how organisation emerges under institutional multiplicity, where coherence is produced not through institutional convergence but through ongoing translation and negotiation. Three mechanisms, institutional translation, identity reconstruction, and capability realignment, explain how actors transform ambiguity into functional and legitimate organisational arrangements and why hybrid forms persist as stable governance configurations. This perspective revises foundational assumptions in institutional theory by reframing legitimacy as an enacted accomplishment and organisational learning as path-dependent experimentation. It also extends debates on hybrid organising and governance by demonstrating that effective formalisation in plural institutional environments depends on adaptive translation rather than uniform rule enforcement. By positioning frontier economies as sites of theoretical insight, the paper shows how bricolage provides a generative mechanism for understanding how institutional order is assembled, maintained, and adapted under conditions of multiplicity.