China and Estonia in Flux: is this a Valid Basis for Comparison of their Approaches to Change Management?

Abstract

In this paper we attempt to analyze management of organizational change in the context of economic and commercial reforms in the former centrally planned economic systems. Developing and transitional economies have intended to dispose of their past ‘blue prints’ and seek out templates which have been successful in the existing market economies. At the core of our questioning is the accepted idea that the process of organizational change in transitional and emerging economies is and needs to be ‘managed’. In this paper the processes of organizational change in two distinct cultures, China and Estonia, has been analyzed drawing partially on an institutional perspective.