The main problem actors face is uncertainty caused by difficulties in finding suppliers and customers and in controlling their own firm. - Neil Fligstein

I use the metaphor "markets as politics" to create a sociological view of action in markets. I develop a conceptual view of the social institutions that comprise markets, discuss a sociological model of action in which market participants try to create stable worlds and find social solutions to competition, and discuss how markets and states are intimately linked. From these foundations, I generate propositions about how politics in markets work during various stages of market development-- formation, stability, and transformation. At the formation of markets, when actors in firms are trying to create a status hierarchy that enforces noncompetitive forms of competition, political action resembles social movements. In stable markets, incumbent firms defend their positions against challengers and invaders. During periods of market transformation, invaders can reintroduce more fluid social-movement-like conditions.

All large organizations have an internal power struggle over the goals and resources of the organization.... In the largest firms, there are two bases of control : formal ownership and authority. Those who own the firm control by virtue of ownership. Authority relations embedded in the organizational structure legitimate how managers can control organizations.

their actors choose a course of action depending on what their competitors do.