As mentioned in the introduction, our theoretical framing
as well as our mode of analysis and method is informed
by the institutional sociology of Bourdieu. This approach
encouraged us to divide the research process into three related
phases. In the first phase, we attempted to map the
field of study in order to understand the contours of the
field and its objective relations (Bourdieu & Wacquant,
1992, pp. 104–5). This initial mapping of the field started
from existing research and focused on the nature of the
field, the role of institutional rules, and the idea of strategy
as a response to those rules (Bourdieu, 2005, pp. 89–126).
The discussion of influence-markets and anti-corruption
barriers, and the material on the role of discretion and
accounting-implicated strategies that were presented in
the previous sections, are the result of this mapping.