Michael Thomas Hannan (born July 14, 1943) is an American sociologist, and professor of management at the Stanford Graduate School of Business, known for his seminal work in the field of organizational ecology.[1][2]
Hannan received his B.A. at the College of the Holy Cross in 1965, his M.A. at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, in 1968, where he also obtained his Ph.D in sociology in 1970.[3]
Hannan started his academic career as assistant professor of sociology at Stanford University, where he got promoted to professor of sociology. In 1984 he moved to Cornell University, where he was appointed professor of social sciences. In 1991 he moved back to Stanford to become professor of management and professor of sociology, and since 2015 emeritus.[3]
Among others he was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowships in sociology in 1987, and a Max Weber Award by the American Sociological Association in 1992 and 2002.[3]
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Main article: Organizational Ecology |
Hannan and John H. Freeman were the first to formulate an explicit organizational theory about population ecology with the 1977 article in the American Journal of Sociology, which was the seminal work in the field of organizational ecology. This article proposed:
The scope of their organizational ecology theory ranged from birth of new organizations (organizational founding), organizational growth and organizational change, to the death of organizations (firm mortality). Organizations compete in their environment, where processes like natural selection rule.
Since the early 2000s, Hannan has been researching how concepts and categories shape markets. His main contribution is introducing fuzzy concepts to the study of industry and population boundaries. With his co-authors, Gael Le Mens, Greta Hsu, Balázs Kovács, Giacomo Negro, László Pólos, Elizabeth Pontikes, and Amanda Sharkey, they published a book on this topic: Concepts and Categories: Foundations for Sociological and Cultural Analysis.
