Abstract
Previous industrial revolutions have primarily been concerned with the transformation of manual labor to automated and robotized production. The 4th industrial revolution rather concerns the digitalization and infusion of technology in knowledge based work, organizations and industries. In particular, this paper explores the development of the Legal Tech field. By building on institutional change and entrepreneurship theory, it explores the development of the legal industry during 2014 to 2018. Institutional entrepreneurship considers how agents create new institutional arrangements and engage in institutional change through a variety of strategies. While past theory on institutional entrepreneurship suggests that new fields primarily are developed by disadvantaged actors, the research presented here suggests that fields are constructed and re-constructed based on digital technologies and tech start-ups. In particular, the paper identifies three phases and levels of change – work processes, organizational transformations and ecosystems. Each of these phases in turn embed different institutional logics and work.