The emergence of governance in an open source community

• 成果类型: Review
• 署名作者: O'Mahony, Siobhan; Ferraro, Fabrizio
• 署名单位: University of California System; University of California Davis; University of Navarra
• 刊物名称: ACADEMY OF MANAGEMENT JOURNAL
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0001-4273
• 发表日期: 2007
• 页码: 1079-1106
• 关键词: OPEN-SOURCE SOFTWARE; FACE-TO-FACE; OCCUPATIONAL COMMUNITIES; LEADERSHIP EMERGENCE; VIRTUAL TEAMS; IRON CAGE; ORGANIZATION; authority; work; self

摘要

Little is known about how communities producing collective goods govern themselves. In a multimethod study of one open source software community, we found that members developed a shared basis of formal authority but limited it with democratic mechanisms that enabled experimentation with shifting conceptions of authority over time. When members settled on a shared conception of authority, it was more expansive than their original design. A statistical test of the predictors of leadership reinforced this finding. By blending bureaucratic and democratic mechanisms, the governance system evolved with the community's changing conceptions of authority.