Institutional 'Dirty' Work: Preserving Institutions Through Strategic Decoupling

Institutions do not come into being de novo, but instead are often based on and built out of much that preceded them. In this chapter, the rhetorical strategy of retaining aspects of the "discarded" institution by reframing them as "new" is traced and outlined. Examples are provided from the claims of post-socialist east European states to have privatized and created new capitalist markets.