The Pressure of the Past: Network Imprinting in Intercorporate Communities

This paper extends organizational imprinting theory to networks by examining how the social technology available during the establishment of community-based intercorporate networks continues to influence contemporary network structures despite major changes in the U.S. corporate environment. I examine the 51 largest U.S. community network systems in 1986, the same networks in 2000, and the network activity of the component organizations of those network systems. Results show that even when controlling for many plausible alternative explanations, communities established prior to the advent of air travel technology have preserved locally focused networks, which suggests that this pattern is maintained by emulation of locally legitimate templates of action. This research contributes to work on imprinting by extending it to networks and in theorizing the social mechanisms that result in the persistence of social forms. Furthermore, it contributes to work on directorship networks by suggesting that the way information flows through this network may be geographically contingent.