Some internal limitations are capital and personnel expenditures, constraints in information processing, costs of upsetting the political equilibrium, and history and tradition. External constraits are legal barriers, fiscal limitations, and costs of securing legitimacy and political support from external forces. Organizations are valued for their reliability, which is only possible with relatively stable structures. They are also valued for their accountability and rationality, which also presumes stable, rational structures. In a stable environment those firms with higher reliability and accountability are more likely to be successful, but are also more likely to fail when the environment changes.
Organizations fail in many ways.
They may dissolve completely, be acquired, or merge. Population ecologists tend to focus on the core features of organizations and look over longer periods. Both views have usefulness.