scaffolding: a process of transforming patterns of ... · scaffolding: a process of transforming...

r Academy of Management Journal2016, Vol. 59, No. 6, 2021–2044.http://dx.doi.org/10.5465/amj.2015.0725

SCAFFOLDING: A PROCESS OF TRANSFORMINGPATTERNS OF INEQUALITY IN SMALL-SCALE SOCIETIES

JOHANNA MAIRMIRIAM WOLF

Hertie School of Governance

CHRISTIAN SEELOSKatholieke Universiteit Leuven

This study advances research on organizational efforts to tackle multidimensional,complex, and interlinked societal challenges. We examine how social inequalitymanifests in small-scale societies, and illustrate how it inheres in entrenched patternsof behavior and interaction. Asking how development programs can be organizing toolsto transform these patterns of inequality, we use a program sponsored by an Indiannon-governmental organization as our empirical window and leverage data that wecollected over a decade. We identify “scaffolding” as a process that enables and or-ganizes the transformation of behavior and interaction patterns. Three interrelatedmechanisms make the transformation processes adaptive and emerging alternativesocial orders robust: (1) mobilizing institutional, social organizational, and economicresources; (2) stabilizing new patterns of interaction that reflect an alternative socialorder; and (3) concealing goals that are neither anticipated nor desired by some groups.Through this analysis, we move beyond conventional thinking on unintended conse-quences proposed in classic studies on organizations, complement contemporary re-search about how organizations effect positive social change by pursuing multiplegoals, and develop portable insights for organizational efforts in tackling inequality.This study provides a first link between the study of organizational efforts to alleviatesocial problems and the transformation of social systems.

Organizational scholars have (re)discovered theambition to study large unresolved societal chal-lenges. These challenges are seen as “grand”: theyare important at a national and global scale; theyaffect many people, including future generations;and tackling them requires big, bold, and novelideas (Colquitt & George, 2011). Arguably one ofthe most pressing grand challenges we face acrossandwithin societies is persistent inequality (UnitedNations, 2015).

Sociologists consider inequality to be an organiz-ing feature of societies (Tilly, 1998).1 It manifests inunequal access to opportunities and rewards fordifferent social positions or statuses within a groupor society, and it is rooted in socially constructedcategories (such as gender, caste, or class) that de-termine boundaries for inclusion and exclusion anddemarcate positions of power and privilege. Thesesocial categories shape and reflect a shared andtaken-for-granted ordering of reality, which is closelytied to a complex institutional grammar of socialnorms, rules, andconventions thatprescribe behaviorand interactions and sanction deviance.

For example, the caste system—widely consid-ered central to entrenched inequality in India—involves a set of norms, rules, and beliefs that un-derpin categories of exclusion and reify social

We are grateful to Jennifer Howard-Grenville andthree anonymous reviewers for their generous, con-structive, and insightful comments. This paper resultsfrom a decade-long journey, and would not have beenpossible without the work that Gram Vikas has beencarrying out for more than three decades. We par-ticularly thank Joe Madiath and Chitra Choudhury fortheir patience and for sharing their experience. KateGanly provided outstanding research assistance in theearly years and Marc Schneiberg and Woody Powelloffered valuable insights and comments throughout thejourney.

1 A review of extant literature on inequality goes beyondthis paper. We follow a sociological tradition in analyzinginequality that prioritizes inequalities across groups overinequality across individuals. Our approach is alignedwith the work of Tilly (1998) on “categorical inequalities.”

2021

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http://dx.doi.org/10.5465/amj.2015.0725

divisions (Beteille, 1965;Dumont, 1980). These rulesandnorms govern social practices in distinct spheresof social life: political, economic, and religious (Mair,Martı, & Ventresca, 2012). As a result, inequalitybecomes explicit in everyday life; it is observablein regularities of behavior and stable patterns ofinteraction. These patterns perpetuate inequality,because they enable opportunity hoarding by theprivileged. They restrict access to already scarce re-sources and opportunities for the underprivileged(Tilly, 1998). Therefore, inequality needs to be un-derstood as patterned: it inheres in patterns of in-teraction and behavior.

The deeply relational and nested nature of in-equality poses substantial challenges for purposiveorganizational action in the form of programsdesigned to tackle inequality. Organizational activityoftensuffers froma lackof legitimacy,motivation,andsupport from both the excluders and the excluded,because existing patterns of inequality are perceivedas “normal” and widely accepted. These aspectsmake asking how a single organization or a singleprogram can tackle persistent patterns of inequalityalmost absurd. The nature of inequality also posesanalytical challenges for organizational scholarship,because the complexity of social relations in a socialsystem makes determining an appropriate level foranalysis difficult and requires a broader range ofmethods (Stern & Barley, 1996).

In this study, we analyze how purposive organi-zational activity can tackle inequality locally—invillages in rural India. We focus on locally boundsocial systems, or small-scale societies (Douglas,1986). Whereas challenges facing villages mani-fest on a “small scale” and are confined to a physi-cal place, challenges such as inequality remain“grand”—multidimensional, complex, and inter-linked. Analyzing inequality in small-scale societiesallows us to be attentive to the social, cultural, andpolitical realities on the ground, and makes organi-zational research on grand challenges feasible aswell as practically and theoretically meaningful.

Centering on small-scale societies opens up pos-sibilities for organizations to engage deeply withlocal realities and to experiment with multiple vil-lages. It permits designing programs that not onlyalleviate symptoms of inequality (such as unequalaccess to social, political, and economic opportuni-ties), but also transform patterns of behavior and in-teraction and thus revises local social orders thatmake inequality durable in the first place. In thispaper, we ask how programs can be organizing toolswith which to transform entrenched patterns of

inequality in small-scale societies. Our main objec-tive is to advance organizational studies of societalchallenges; we apply a multidisciplinary toolkit toaccomplish our goal (Howard-Grenville, Buckle,Hoskins, & George, 2014).

Understanding how organizations affect local so-cial systems and are affected by them is central toorganizational theory (for a review and a reminder,see Stern & Barley, 1996; also, Hinings & Greenwood,2002). In a seminal study, General Gypsum Corpora-tion (a pseudonym), Gouldner (1954) showed howone form of bureaucracy was replaced by anotherand how the change affected the community in un-expected ways. In TVA and the Grassroots, Selznick(1949) described how an organization navigated anenvironment that was full of power struggles anddiverging interests. His analysis showed how theoriginal goals and structures of the Tennessee ValleyAuthority were transformed as a result of organi-zational commitment and formal and informal co-optation of powerful stakeholders in the localcommunity. Pressures and dynamics associated withlocal social systems were also of theoretical interest,as they helped to uncover the sources of unintendedconsequences in purposive action. Nevertheless, theprimary focus rested on the transformation of orga-nizations and organizational structures.

Contemporary organizational studies relate purpo-sive action to societal problems. Research on organi-zations that have an impact on society, create positivesocial change, or address persistent or new socialproblems has flourished over the last decade (seeStephan, Patterson, Kelly, & Mair, 2016, for a recentreview). Studies center on a diverse set of organiza-tions, including social enterprises, non-governmentalorganizations (NGOs), companies, and hybrid orga-nizational forms such as benefit corporations, thatpursue goals related to societal problems ranging fromhomelessness, unemployment, and poverty to HIVinfection and disease (Lawrence &Dover, 2015; Pache& Santos, 2013; Tracey & Phillips, 2016; Tracey,Phillips, & Jarvis, 2011).

Some studies recognize the importance of localinstitutional arrangements and place in affectingthe work and societal impact of these organiza-tions (Lawrence & Dover, 2015; Mair et al., 2012;Venkataraman, Vermeulen, Raaijmakers, & Mair,2016). Still, societal challenges are mostly treatedas setting or context (Battilana & Dorado, 2010;McKague, Zietsma, & Oliver, 2015; Seelos & Mair,2007). This stream of work has paid relatively littleattention to how organizations make progress ona specific problem by affecting local social systems

2022 DecemberAcademy of Management Journal

that give rise to the problem and perpetuate it. Thetheoretical (and empirical) focus generally lies on or-ganizational form, internal structures, and processes(Besharov, 2014; Ebrahim, Battilana, & Mair, 2014;Mair,Mayer, & Lutz, 2015; Tracey&Phillips, 2016), orthe relationship between the organization and rele-vant actors in the institutional field (Lawrence,Hardy,& Phillips, 2002; Mair & Hehenberger, 2014).

Separating the study of social problems and socialsystems might fit the existing paradigm in organiza-tional theory. As Stern and Barley (1996: 149) con-tended, “The study of social systems and socialproblemsaredifferent andshouldnotbeconfusedeventhough many social problems are systemic in nature.”But separation also limits the scope of relevance fororganizational theory.Payinganalytical and theoreticalattention to the nested and interlinked relationshipbetween social problems and social systems is criticalfor making progress on grand societal challenges.

In this paper, we report on the purposive organi-zational activity of Gram Vikas, an NGO best knownand widely recognized for its program that bringswater and sanitation to rural villages in India. But thisaspect of its work does not reflect its members’ prin-cipal interest. They use the water and sanitation pro-gram as a means to transform patterns of inequalitywithin rural villages—a goal they conceal from thevillagers they work with. The program is an adaptivestructure between the organization and the local so-cial system. It brings anarray of social actors intoplay:the organization sponsoring the program as well asgroups across socialdivides.Using theprogramasourempirical window, our analysis aims to unpack themicro-processes that transformpatterns of inequality.

We identify scaffolding as a process that enablesand organizes this transformation, and we specifythree generativemechanisms. First, scaffolding entailsmobilizing institutional, social organizational, andeconomic resources. Second, it hinges on stabilizingemerging patterns of interaction that reflect an alter-native social order. And, third, scaffolding involvesconcealing goals that are not desired by those affectedby the transformation. Most important, scaffoldingsupports the institutionalization of a new local socialorder based on the transformation of normative socialstructures rather than their replacement.

Our findings complement classical and contem-porary scholarship on organizations that seek to solvesocietal challenges. We move beyond conventionalthinking on hidden social forces as unintended con-sequences of purposive action offered in classicalstudies; we show how scaffolding supports pursuingmanifest and concealed organizational goals aligned

with the organization’s purpose. Our findings canbe extended to a broader set of societal challengesthat are based on interlocking normative and socialstructures and require organizations not only to ad-dress social problems but to transform social systems.

In the following sections, we summarize insightsfrom research in social anthropology and develop-ment studies to inform our empirical and theoreticalapproach. Next, we introduce the context and focalprogram, describe our researchdesign and analyticalstrategy, and report our findings in the form of twonarratives. In the discussion section,we elaborate onhow our findings contribute to the organizationalstudy of societal challenges and efforts to alleviateinequality. We conclude with remarks for future or-ganizational research on grand societal challenges.

BACKGROUND LITERATURE

How to transform entrenched and durable patternsof inequality poses puzzling questions for organiza-tional theory and practice. Finding answers andmaking progress on this grand challenge requires tak-ing seriously—building on and applying—knowledgegenerated in multiple disciplines. In this section, wefirst draw from literature in social anthropology toground our analytical and theoretical approach andhelp us unpack the interlinked and complex nature ofentrenched patterns of inequality in local social sys-tems. Second, we turn to research in developmentstudies to take stock of organized efforts to tackle in-equality in the context of small-scale societies.

The Patterned and Relational Nature of Inequality

Social anthropologists immerse themselves in “small-scale societies”—understood as locally bound sites—to understand how these systems affect the lives ofpeople on the ground. The work of Mysore Srinivasand his students Mary Douglas and Andre Beteille isparticularly helpful to us, as it is attentive to the in-terlock between normative and social structures onthe ground and pertains to the small-scale societieswe examined—villages in rural India (Beteille, 1965;Douglas, 1986; Srinivas, 1976).2 Such villages do not

2 We are aware that anthropologists have used the term“small-scale societies” differently, such as in reference toprimitive cultures in general or to isolated tribal villagesspecifically. Our emphasis is not on backwardness or theunique features of a local order, but on denoting locallybound sites that constitute small-scale societies. In thispaper, we use the term interchangeably with “village.”

2016 2023Mair, Wolf, and Seelos

exemplify an ideal vision or sense of communityas Gemeinschaft (Tonnies, 1887). Small size is notnecessarily associated with mutual trust or self-stabilizing dynamics (Douglas, 1986). Instead,stability—regularity of behavior and patterns ofinteraction—is based on a complex “grammar ofinstitutions,” a set of local norms and rules, sharedperceptions of what is proper and improper, andshared commitments created and enforced by thevillage (Crawford & Ostrom, 1995).

Institutions “do the thinking”; they shape bound-aries between groups and reinforce local social or-der (Douglas, 1986). In Purity and Danger, Douglas(1966) argued that norms that define and prescribewhat is clean and what is dirty delimit judgmentabout objective reality, provide scripts for behaviorand interaction, and act as evaluative devices thatgovern daily life. Institutions safeguard access topolitical, social, and economic opportunities. Theydetermine who is eligible to participate in politicaldecision making, market-based activities, or simplyrecreational activities such as “hanging out” ormeeting in public spaces (Mair, et al., 2012). And, asDouglas’s (1966) work shows, they often make life-and-death decisions, definingwho needs to be savedin situations of danger and who does not.

This interlock between normative and socialstructures characterizing small-scale societies is atthe center of anthropological research on the natureand persistence of inequality exemplified in thework of Andre Beteille. Grand designs to createmoreequal societies tend to concentrate on inequalityamong individuals, as acknowledged in the Indianconstitution and promoted in the work of AmartyaSen (1973;1992), but Beteille argued that inequalityamong social groups is more salient, especially invillages in rural India.

Going beyond prominent work on caste and re-ligion (Dumont, 1980), Beteille showed that varioussocial categories such as class and caste are in-terwoven, that this produces and reproduces pat-terns of inequality, and that inequality cannot bereduced to one dimension. In his words (Beteille,2003: 2):

There are inequalities among individuals and dis-parities among groups; inequalities of income, esteemand authority; and so on. These inequalities do notrun along the same lines; they sometimes reinforceandat other times cut across eachother.Where simplejudgements about increase or decrease of inequalityaremadewithout taking into account themultiplicityof dimensions, the judgements tend to be defective.

Beteille’s work in Sripuram—a rural village in thesouth of India documented inCaste, Class andPower(Beteille, 1965)—exposes how class and caste shapepatterns of interaction and behavior. Inequalityinheres in such patterns. It is entrenched in localorders, becomes visible in patterns of interaction andbehavior, and can be observed in three dimensions:the distribution of wealth, power structures, andstatus. Although empirically these three dimensionsare intertwined, they serve as a valuable analyticalframe for analyzing inequality. They expose themorphology—form and structure—of inequality atthe local level, and they also serve as markers to as-sess progress toward the transformation of behaviorand interaction patterns. We build on these insightsin this paper to strengthen our analytical approach,but also to expand current research on institutionsand inequality in organizational scholarship.

The core insight of social anthropologists studyingsmall-scale societies—that inequality not only be-comes visible through patterns of interaction andbehavior, but also gets reproduced through preciselythese patterns—is hardly surprising to organiza-tional scholars interested in inequality. In a recentreview, Amis, Munir, and Mair (2017) uncoveredand summarized the ways in which inequality be-comes reified in everyday actions and interactionsby and among individuals as members of organiza-tions or organizational fields. Research in social an-thropology allows us to expand the scope of inquiryfrom organizations to local systems—small-scalesocieties understood as normative and social struc-tures inwhichpatternsof inequality areperpetuated.In this study, we investigate how purposive organi-zational activity can transform these entrenchedpatterns.

PRACTICAL DIFFICULTIES WITH TACKLINGENTRENCHED PATTERNS OF INEQUALITY

Programs that are established with the aim of de-creasing inequality have a long tradition in devel-opment practice. Such programs are seen as toolswith which to achieve a predefined and desired goalor to empower individuals and communities toachieve their goals. The former perspective is asso-ciated with a social engineering logic and the latterwith a participatory logic.

Programs following a social engineering logic relyon expert and scientific knowledge to define goals,design solutions, and assess impact. For example,to increase access to economic opportunities formarginalized women, program designs center on


facilitating self-employment (entrepreneurship), train-ing, and skill or cash transfers, and they integraterandomized control trials to compare results witha comparable group not benefitting from the program(see Banerjee et al., 2015, for an example). Critics ofthese programs argue that they typically focus ona single dimension of inequality and pay little or noattention to the patterned nature of inequality (Viterna& Robertson, 2015). Social norms at the root ofentrenchedpatternsof inequalitymightbe recognized,but they are ignored in planning and evaluating pro-grams (Cernea, 1985). As a result, the processes andmechanisms underpinning the transformation of pat-terns of inequality remain largely underspecified—ashortcoming that even those involved in planning andevaluating programs acknowledge (Banerjee et al.,2015).

Programs following a participatory logic rely onthe active involvement of villages or social groupsin formulating program goals and the design andimplementation of the program. For grassroots or-ganizations, participation is an end in itself, andgoals and strategies form during implementation.For governments and international developmentorganizations, participation is a means to ensuremore equal access to the benefits of development.For both, reversing power relations across socialgroups is crucial for tackling inequality in variousdomains, such aswater supply (Cleaver, 1999;Katz&Sara, 1997) or education (Jimenez & Paqueo, 1996).

Evidence on whether and how these programs al-ter patterns of exclusion or prevent powerful elitesfrom capturing program benefits ismixed at best (seeMansuri & Rao, 2004, for a review). Defining featuressuch as public events to negotiate program goalsmake participatory programs inherently politicaland liable to relations of dependency, authority, andgender. In fact, research by development anthropol-ogists has shown that most programs are dominatedby local elites. For example, in a review of waterprojects, researchers found that benefits are largelyappropriated by community leaders, with little at-tempt to include households let alone marginalizedgroups. Even well-trained staff struggle to challengeentrenched norms of exclusion (Katz & Sara, 1997).Women are often systematically excluded (Agrawal,2001), and wealthier members of the communitydominate decision making (Rao & Ibanez, 2003). Asa result, programs following a participatory logicunintentionally but repeatedly reproduce estab-lished patterns of thought, behavior, and interaction.Not surprisingly, a recent review of studies fromdisciplines including economics, sociology, and

anthropology, covering both social engineering andparticipatory programs, concluded that we actuallyknow very little about how local development in-tervention may reshape local patterns of inequality(Viterna & Robertson, 2015).

In this paper, we build on an understanding ofinequality in small-scale societies put forward bysocial anthropologists and take into considerationinsights from development studies to understandhow programs can be tools for transforming deeplyentrenched patterns of inequality. The trans-formation requires (a) the institutionalization of analternative order, and (b) purposive organizationalaction that includes concealing undesired effectsand preventing powerful elites from coopting theprocess. These two aspects make this study particu-larly relevant for organizational analysis.

METHODS

The question we asked in this study—How areprograms used as organizing tools to transformentrenched patterns of inequality?—is “problemdriven,” and we apply a pragmatic approach to datacollection and analysis. A qualitative case study re-veals the difficult-to-observe mechanism and pro-cesses that transform patterns of interaction andbehavior (Rojas, 2010; Yin, 2003). “Being there”(Geertz, 1988), visiting multiple villages and gainingexposure to local realities in small-scale societies westudied, helped us to refine the theoretically andpractically meaningful questions (Greenwood &Levin, 2005), to analyze data, and to derive impli-cations for old and new theories.

Inequality in Rural India

India is a textbook example of a hierarchical soci-ety and an extreme case of social inequality. Themost striking feature of inequality in India is its vis-ibility (Beteille, 2005). Placement in a social categorydefines inclusion or exclusion that is evident in theway people live and how they dress, behave, andinteract with others. An additional striking feature ofinequality in India is the subordination of the indi-vidual to the group. Individuals have obligations tothe group they adhere to by birth; groups have obli-gations to other groups according to their respectivesocial ranks (Beteille, 2003). Socially constructedcategories of caste, class, and gender define who isranked higher and lower in society. In particular, thecaste system (Dumont, 1980; Srinivas, 1962), based


on kinship and religion, prescribes distinct styles oflife and regulates the social interactions within andbetween groups. Caste is acquired by birth andis believed to be changeable only through rein-carnation, which is said to reward those who con-formed during life and punish those who did not.Castes are grouped in hierarchical order, from Brah-mins at the topdowntoScheduledCastes,3withmanysubcastes in between, depending on the village.

Class is defined by ownership of land, property,and means of production; it is another importantsocial structure and categorization scheme. Casteand class are similar in some aspects, but they differin others. For instance, caste mobility is neverdownward, whereas class mobility may be. Fora more detailed account of the interrelationshipsbetween caste and class, see Beteille (1965; 2005).Over the past decades, the caste system has be-come closely interpenetrated with class structures(Beteille, 2003). Gender continues to be an importantcategory that prescribes exclusion for women frommany aspects of social, economic, and political life.The Indian constitution prohibits discrimination ongroundsof social categories. Yet, particularly in ruralareas, these social divides shape local realities. Asresearch shows, there is little mobility betweensocial groups—the boundaries between castes andclasses appear almost insurmountable (Banerjee,Duflo, Ghatak, & Lafortune, 2013; Chaudhuri &Ravallion, 2006; De Haan, 2004).

GramVikas and the Rural Health and EnvironmentProgram

Gram Vikas is an Indian NGO that confronts pat-terns of inequality in rural villages in Odisha, one ofIndia’s poorest states. Forty-seven percent of thepopulation lives below the poverty line, and dis-crimination and exclusion of social groups—particularly women, lower castes, and indigenous

tribes—are particularly pronounced (DeHaan, 2004;Government of Odisha, 2011). Working with ruralvillages in Odisha since 1979, GramVikas identifiedpoor health caused bywaterborne diseases, resultingfrom widespread open defecation and the use ofpolluted water sources, as a concern of villagersacross social and economic divides. GramVikas sawa water and sanitation program as an “entry-pointprogram,” as it allowed the organization to reach outto every household in a village and to communicatedirect benefits for them in the form of improvedhealth.

In 1991, GramVikas initiated the Rural Health andEnvironment Program (RHEP), the manifest goal ofwhich is to provide every household in a village—regardless of the social category to which thehousehold belongs—with piped drinking water anda separate toilet and bathing room.4 The program isunique among existing water and sanitation pro-grams. It combines elements of social engineeringprograms, focusing on the construction of water andsanitation facilities, with elements of participatoryprograms empowering rural villages to solve theirown problems.

Four features illustrate the RHEP’s uniqueness.First, a “100% inclusion” rule prescribes workingtogether across religious, social, and economic di-vides to construct and use water and sanitation fa-cilities. The RHEP formally starts only after eachhousehold in the village has agreed to the 100% rule.Second, a multilayered local governance structureformalizes equal representation of all social groupsin decision making. It includes a Village ExecutiveCommittee, which is officially registered under In-dia’s Societies Registration Act of 1860. The com-mittee is responsible for implementing the programand for maintaining and monitoring the use of thewater and sanitation infrastructure built. Third,a corpus fund, administered by theVillage ExecutiveCommittee, is collected to ensure that financial re-sources are available to build water and sanitationinfrastructure for families entering the village afterthe completion of the RHEP. Each household is re-quired to contribute to the fund according to itsability to pay. And, fourth, the water and sanitationinfrastructure is collectively constructed. Eachhousehold is required to contribute labor and mate-rial resources, and Gram Vikas provides material

3“Scheduled Castes”—often referred to as “untouch-

ables” or “Dalits”—refers to the lowest status groups in thecaste system. Together with “Scheduled Tribes”—India’sindigenous tribal people also known as “Adivasis”—theyare among the poorest in the country. In areas where thetribal population and Hindus are residentially mixed,ScheduledTribes tend to have a low statuswithin the castehierarchy. Higher castes take extreme care to preventphysical and social contact through complicated pro-hibitions on the sharing of food and water and other formsof interaction with these groups (Dumont, 1980; Srinivas,1955).

4 In 2004, Gram Vikas changed the name of the programfrom RHEP to Mantra (Movement and Network for theTransformation of Rural Areas). The change of name didnot affect the objective and content of our analysis.


support and know-how.According toGramVikas, asof January 2015, the program has been implementedin 1,140 villages across 28 districts in rural Odisha(Gram Vikas, 2015).

Data Sources

The data for this study were collected and ana-lyzed over the course of ten years. Our study drawson multiple sources of data and several rounds ofdata collection. We conducted interviews, collectedinternal and external reports as well as video mate-rial, engaged in participant observation and shad-owing, and consulted with research teams that havestudied the focal program fromadifferent theoreticaland empirical angle.5 Figure 1 provides an overviewof the data collection process.

Interviews. Our interview partners includedmembers of the founding team of Gram Vikas, GramVikas staff members coordinating the water andsanitation program with varied degrees of experi-ence with the program, support and partner organi-zations, experts in development and water andsanitation, village leaders, and villagers. The inter-views lasted from 15 minutes to several hours andwere audio recorded and transcribed verbatim. Forinterviews within villages, we relied on a localtranslator.

Exploratory interviews in the early stages of datacollection helped us to generate an understanding ofthe program and the local context (Strauss & Corbin,1990). During our second field trip, we conductedsemi-structured interviews that allowed us to solid-ify emerging conceptual and empirical patterns. Weconducted a third round of interviews to triangu-late and consolidate specific aspects of preliminaryfindings.

In addition, we applied three measures to ensureand enhance robustness in our data. First, we re-peated interviews with the same interviewee indifferent locales and different years. Second, wecorroborated the content of the interviews withmultiple sources: reports, archival data, and publicappearances. This method helped us to mitigatepotential biases of any individual respondent as

well as situational biases (Miller, Cardinal, &Glick,1997). For example, we interviewed the founder ofGram Vikas, Joe Madiath, multiple times, with in-terviews lasting from 15 minutes to 4 hours. Weobserved him in internal meetings in the GramVikas headquarters and while he was speaking todifferent audiences at various events (see Table 1).We reduced interviewer biases by conducting in-terviews involving different research team mem-bers and by comparing notes across interviewsconducted by different teammembers; see Table 1for a list of interviews conducted.

Secondary data. We collected internal and ex-ternal reports written by Gram Vikas staff, such asannual reports, project reports, mission reports, andprogress reports, as well as presentations. Reportsare an internal learning device for organizations(Seelos & Mair, 2016); they provided us with an un-derstanding of the historical development of theprogram and sense-making of the organization. Weconsulted film material and documentaries createdby third parties. Film and documentaries allowed usto triangulate observations from our own fieldworkand more systematically include voices of peopleaffected by the program. Last, we ensured accessto program evaluation reports by independentagencies.

The more than 100 documents we collected hel-ped us to deepen our insights from interviews andfield trips, and to assess and compare internal andexternal perceptions and representations of theprogram. We relied on government reports, legal re-ports, reports from development agencies (such asthe World Bank’s World Development Reports,World Health Organization reports, United NationsChildren’s Fund reports, and reports commissionedby the local government in Odisha), and local,national, and international newspapers (such asOdisha Diary, the Hindu Times, the Economist) tofurther develop our understanding of the local, re-gional, and national context. We used these docu-ments and videos as an archival database for ouranalysis. A full list is available from the authors.

Participant observation and shadowing.Weusedparticipant observation to better understand localrealities, and especially to overcome our biases asresearchers trained and socialized in a different—Western—context. Exposure to the daily life andstruggles in villages in three field trips over the courseof seven years allowed us to appreciate particularlocal social environments and to explore the socialcontext from within (Bechky, 2003; Van Maanen,1979). Besides conducting interviews and collecting

5 We exchanged views and discussed our findings withan anthropologist who studied life in tribal villages thatwork with Gram Vikas, and with a research group at theAbdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab at MassachusettsInstitute of Technology that studied the same program butfocused on the effect of access to clean water on healthoutcomes.


archival data, we used these visits to shadow thefounder and senior and junior staff members inteam meetings and in their interactions withvillagers.

Data Analysis

We analyzed the data by continually going backand forth between data and emerging theoretical ar-guments (Glaser & Strauss, 1967; Strauss & Corbin,1990). Several rounds of coding and involving dif-ferent analysts in the process helped to spot flawsand/or personal biases. We discussed emerging cat-egories and theoretical themes within our researchteam, with other research groups and Gram Vikas.Within our research team, we did not always agreeon categories and themes. These instances of di-vergence helped us to sharpen our analytical focusand—most importantly—our theoretical contribu-tion. For example, discussions and a lack of consen-sus on the characteristics of stabilizing as a definingmechanism of scaffolding triggered an insight thatencouraged us to revisit the work of Selznick (1949)and resulted in the proposition of concealing as anadditional constitutive mechanism of scaffolding.

Our analysis and coding strategy included twomajor steps. In a first step, we surfaced local patternsof inequality before and after the RHEP, our focalprogram. Building on the work of Beteille (1965,2003, 2005), we used data across villages to codepatterns of access to economic assets and in-frastructure, distribution of power, and attribution ofstatus before the start of the program.Next, we codedhow such patterns changed as a result of the pro-gram, to show that transformation is possible. Ina second step, we used RHEP as our empirical

window and analyzed how the program affectedthe process of transforming entrenched patterns ofinequality. First, we coded instances referring toprogram dynamics, and how villagers across socialdivisions participated in the program. We identifiedthree sets of resources mobilized in the processof implementing the program in villages: (1) in-stitutional resources, such as local beliefs aboutpurity and pollution; (2) social organizational re-sources, such as village committees or self-helpgroups; and (3) economic resources, such as finan-cial means, labor, or material. We then coded why,when, and how different types of resources weremobilized;whomobilized the resources (GramVikasor the villagers), and how and why behavior and in-teractions between social groups started to change.Second, we coded instances of resistance and con-flict emerging as a result of implementing the pro-gram, andof howconflictwas resolved.This allowedus to trace patterns of cooptation and different formsof sanctioning when groups or individuals chal-lenged the implementation of the program. And,third, we coded for instances of variance in how theprogramwas implemented across villages. Althoughthis last aspect of our analysis was not directlyaligned with our theoretical interest—specifyingthe mechanisms underpinning the process of trans-forming entrenched patterns of inequality—it en-hanced the robustness of our findings.

FINDINGS

We report our findings in the form of a narrativeand in twoparts. In the first part,we take stockof howinequality manifests in patterns of behavior and in-teraction in small-scale societies and showcase the

FIGURE 1Data Collection Timeline

Field trip

Interview,participantobservation

Crosscheck,expert / teamdiscussion

Deskresearch

Year 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015


TABLE1

Summaryof

OurInterviewsan

dFieldwork

Date

Loc

ation

Data

2004

(Jan

.)Gen

eva,

Switze

rlan

dcfirstc

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transformation of such patterns. In the second part,we document and explain the process of trans-forming entrenched patterns of inequality.

Entrenched Patterns of Inequality in Small-ScaleSocieties

In the following narrative, we illustrate how in-equalitymanifests in small-scale societies before andafter the implementation of the RHEP. We followedthe work of Beteille (1965) to analyze our dataaccording to (a) how economic assets and infra-structures are accessed by different social groups, (b)howpower is distributed between social groups, and(c) how status and privilege are attributed to mem-bers of different social groups.

Access to economic assets and infrastructure.Before the program, access to and use of infrastruc-ture related to water, sanitation, and other serviceswas largelycontrolledby localelites andhigher castes.A localwomandescribed howhigher castes restrictedaccess to local water sources for lower castes:

We are Dalits. That’s why they [those belonging tohigher castes] denieduswater. Ifwewent to getwater,there would be a fight. They would tell us we areuntouchable.

(Lower-caste woman, Video)

Lack of cleanwater and safe sanitationwas amajorcause of illness, and families had to take out loans topay for medicines and treatments. Borrowing hadsevere consequences for poor villagers and led to anupsurge in economic inequality at the local level(Keirns, 2007).

After the program—a local woman explains—notonly members of privileged groups but every house-hold in the village gained access to a piped water sup-ply and safe sanitation:

We have [. . .] piped water supplies to all families,without exception. Every family has its own toilet andbathing room as well.

(Local woman, Interview)

A study of 100 villages that had implementedthe program shows that the availability of cleanwater and safe sanitation in the villages reducedincidences of waterborne diseases by up to 50%—

which also resulted in a significant decrease inillness-related indebtedness (Duflo, Greenstone,Guiteras, & Clasen, 2015).

Our findings also point to changes in access to fi-nancial resources and relationships of dependencybetween social groups. Before the program, it was

TABLE1

(Con

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Date

Loc

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Data

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common practice for members of Scheduled Castesand Tribes to mortgage trees, small pieces of land, orother private possessions to local elites in order topay for medicine, funerals, or wedding dowries.Another common social practice—inherited fromone generation to the next andperpetuating relationsof dependence—was bonded labor. Because casteand class membership are inherited, dependent re-lationships were reproduced, and escaping thevicious circle became extremely difficult. Womenwere confined to a householdwith very limited or noaccess to the household wealth or rights to property.

In the villages where the program was fully imple-mented, existing dependencies such as bondedlabor and mortgaging diminished. Formal courts of-ten validated the changes, an important signal forvillagers who may now rely on laws to ensure theirrights. Women started to generate extra income forthe household as they were trained as masons andlearned to operate fisheries in the local pond. A localwoman attributed her improved finances to theavailability of running water:

We can finish our chores quickly and havemore timeto earn extra income.

(Local woman, Video)

Women also formed savings groups in which theypooled their income, improving their economicstatus.

Access to education changed too. Before the pro-gram, a minority of boys from Scheduled Castesattended school, and few girls were literate. Afterthe program’s implementation, almost all childrengained access to education, regardless of caste orgender, according to JoeMadiath, a member of GramVikas’s founding team. Increased education gavewomen and lower castes important skills to helpthem access economic opportunities. These groupsgrewmore independent andwere able to access newopportunities, such as working with governmentagencies or attaining positions of power at the villagelevel and beyond.

Distribution of power. Before the program, posi-tions of power were inherited and available only tomen belonging to a certain caste and class. A seniorstaff member of Gram Vikas explained how localleaders came into office:

By birth, such fellows became the leaders. And, oncethat fellow dies, his son used to become the leader.

(Senior staff member, Interview)

Members of higher castes and classes who benefit-ted from these informal rules had little motivation to

alter the status quo. Low levels of education amongmembers of Scheduled Castes and lower classes per-petuated the pattern. Certainly, women in leadershippositions were unimaginable. Despite governmentprograms and international development schemes, itwas extremely difficult to bring Scheduled Castes orwomen intopublic offices.AGramVikas staffmember,suggested why:

[Although the] governmentmay insist that [. . .] Dalits,women, and minority community members shouldhave appropriate representation in these local bodies,the problem [is] [. . .] the Tribes or the Dalits or thewomen have always been considered as incapable, aspeople not required to give their personal opinion. So,the control of administrationwas alwayswith [. . .] theupper castes, and women per se were always thoughtto be people of domestic involvement [. . .]. So, thesepeople are [. . .] not able to [. . .] perform their respon-sibilities as anticipated.


After the RHEP programwas implemented, accessto positions of power and leadership were no longerexclusively tied to kinship and gender. In a reportGram Vikas conducted in 2002 to document theprogram’s progress, a local woman explained howpatterns of interactions with men have changed:

We never thought we could sit on the samemat as themen. But things have changed now. We no longerdraw the veil over our faces, andwe can talkwithmenas equals.

(Local woman, Archival data from 2002)

Our own observations, corroborated by interviewdata from Gram Vikas staff members, revealed thatwomen andmembers of Scheduled Castes and tribeshad gained an active voice in village-level meetings,and their presence in meetings was considered ap-propriate. Archival documents record that, in one ofthe villages that completed the RHEP program,a woman was voted into the regional government.The changes in the distribution of power betweensocial groupswere closely intertwinedwith a changein the attribution of status to social groups—amarkerof transformation we explore in the next section.

Status assigned to members of social groups.Before the program, restricted access to economicassets and power for women and members ofScheduledCastes or lower classeswasnot only takenfor granted, but perceived as appropriate by all socialgroups—privileged and disadvantaged alike. Mem-bers of Scheduled Castes were considered impureand polluted, and therefore physical distance was


required. Changing caste in this life was consideredan offense to a god’s will, because Scheduled Castesare believed to be in penitence for misbehavior ina previous life. Conformity to one’s fate is consideredthe only option to escape divine punishment in thenext life:

What can I do? I am born Dalit, so, in this birth, I willbe excluded. In this birth, this will be my fate. Maybe[in the] next birth, I’ll be different.

(Member of the GramVikas foundingteam recasting the voice of a memberof the Scheduled Castes, Interview)

Higher-caste members feel entitled to excludethem from most aspects of social, political, andeconomic life:

We have a right to exclude them [. . .] we are theprivileged.

(Member of the GramVikas foundingteam recasting the voice of a member

of the village elite, Interview)

Before the program, for the local elites, conformingto norms associated with purity and pollution en-sured privilege and signaled superiority, and, for theScheduled Castes, it allowed for expiation and hopefor redemption in the next life. Both groups perceivedthe order as god-given fate, and the resulting exclu-sion was neither questioned nor problematized. In-stead, much effort went into safeguarding boundariesbetween social groups to protect the purity of thehigher castes and confine pollution to the ScheduledCastes or Tribes.

After the program, the status attributed tomembersof various social categories changed. Video data fromour archival database corroborates this: a local man,asked if a member of a Scheduled Caste or Tribe wasworking with him on the community hall, replied:

I don’t know,wedon’t discuss thesematters anymore.(Local man, Video)

An elderly woman explained that the importanceof caste membership in daily life has changed, par-ticularly in interactions among younger people:

For ages, we’ve practiced untouchability. [. . .] Now-adays, the boys say “what untouchability”!

(Local woman, Video)

During our fieldwork, we observed members ofdifferent castes sitting next to each other, sharingmeals,working together doing the same typeofwork,conversing together at villagemeetings, andworkingtogether to build community libraries.

To summarize, our findings show that, althoughcategories of caste, class, and gender are still in place,they are less salient in determining patterns of be-havior and interactions between social groups at thelocal level. After the program, access to economicassets and infrastructures, the distribution of power,and the attribution of status were determined notonly by membership in a social group. Our findingsresonatewith theworkofBeteille (1965) andDouglas(1986): the interlock between normative and socialstructures provides a complex system of rules, be-liefs, and norms that make patterns of inequalitydurable—unquestioned, uncontested, and hard tochange. Whereas anthropologists have focused theiranalytical attention on the local reproduction andreification of inequality, we found that patterns ofinequality can be purposefully transformed—bymeans of a development program.

Scaffolding: A Process of TransformingEntrenched Patterns of Inequality

In the previous section,we illustrated the outcomeof the transformation process. Here, we show howit unfolds. Scaffolding underpins and shapes thetransformation of durable local orders that entrenchpatterns of behavior and interaction. Specifically, itis a process of transforming deeply entrenched pat-terns of interaction and behavior that account fordurable social inequality in small-scale societies.Our findings suggest three generativemechanisms ofscaffolding: mobilizing, stabilizing, and concealing.

First, mobilizing resources involves creating, un-locking, and repurposing new and existing resourcesfrom both the organization and the villagers. Three setsof resourcesweremobilizedintheprocessweanalyzed:(1) institutional resources—formal and informal rulesdirectly related to the water and sanitation program, aswell as local norms and beliefs about purity and pol-lution; (2) social organizational resources—formal orinformal governance structures organizing the in-teractionswithin or between groups in the villages; and(3) economic resources—material or economic meansaccessed fromwithin the villages or from outside.

Second, scaffolding hinges on stabilizing newpatterns of interaction that reflect an alternative so-cial order. Stabilizing enables the institutionaliza-tion of new ways of thinking, acting, and relating.It includes formal and informal enforcement andsanctioning mechanisms that are built to protect thenew shared goal. Stabilizing is critical in a trans-formation that revises a social order rather thanreplacing it.


Third, scaffolding involves concealing goals thatare neither anticipated nor desired by the membersof some social groups. Concealing requires focusingon the desired and uncontested manifest goal ratherthan the covert goal of revising the social order.Concealing helps generate consensus across socialgroups, enables collective purposive action, andprevents cooptation efforts by specific groups.

Wedocument the process in a narrative that furtherillustrates the rationalization, routinization, and so-lidifying of new patterns of interaction and behavior.

Coopting power structures, norms, and beliefs:Rationalizing interaction. When approaching vil-lages to join the RHEP, Gram Vikas adheres to localrules by first establishing contactwith village leadersand local elites. Although the elites perceive sanita-tion and running water as desirable for themselves—the pure, clean, and superior people—they do notsupport involving the Scheduled Castes and Tribes—the dirty, polluted, and inferior ones. From thisperspective, using the same water source with theScheduled Caste people would put the higher castes’superiority and purity at risk, as relayed here:

[The higher-caste women] get water by the turn of thetap, and the Scheduled Caste women also by the turnof the tap will get water. That means there is no dif-ference between us, andwe are supposed to be higherand they’re supposed to be lower.


In an effort to gain the local leaders’ support, GramVikas coopts institutional resources—local norms,values, and beliefs about purity and pollution—topromote the program. Joe Madiath, a co-founder,recalled how he approached village leaders:

You want to drink Dalit shit? Now, you are drinkingeverybody’s shit so, by not [including them in theprogram], you are only drinking their waste.

(Member of Gram Vikas foundingteam, Interview)

Madiath recalled a pitch to persuade local elitesthat involving 100% of village households, in-cluding the Scheduled Castes, was instrumental forretaining higher caste purity and thus for safe-guarding the existing social order:

Even if 99% is there, but one family shits all over theplace, that family can pollute the water, the sur-rounding, everything of the village.

(Member of Gram Vikas foundingteam, Interview)

Gram Vikas’s tactics included demonstrating howfeces dilute in water used for drinking and washing.Staff members organized “walks of shame”—askinglocal elites to show the defecation spots around thevillage—to persuade local leaders to include marginal-ized social groups in the water and sanitation program.

As a result of this sort of argument, local elites ac-tively promote and support the process: they leveragetheir position of power and privilege to influence,motivate, and coerce other villagers to commit to theprogram. As Chitra Choudhury, a member of themanagement team, told us, established hierarchiesand traditional enforcementmechanismsstart toworkin favor of implementing the program because thevoice of the elites is heard and accepted by the village.

GramVikas continued to insist that all social groupsin the villages—not only elites—must actively endorseand participate in the program. Members of GramVikas repeatedly pointed out that starting the pro-gramwithout full commitment fromall social groupsin the community backfires later on:

Wherever we have not got a consensus and we havetried to cut short those methodologies, we have suf-fered for it.


Reaching consensus requires intensive effort andtime. From various archival documents and our in-terviews, we learned that, in the early years of theprogram,GramVikas tried to implement theprogramin a village close to its headquarters. To speed up theprocess, Gram Vikas did not insist on the 100% in-clusion rule. The RHEP could not be completed inthat village. More importantly, interactions betweenmembers of different social groups could not beconsolidated, and existing patterns of entrenchedinequality could not be transformed. As SojanThomas, a senior member of the Gram Vikas team,observed, once 100%commitment is reached, it is rarefor villages to halt implementation or discontinue theprogram, and thus halt the transformation process.

Even if only a single household does not commit tothe program, Gram Vikas will not officially start thewater and sanitation program in that village:

Wedonot take a “no” fromanyone [theprivileged andthe underprivileged]. We do not accept positions like“wedonotwant them included”or “wedonotwant tobe included.”


Once consensus to implement the program hasbeen reached among all social groups in the village,Gram Vikas launches a formal contract that binds


each household to the prescribed rules of theprogram. The contract entails multiple rules to en-force a collective effort and thus is an additionalmechanism to rationalize new ways of interacting.The contract establishes the villagers’ commitmentat a stage during which they do not recognize noranticipate the full extent of the transformation.

In sum, Gram Vikas coopts local norms and be-liefs about purity and pollution and local powerstructures to turn water and sanitation into an un-contested but confined space for breaking taken-for-granted patterns of interaction. Clean water andsanitation as manifest goals of the program unite allmembers of the village, and interaction between so-cial groups is perceived as critical to protect the pu-rity of powerful elites. Elite pressure and the fear ofbeing punished in the next life are enforcement andsanctioningmechanisms in service of theprogram.Aformal contract between Gram Vikas and the villageis an additional stabilizing mechanism to enforcechanges in patterns of interaction and behavior. Asa result, the local population rationalizes interac-tions across social divides on the basis of the samelocal normative order that created and reproducedcategories of exclusion in the first place.

Redesigning local governance structures: Rou-tinizing interaction. Contractually enforced pro-gram rules require that the villages establish formalgovernance structures involving all social groups,notwithstanding gender, class, or caste. Our findingspoint toward a number of challenges and also re-sistance to this rule. For example,womenhave neverbeen permitted to engage in decision making at thevillage level, and their exclusion has become takenfor granted. A female member of Gram Vikas’s found-ing team recalled the response of a local woman:

All the centuries our men decided everything—sowhy should we decide anything?

(Member of the Gram Vikas foundingteam, Interview)

Husbands often oppose the idea of women leavingthe house to join village meetings. We observed in ourfieldwork that, even if women do join, they often ad-here to traditionalwaysof interaction:menandwomenwon’t sit together in ameeting. Severalmembers of theGram Vikas team corroborated our observation.

To facilitate change in how women behave andinteract with others, Gram Vikas initially adheres tolocal norms and hierarchies. As women are not tra-ditionally allowed to move freely, team membersapproach women within the confines of their homesto discuss “appropriate” topics, such as maternal

health and children’s diseases. As women gain con-fidence, Gram Vikas encourages them to form “Self-Help Groups” that meet in public. Meetings of thesegroups are safe spaces (Mair et al., 2012)wherewomencan raise anddiscuss issues or problems of a contestednature, such as saving money, alcoholism, and do-mestic violence. Meanwhile, their husbands are fo-cusing on the requirements for implementing thewater and sanitation program. Self-Help Groups area valuable social organizational resource, as they sup-port women in learning to be more vocal about theirconcerns and gain self-confidence (Sanyal, 2009).

As women begin to express their needs and con-cerns outside the confines of the household, GramVikas encourages them to create a new social orga-nizational resource in the form of an all-female Vil-lage Body, which formally and officially representsthe interests of women in the village. It is composedof the female heads of all households independent ofcaste or class. The Village Body gives women a plat-form to raise and discuss issues that concern theentire village. Examples include village-level accessto health services to reduce child mortality and re-strictions of local alcohol sales to combat alcoholismin the village. In parallel to the all-female VillageBody, Gram Vikas initiates another Village Bodyconsisting of the male heads of all households. Al-though the men—both lower and higher caste—areused to voicing their concerns within their own so-cial groups, for many, it is the first time they interactand consider opinions across groups. Gram Vikasactively moderates the interchange, nudging mem-bers of Scheduled Tribes and Scheduled Castes tovoice their concerns, and higher castes andmembersof local elites to listen. Men willingly comply withthis requirement in light of the prospect of obtainingaccess to running water and sanitation.

As the two committees begin to develop routinesfor meeting and decisionmaking, GramVikas insiststhat the gender-segregated groups merge into oneVillage General Body. In most villages, the mergeridea meets with skepticism and resistance. Never-theless, men and local elites agree to compromisewithin the uncontested domain of water and sanita-tion and the confines of the program. The followingquote, retrieved from archival data in the form of aninternal report, illustrates this point:

Gram Vikas says we must involve women to makedecisions, but this is just for [the] RHEP, not for otheractivities.

(Local man, Archival data from 2003)


Gram Vikas does not correct these views. In fact, theorganization conceals the extent of the transformationunfolding. Once the Village General Body operateswith all social groups represented and equally in-volved in discussions and decision making, GramVikas prompts and oversees the election of a Vil-lage Executive Committee. The Village ExecutiveCommittee—four women and fourmen—is electedby the Village General Body, and it stays in powerfor three years. It gets registered as a legal entity,assumes formal decision-making power over alltopics related to water and sanitation, and takesresponsibility for adherence to the program ruleswithin the village. The Executive Committee alsointeracts with outside agencies, such as govern-ment agencies or public administration.

As interaction between members of differentcastes, classes, and genders became a daily routine,ways of dealing with group boundaries in dailyroutines also started to change. For instance, beforethe program, a purification ritual—bathing—wasprescribed each time a higher-caste member inter-actedwith a ScheduledCastemember. In the archivalvideo material, we analyzed a higher-caste woman’sexplanation of how this ritual was altered. Wearinga good saree is now enough to prevent being pollutedby the lower castes:

We wear a good saree—a synthetic saree. [. . .] Wedon’t bathe on return if we wear a good saree.

(Higher-caste woman, Video)

Both the villagers and Gram Vikas mobilize andcreate socialorganizational resources.Asallmembersof the village—both privileged and marginalized—keep their eyes on the goal of gaining access to waterand sanitation, taken-for-granted patterns of behaviorand interaction are compromised. The behavior ofsocial groups and interaction between them start tochange. The local governance structures that are cre-ated, including formal rules established by the con-tractual agreement and informal rules such as theneed to safeguard purity of the elites, further enhancea shared commitment to the program. These effortsstabilize the ongoing transformation of patterns ofbehavior and interaction between men and womenandmembers of different castes and classes, and thusallow the villagers to build routines that involveinteracting across social divides.

“Constructing together”: Solidifying interaction.Once cross-group divides are bridged by new in-teraction routines, Gram Vikas initiates the mobili-zation of economic resources to build the water andsanitation infrastructure. The Village Executive

Committee collects a corpus fund to which everyhousehold contributes, regardless of class and caste.Through the course of implementing the RHEP,members of privileged groups become particularlyinterested in gaining access to piped water and safesanitation to avoid being polluted by ScheduledCaste feces. Therefore, to prevent delays caused bythe limited financial means of the marginalized,elites frequently subsidize poorer families, coveringtheir contributions.

Because there is nobody in that village who can beexcluded, the poorer villagers are now subsidized.


In addition, Gram Vikas motivates and supportsthe Village Executive Committee to unlock addi-tional financial resources, such as subsidies, avail-able in the form of development schemes at the statelevel.Mobilizingmaterial and economic resources isa distributed effort: village households across socialgroups raise the corpus fund, Gram Vikas providesa financial top-up, village households provide basicmaterials for construction, Gram Vikas providesmasonry training, village households build basicbrickwork, Gram Vikas provides the material forroofing, and so on. This process continues until thewater tank is constructed. The tank is visible fromafar and symbolizes the villagers’ collective effort.

The collectivemobilization of economic resourcesforces all social groups within the village to worktogether, to gain confidence and solidify the routineof interacting across social groups. Our study, how-ever, also exposed a high risk to program success: ifone group or a single household resists participation,both construction and the covert transformation ofthe social order could stagnate or collapse. In manyvillages, the self-esteem of members of ScheduledCastes has grown by this time, and power games andconflicts begin to surface between groups. Madiathtold us that formerly marginalized groups, in par-ticular, start abusing their newpower to block highercastes’ access to infrastructure:

They agree [. . .] and then, as thework begins, they say,“We will not even contribute physical labor.” So therest of the village has to bring the materials for thosepeople and even provide the labor for them in order tocomplete. So this [is] a revenge mentality—[the mar-ginalized groups realize] that this is one time whenthey can blackmail these people: “These people haveblackmailed us all throughout or exploited us allthrough life.”

(Member of founding team, Interview)


Our findings indicate that, in such critical sit-uations, village members sanction deviance andenforce compliance to the process, with the resultthat emergent changes in patterns of behavior andinteraction are not reversed. According to archivalfilmmaterial provided byGramVikas, in one village,for instance:

[O]ne person [a man] tried to stall the work. He re-fused to participate. The village collectively madea decision to excommunicate him fromvillage life. Hewas banned from meetings and feasts, denied all ser-vices, could not even arrange the marriage of hischildren. Finally, [. . .] he came around, requesteda compromise.

(Video)

The Village Executive Committees frequently es-tablish their own sanctions, not prescribed by theformal contract, to ensure each household’s com-pliance. Such sanctions include cutting attendanceat weddings or other festivities, public shaming, anddenial of access to water. In a report Gram Vikasdeveloped in the early days of the program, a localwoman elaborated as follows on options to ensurecompliance from men:

If themen do not co-operate in the implementation of[the] RHEP in our village, we will employ laborersfrom outside for the construction of [the] RHEP in-frastructure andwill go for an indefinite kitchen striketo ensure their co-operation.

(Local woman, Archival data from 2003)

Women assume a particularly important role inpolicing the implementation of the program and,although it is not the center of their attention, thetransformative process. One village we visited wasparticularly affected by alcoholism. Men’s liquorconsumption dried up the already-scarce financialresources of families and hampered efforts to raisethe corpus fund. In this village, women—organizedin Self-Help Groups—collectively decided to takeaction. They expelled the liquor vendor from thevillage and called a village meeting to declare thatliquor consumption was prohibited in the villageand penal action would be taken against those whosell or consume alcohol. As this and other similarinstances show, informal and formal mechanisms toenforce rules and impose sanctions are importantanchors to implement the program, and also—moreimportant for our theoretical interest—to stabilizethe emerging new social order.

The RHEP program officially ends with the con-struction of a functioning water and sanitation

infrastructure. Our interviews and archival data in-dicated various stabilizing mechanisms that enablescaffolding and a revised social order to persist afterGram Vikas withdraws. A multilayered net of gover-nance structures establishes legal and formal mecha-nisms that ensure transparency, accountability, andthe representation and participation of all villagehouseholds. The interest earned from the corpus fundensures financial viability and substitutes for thesubsidies that Gram Vikas has provided or made ac-cessible as part of implementing the RHEP.

As a result, the “100% inclusion” rule is main-tained even after the manifest goal—access to waterand sanitation—has been achieved. Newly formedhouseholds and families moving to the village areautomatically represented in the Village GeneralBody, and members of disadvantaged groups areactively integrated into various committees and Self-HelpGroups.Althoughnewhouseholds are requiredto build their own water and sanitation infrastruc-ture, they can use the interest earned from the corpusfund to partly finance this effort. Savings and newlyacquired skills enable women, men, and lower-castemembers to engage productively in a broader set ofeconomic activities. Economic opportunities are moreabundant because of the legal status of the VillageExecutive Committee, which facilitates access togovernment funds and development programs forinfrastructure projects. Such projects include build-ing local fishponds, asphalt roads, community cen-ters, schools, health centers, and improved houses.These projects are collective efforts, and the infra-structure is made accessible to all villagers regardlessof gender, caste, and class.

Summary of scaffolding. Through our analysis ofthe RHEP program, we identified the process ofscaffolding, which transforms deeply entrenchedpatterns that account for durable social inequality insmall-scale societies. We identified three mecha-nisms of scaffolding: (1) mobilizing institutional,social organizational, and economic resources; (2)stabilizing emerging patterns of interactions that re-flect an alternative social order; and (3) concealinggoals that are neither anticipated nor desired bysome groups. These interrelated mechanisms makethe transformation processes adaptive and emergingalternative social orders robust.

We found that scaffolding requires active planningandcannot rely on self-organizing. First, theprogramwe analyzed here is the result of many years ofexperimenting, failing, and learning (for more de-tails, see Seelos & Mair, 2016). It builds on the ac-cumulated knowledge of an external actor—an


organization the purpose of which is to alter deeplyentrenched patterns of inequality. Second, whereasscaffolding is instigated and guarded by the organi-zation, villages need to build the first platform of thescaffold andhelp lay the foundationof thenewsocialorder—forming a consensus on the 100% inclusionrule formalized in a contract. And, third, the involve-ment of the external actor is temporary; itswithdrawalneeds to be carefully planned so that the new norma-tive and social structure cannot be detached. Rather,the process builds a strong foundation to supportongoing transformation and development efforts.

Figure 2 provides a visual overview of the processwe uncovered.

Scaffolding: Robustness and adaptation acrossvillages. The main objective of our analysis was tospecify the process of transformation. Scaffoldingwas remarkably robust across villages in our study.But villages did not “undergo” scaffolding at thesame pace. Although it was not themain focus of ouranalysis, our results point to heterogeneity of socialgroups within villages as a main driver of variationacross villages.

For example, caste villages and tribal villages dif-fered in the time required for changing patterns ofbehavior and interaction. Caste villages—deeplysegregated into multiple castes and classes—tooksignificantly longer to reach consensus and to

establish functional governance structures in whichall social groups were represented. In Kholo Saman-tapur, oneof the castevillages, for instance, it took162village meetings to reach initial consensus about ad-hering to the explicit rules of the program. In BimalaJani, another caste village, it took ten years until theprocess was completed.

Tribal villages—predominantly populated bymembers of Scheduled Tribes with less heterogene-ity in social classes and castes—struggled muchmore to raise the corpus fund. Two factors mightaccount for their difficulty. First, local economicelites do not typically reside in the tribal villages andtherefore did not subsidize or support financing fortribal villagers; and, second, because of their geo-graphic isolation, villagers are less accustomed toengaging with outside actors such as governmentagencies. In suchcases,GramVikasput in extra effortto teach the villagers how to access external fundsand mobilize government support.

Specific social organizational resources such asSelf-Help Groups played an important role in en-suring a robust scaffolding process. Our preliminaryanalysis showed that scaffolding is adjusted to ac-count for variance in social structures and availableresource types within small-scale societies. Forexample, the specific types of norms or persuasiontactics that were used varied according to the

FIGURE 2Scaffolding: A Process of Transforming Patterns of Inequality

Villagers

Persistentpatterns of

interaction andbehavior

reinforcingsocial divides

Rationalizing newinteractions

Coopting localnorms and power

structures

Routinizing newinteractions

Redesigning localgovernancestructures

Solidifying newinteractionsConstructing

together

New patterns ofinteraction and

behaviorbreaking withsocial divides

Gram VikasMobilizing

Stabilizing

Concealing

Unlocking, creating, and repurposing institutional, socialorganizational, and economic resources

Enforcing and sanctioning through formal and informalgovernance structures

Drawing and focusing attention on a desired and uncontested goal


sensitivities of local leaders and the marginalizedmembers of the village. The issues that Self-HelpGroups dealt withwere adapted to the specific needsand problems in the communities, and economicresources were mobilized in accordance with avail-ability and intra-village dynamics. Additional re-search is needed to examine variance across villagesand identify sources of variation as well as enablingand disabling conditions more systematically.

DISCUSSION

In this paper, we studied how an organizationconfrontswhatmathematicianDavidHilbert dubbeda “grand challenge.” We examined how a grandchallenge such as social inequality manifests insmall-scale societies and inheres in patterns of be-havior and social interaction. Local patterns of in-equality constitute local realities—they are visibleand provide comfort to those who marginalize andthose marginalized. Alternative realities or socialorders are unthinkable and not wanted; therefore,programs confronting inequality are vulnerable,contested, and likely to fail. Yet, transforming dura-ble patterns of inequality is possible—in particular,our findings show that transformation of such pat-terns is possible through scaffolding.

As a metaphor for building temporary supportstructures, scaffolding has been used by cognitivescientists to study individual transformation pro-cesses (Vygotski, 1964) and by evolutionary bi-ologists to understand the evolution of complexadaptive systems (Davidson & Erwin, 2006). In thisstudy, we demonstrate the relevance of scaffoldingfor research on organizations and institutions.We gobeyond using scaffolding as ametaphor (Orlikowski,2006) and specify it as a process that enables andorganizes institutional transformation. Scaffoldinginvolves mobilizing, stabilizing, and concealing;three generative mechanisms to unlock entrenchednormative and social structures and, in parallel, toinstitutionalize emerging alternative social orders.Although it is temporary, scaffolding blends in andbecomes integral to new normative and socialstructures. In other words, scaffolding is an under-recognized process for building and strengtheningalternative local social orders.

In the next sections, we first elaborate how ourfindings contribute to existing organizational schol-arship on societal challenges and to practical en-deavors to tackle entrenched patterns of inequality.We then conclude with ideas for future research ongrand challenges.

Contribution to the Organizational Study ofSocietal Challenges

Themain theoretical objective of this paper was toadvance organizational study of societal challenges.Our findings on scaffolding establish a first butimportant link between the study of organizationalefforts to alleviate social problems and the trans-formation of social systems. The concept and thethree mechanisms of scaffolding—concealing, sta-bilizing, and mobilizing—build on classical andcontemporary work on purposive organizationalactivity that affect society and extend it in impor-tant ways.

First, we revive a theoretical and analytical tradi-tion that deeply engages with organizations and ex-amines how their activities affect the lives of peopleand communities (Gouldner, 1954; Selznick, 1949).The main objective of these studies was to reveal thehidden social forces in a system—the unintendedconsequences of organizational activity (Selznick,1949). Instead, our findings on concealing show thata program sponsored by an organization can be usedas a tool to organize these hidden forces. We showthat purposive action can entail pursuing bothmanifest and concealed goals. Scaffolding allowsorganizations to hide consequences in pursuit ofa concealed goal—transforming social orders andentrenched patterns of inequality—and concur-rently reveal consequences aligned with a manifestgoal: access to clean water and safe sanitation.

Our findings allow us to turn attention to the “thelimiting function of end-in-view”—a conceptSelznick (1949) identified as significant, but dis-regarded as sociologically irrelevant in explainingpurposive organizational action.6 According toSelznick (1949: 255), “The very necessity to keepyour eye on the ball—which demands the con-struction of a rational system explicitly relatingmeans and ends—will restrain the actor fromtaking account of those consequences which in-directly shape the means and ends of policy.”

In our case, scaffolding enabled Gram Vikas toproactivelymanage villages to keep their eyes on thewater-and-sanitation “ball.” Scaffolding helped toprovide scope for what people can and will do, andto hide the emergence of a new social order thatwas neither desired nor anticipated by some socialgroups. Concealingwas important becausemembers

6 Selznick (1949) identified two sources of unintendedconsequences and considered this one as sociologicallyinsignificant compared to commitment.


of specific social groupswould resist and potentiallycompromise the process of transformation. In thecase reported here, the formulation of an end-in-view—probably surprising to Selznick—was a com-mitment structure in itself, and it was an importantorganizing device for the organization sponsoringthe program.

Second, our findings complement contemporaryresearch that has identified pursuing multiple goalsas a defining feature of organizations that effectpositive social change.7 Standing on the shoulders ofSelznick, this literature has emphasized conflict,tension, and challenges involved in pursuing mul-tiple organizational goals. Such goals are typicallyassociated with distinct and competing institutionallogics—a commercial logic and a development logic(Battilana & Dorado, 2010; Ebrahim et al., 2014).Similar to Selznick’s, these authors’ main interestlies in understanding how conflict affects or trans-forms organizations (Besharov & Smith, 2014; Mairet al., 2015) or the organization’s environment un-derstood as organizational fields (Lawrence et al.,2002; Mair & Hehenberger, 2014). Gram Vikas alsopursuesmultiple goals. But these goals do not reflect“institutional conflicts.” Instead, they refer toa specified (uncontested) social problem nested in/related to deeper relational and institutional (con-tested) challenges.

The concept of scaffolding put forward in thispaper is a first attempt to connect the study of goalsrelated to a social problem and the study of goalsrelated to transforming a local social system (Stern& Barley, 1996). Doing so allows us to expandSelznick’s ideas on institutionalization as a processof strengthening, stabilizing, and infusing organiza-tions with value (Selznick, 1957). We show howscaffolding plays an important role in transformingexisting social orders and strengthening and stabi-lizing alternative ones at the level of small-scale so-cieties. Our insights complement existing researchon institutional change that predominantly studiesattempts to directly challenge or replace existinginstitutional orders (Greenwood, Suddaby, & Hinings,2002; Hargrave & Van de Ven, 2006). Instead, scaf-folding refers to an ongoing and gradual process oftransforming local orderings of reality. Our findingson scaffolding provide a more granular view andanalysis of the interplay between thosewho prompt

transformation efforts and those who inhabit theinstitutional arrangements to be transformed (Hallett &Ventresca, 2006; Mair et al., 2012).

In addition, our findings reemphasize the impor-tance of mobilizing resources for organizational ef-forts to affect institutional and societal change(Battilana & Leca, 2009; Mair & Martı, 2007; Ganz,2000; Seelos &Mair, 2007). Our study complementsthis tradition and specifies that mobilizing resourcesis intertwined with mechanisms such as stabilizingand concealing in the process of transformation. Ourfindings also show how collective mobilizing and theinterplay between organization and village distributesagency in the transformation process, a critical featureof scaffolding.

As we mentioned before, our analysis focused onthe process of transformation. Future research basedon designs that allow for specific attention to vari-ance across small-scale societies will help to sys-tematically unpack how resources are combined andconfigured in the process of scaffolding. This willconnect to yet another set of literature, social move-ment theory, which argues that access to re-sources determines the likelihood of collectiveaction, and hence dynamics and outcomes oftransformation processes within societies (Edwards &McCarthy, 2004; Schneiberg & Lounsbury, 2017).

Contribution to Efforts to Alleviate Inequality

In line with showcasing the relevance of organi-zational studies, the second main objective of thispaper was to develop portable insights for orga-nizational efforts to tackle inequality. Scaffoldinghas the potential to transform prevailing condi-tions of the social, political, and economic lives ofpeople and thereby alter patterns of thought andbehavior.

Well-intended programs, especially in develop-ing countries, often target specific dimensions ofinequality—for example, seeking to decrease thenumber of households below the poverty line byfostering entrepreneurship, or working to decreasethe number of children not going to school by buildinga school system parallel to the public school system.These efforts might enable access to opportunitiesfor marginalized groups. Yet, the effect of suchprograms is often elusive, temporary, and revers-ible. Programs are not designed to monitor theemergence of hidden social forces leading to un-intended consequences or to deal effectively withthem. For example, elites might not respect newrules, or, as research on microfinance has shown,

7 More recently, Markman, Russo, Lumpkin, Jennings,and Mair (2016) have extended this perspective to the en-trepreneurship literature and have portrayed entrepre-neurship as a platform for pursuing multiple goals.


benefits for women of a community may be appro-priated by their husbands (Goetz & Gupta, 1996). Weargue that assisted processes of transformation suchas scaffolding create more robust and more enduringresults. Scaffolding creates a guarded and supportedspace where manifest and concealed goals can bepursued in parallel until renewed or altered localorders emerge.

Our findings also have implications for evaluatingthe success of organizational efforts to alleviate in-equality. The progress each village makes in trans-forming local realities so that marginalized groupsare included in many aspects of social, economic,and political life is an important marker of success.Yet, evaluating ongoing progress is not included inthe standard repertoire of development practice.Evaluations of programs such as the onewe report onin this study typically assess effectiveness in allevi-ating a specific problem that is perceived as impor-tant by those affected by it and those seeking tosolve it. A study on the RHEP—the program westudied—by economists from the Abdul LatifJameel Poverty Action Lab at Massachusetts Instituteof Technology, for example, assessed how the pro-gram affects levels of diarrhea and malaria in villages(Dufloetal. 2015).Nodoubt,positivehealthoutcomesare an important indicator for progress. But, as ourstudy shows, health problems are deeply rooted inentrenched patterns of interaction and behavior pre-scribed by a local system of rules, norms, and beliefs.

Our study shows that social problems and changein social systems can be addressed conjointly. Or-ganizational research can complement efforts byeconomists in important ways. Confronting and al-leviating stubborn social problems requires takinglocal realities seriously to diagnose the root cause ofthe problem but also to include local factors such asplace and local governance structures for under-standing processes that are conducive to trans-formation and positive social change (Lawrence &Dover, 2015; Mair et al., 2012; York, Hargrave, &Pacheco, 2016).

Extending Research on Organizations andGrand Challenges

Research on how to confront grand challenges al-lows us to recover the ambition to combine rigor andrelevance in organizational research (Lawrence, 1992)and, at the same time, to engage with knowledge de-veloped in other disciplines (Howard-Grenville et al.,2014). In this study, we built on literature from socialanthropology. Social anthropologists recognize that

“patterns [of inequality] can never be observed bymeasurement” and “change from one pattern to an-other is even less observable” (Barth, 1967: 662). Ourobjectivewas not to capture change in the patterns ofinequality in real time and in situ. Instead, our con-tinuous engagement with the organization and expo-sure to villages over ten years allowed us to captureinstances of transformation across villages, andallowed us to better understand how an organi-zation can intervene and confront entrenchedpatterns of inequality in institutionally complexsettings.

We studied local experimentation without losingsight of the grand challenge. The characteristics ofgrand challenges are often thought of as being scaledependent (Ferraro, Etzion, &Gehman, 2015). In thisstudy, we draw attention to characteristics of grandchallenges as they manifest locally. We propose thatthe important characteristics of inequality are scaleindependent. Inequality remains multidimensional,complex, and interlinked even in locally bound set-tings. Yet, scale-independent grand challenges at thelevel of small-scale societies—local villages—enableexperimentation and learning.

This study centered on a specific and locallybound societal challenge—inequality entrenchedin durable patterns of interaction and behavior inrural villages in India. Which other problems couldscaffolding shed light on? Societal challengesrooted in normative and structural interlocksabound in the developing and developed worlds.Scaffolding provides a theoretical and practicallens with which to reflect on important societalchallenges and the ways we address them. Thefollowing two examples illustrate the potential ofscaffolding tomake progress on established aswellas new social problems.

First, a well-documented example representsmicrofinance, inwhich a specified problem—womenor marginalized groups not able to access finance—isaddressed by a technical solution: microloans. Suchsolutions often overlook the relational aspects of theproblem rooted in normative and social structuresprevalent in both small-scale and large-scale societies(Martı &Mair, 2009).

More recent and unexpected societal challenges,such as the influx of refugees in Europe, can beassessed through a scaffolding lens too. Most well-intendedefforts prioritize the alleviation of a specificproblem; for instance, providing language courses orjob training to support the integration of refugees.Our insights on scaffolding suggest that programsmight also involve various groups within the host


societies in programs. They should identify mani-fest goals to keep the eye on the ball while adaptingnormative and social structures necessary for in-tegration to work. Maintaining focus on a technicalproblem is far easier, but ultimately success willdepend on facing relational challenges defined bynormative and power struggles. Exploring scaf-folding across a diverse set of societal challengeswill help to further clarify the boundary conditionsof scaffolding.

We hope that our detailed specification of scaf-folding as a productive tool with which to organizetransformation will serve as a template for re-searchers and practitioners to expand our under-standing of this process and the potential and limitsof its generalizability.

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Johanna Mair ([email protected]) is a professor oforganization, strategy, and leadership at the Hertie Schoolof Governance in Berlin. She is also a distinguished fellowat the Stanford Center on Philanthropy and Civil Society.Her research focuses on how organizational and in-stitutional arrangements affect social and economic de-velopment, and the role of innovation in this process. Shereceived her PhD from INSEAD.

Miriam Wolf ([email protected]) is a post-doctoralresearcher at the Hertie School of Governance in Berlinand a project manager for the SEFORIS Project (Social

Entrepreneurship as a Force for more Inclusive andInnovative Societies). Her research interest lies in or-ganizing processes around social or environmental is-sues. She received her PhD from Leeds UniversityBusiness School.

Christian Seelos ([email protected]) is the Leo Tinde-mans Chair of Business Model Innovation at KU Leuvenand a research fellow at the Stanford University Center onPhilanthropy and Civil Society. His research focuses onhow social sector organizations enact innovation processesand on the link between innovation, scaling, and impact.


mailto:[email protected]



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