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Toiviainen, H. (2003). Learning across levels: Challenges of collaboration in a small-firm network. Academic Dissertation. Helsinki: University of Helsinki, Department of Education.
According to a generally held view, the rise of networks adds a new interorganizational level to the analysis of learning alongside individual, group, and organizational levels. In this study, it is argued that networks open up an alternative way of considering levels, not as predetermined and given, but as dynamic spaces for learning. Learning in networks as an interplay of levels is a highly contextualized and embedded phenomenon, to be explored specifically for each network setting. Consequently, the definition of levels becomes a major research task.
For small metal-working subcontracting companies in Finland in the 1990s, networks and networking presented a collaborative challenge, marked by the economic depression in the early 1990s, and by the concurrent reorganization of the subcontracting system initiated by the customer companies. Joint production became a new leading activity for horizontal collaboration among subcontractors. Pursuing production in networks was not, however, a straightforward undertaking. The formation of networks engendered a variety of activities directed at their own objects and outcomes of collaboration. By following the emerging objects within the Club network and its sub-networks, I found four levels of collaboration and learning, which I named the network-ideological, project, production, and worker levels.
In the study of learning, I apply the cultural-historical activity theory and the theory of expansive learning. Besides emphasizing object orientation, this line of research leads to a consideration of the diversity of perspectives intersecting and confronting one another in networks. An empirical chapter of the thesis is devoted to each of the four levels.
My historical analysis of the Club network covers the years from 1991 to 1995. Participant observation covers the period between 1995 and 1999. The data consists of videotaped and audio-recorded network meetings, interviews, and interactions across the firms, complemented by archival documents and researcher’s field notes. The data draws significantly on discursive materials.
The notion of levels of network activity contributes to the cultural-historical activity theory and to the theory of expansive learning in two main ways. First, by introducing the levels, I suggest a vertical dimension of intersecting levels to be integrated in the third generation activity theory, which has thus far been conceptualized mainly horizontally, in terms of multiple activity systems orienting towards a shared object. Second, embedding this vertical dimension in the cycle of expansive learning may enrich our understanding of the dynamics of the cycle, by introducing the idea of concurrent and contradictory movements of learning from above and learning from below.
Concerning the future learning challenges for the network and sub-networks I studied, the major finding of this study points at the emerging partnerships and partnering activity. A fifth level, the partnership level, seems to be needed for mediating learning from above and learning from below. This study anticipates a new phase of discussion on partnering, suggested by other alliance researchers, namely a shift of focus from alliance formation to alliance management and partnering competence. Cultural-historical activity theory may contribute to this discussion by elaborating the ideas of co-configuration, knotworking, and related concepts to articulate the learning challenge.
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