The governance crucible : institutional logics and the transformation of corporate governance in Slovenia

Dvorski, Katarina (author), Hruška, Domagoj (author)

This study explores how institutional logics are enacted and recalibrated within corporate governance amid legitimacy challenges and organisational change. Set in Slovenia’s posttransition banking sector, it combines a symbolic–material ontology of institutions with a dual distinction between identity-based logics, grounded in values and organisa- tional purpose, and activity-based logics, rooted in operational practice and performance. Drawing on elite–expert interviews and governance artefacts, the analysis traces how these logics interact across three phases of governance transformation—state stewardship, privatisation, and postprivatisation resilience. The findings show that governance is not merely a technical control system but a meaning-laden crucible where legitimacy is continually constructed and reinterpreted through leadership, decision routines, and institutional objects such as rules, metrics, and narratives. The study contributes to institutional logics research by demonstrating how identity and activity logics blend and evolve in practice and offers practical insights for governance actors seeking to sustain legitimacy and resilience in institutionally complex, historically layered environments.

• Language: English
• Keywords: entrepreneurship, knowledge management, labour efficiency, business efficiency, corporate governance, institutional logics, identity-based logics, activity-based logics, legitimacy, Slovenia
• Work type: Article
• Typology: 1.01 - Original Scientific Article
• Organization: EF - School of Economics and Business
• Publication status: Published
• Publication version: Version of Record
• Year: 2026
• Number of pages: Str. 16-34
• Numbering: Vol. 28, iss. 1, article no. 2
• PID: 20.500.12556/RUL-180696
• UDC: 005.336.1
• ISSN on article: 2335-4216
• DOI: 10.15458/2335-4216.1366
• COBISS.SI-ID: 270216451
• Publication date in RUL: 13.03.2026

Record is a part of a journal

• Title: Economic and business review
• Publisher: Ekonomska fakulteta
• ISSN: 2335-4216
• COBISS.SI-ID: 268649216

Licences

• License: CC BY 4.0, Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International
• Link: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
• Description: This is the standard Creative Commons license that gives others maximum freedom to do what they want with the work as long as they credit the author.

Secondary language

• Language: Slovenian
• Keywords: delovna organizacija, organizacijski razvoj, identiteta podjetja, nadzor vodenja podjetja, Slovenija