UC Irvine

In this dissertation, I investigated the importance of institutional relational work, especially in terms of interpersonal relationship building and interactions at the individual level, in driving institutional change. Situated within the scope of policy making and policy change, my studies examined how the relationships between the business actors (as the regulated) and the government actors as (the regulator) are established and leveraged to successfully achieve policy related outcomes. Moreover, I find an important and specialized role of intermediary actors in mediating relationships and interactions between the regulated and the regulator and substituting direct relational work between the two. This research addresses key limitations in the existing literatures on relational work, institutional intermediaries, and policy research by delving into the nuances of specific strategies employed at the individual level to build and leverage such relationships and how these interpersonal interactions shape policy processes at the ground level. Moreover, through a comparative lens, complex relational work is examined in both China and the U.S. to develop theory that cuts across these contexts.