Construction of patents as social objects [electronic resource] : the routine of information compliance and the creation of legal rights by an occupational field; and the engagement of patents as resources and representations of technology, knowledge, and search
Keywords: Management Science and Engineering

Patents are widely regarded as a cornerstone of modern economies. This is evident in the discourse on the knowledge economy and the role of patents in the knowledge production function. Yet, few micro-level studies have examined how organizations and workers other than inventors routinely create patents. Furthermore, the meanings that social scientists have assigned to patents and patent data as representations and indicators of knowledge, search, and technology have not been substantiated. This interdisciplinary dissertation addresses these voids and examines patents as social objects. In my inductive study, I identify a social world around patents and subworlds that focus on the creation of patents as social artifacts, their utilization as representations and indicators, and their utilization as organizational resources. I find that contrary to the assumption that the inventor is the sole author of the patent, an invisible occupational field of participants shapes the invention that is embodied in the document over a four phase process. In my investigation of "References Cited, " I demonstrate that labels may not reflect what some think they mean. I find that the reference lists of patents are not like those in academic publications: only a fraction of the information listed under "References Cited" in a patent is cited in the text -- a finding that undermines the basis for the application of citation analysis to patents. Instead, the list is a product of information compliance. Participants are motivated by a legal duty to disclose categories of information and their response is shaped a host of strategic factors. Participants follow to the letter of the law when the law is unambiguous. When the law is ambiguous, they err on the side of caution: they disclose more information than may be necessary and selectively interpret information. Thus, the information in "Reference Cited" is a composite of different categories of information from many participants and legal concerns, not just the inventor or the examiner. This study raises questions about fundamental assumptions in studies that use patent data, namely the literature on knowledge flows, knowledge diffusion, organizational search, and ecological niches. To account for misalignment in meaning between subworlds of producers and engagers, I identify a three step model that leads to misalignment of meaning: lack of transparency and coordination during creation; incomplete objectivation; and selective mechanisms of engagement. Three conditions in the patent process contribute to missingness or absence in the final product. This absence creates opportunity for engagers to assign their own meanings. In the subworld that creates and uses patents, participants recognize that the primary purpose for creating patents is to fulfill organizational objectives. Because a patent is just one artifact in the life history of a resource, I identify a trajectory or a resource life cycle that encompasses the following phases: creation, development, deployment, and death. Through interaction with the institutional and dynamic environments, workers change resources over time, yielding different resource artifacts. When workers put these artifacts into use, the artifacts become resources-in-use. It is through the action and inaction of participants, that resources advance, retreat, fail to progress, and cease to exist. This study presents a dynamic account of individual resources shaped by agency and changing environmental conditions. This dissertation contributes to the sociology of intellectual property, economic sociology, information compliance, construction of resources, resource-based-view of the firm, organizational routines, and methodology in organizational studies and applied economies.