Political, Institutional, and Economic Conditions for New Industry Emergence: Retail Clinics

Abstract

What conditions predict new organizational entry and growth in an emergent industry? We investigate regulatory and economic market conditions associated with new entry and integration of retail health clinics–a radically new organizational form–into the organizational field of primary care in the U.S. While prior literature examines, separately, economic, institutional, and political predictors of new industry emergence, we use fuzzy set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA) to identify configurations of field conditions on the three dimensions simultaneously that are associated with clinics presence and growth. We find all three dimensions played a role in the initial growth of the new organizational form across U.S. states up to 2008, the industry’ subsequent growth from 2008 to 2013. Most important, we find that regulatory barriers of professional license, which research on professions and occupational licensure would predict to be a key hurdle for new entrants, did not matter for retail clinics proliferation, when political and economic was favorable for entry.