Proceedings: Conference on Corporate Communication 2012 Page 1

Voices in Conflict? The Crisis Communication of Meta-organizations
A Multiple Case Study
Finn Frandsen and Winni Johansen,
Center for Corporate Communication
Department of Communication
Aarhus School of Business and Social Sciences
Aarhus University
ff@asb.edu wj@asb.edu
Meta-organizations such as industry trade associations are organizations whose members are
other organizations. Meta-organizations differ from individual-based organizations in important
ways. On one hand, meta-organizations are complex organizations serving as an intermediary
between its members and their external social environment. On the other, they are searching for
consensus between their members trying to avoid inter-organizational conflicts. When a private
company finds itself in a crisis situation, the news media often contact a spokesperson of the
corresponding industry trade association(s) asking him or her to comment on the situation. Based
on Ahrne and Brunsson’s (2008) theory of meta-organizations, and on a multi-vocal approach to
crisis communication (Frandsen and Johansen, 2010), the aim of this paper is to examine how
meta-organizations communicate in a crisis situation affecting one or more of their members, or
the industry as such. The following research questions will be addressed: (1) How do metaorganizations
work with crisis management and crisis communication? (2) How do they define
their role in a crisis situation? (3) How do they communicate, externally and internally, when one
of their members is in crisis? (4) What kind of expectations do their members have when it comes
to gaining communicative support from their meta-organizations? The research design consists of
a multiple case study. Three organizational crises, taking place within three different industries in
Denmark, have been subjected to empirical study (combining interviews, archival studies, and
rhetorical analysis).
Keywords: Conflict, Crisis communication, Meta-organization, Multi-vocal approach.
Paper type: Case study.
Abstracts of <strong>Conference</strong> <strong>Proceedings</strong>: <strong>Conference</strong> on Corporate Communication 2012
Page 61