Nevertheless, They Persisted: How Patterns of Opposition and Support Shaped the Survival of US Abortion Clinics

Stigmatized organizations are generally assumed to face a variety of unique operational challenges. This paper examines the survival of stigmatized organizations in light of such challenges. Specifically, we investigate how patterns of opposition and support from multiple external stakeholders and audiences affect organizational survival within the context of abortion provision in the United States. We use a fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA) to examine the causal linkages between the above factors and the survival outcomes of the full identifiable industry of 983 abortion clinics that were in operation in the U.S. between 2011 and 2017. Our results reveal the existence of multiple paths to survival, based primarily on either the absence of overt opposition or the presence of factors like political support that enabled organizations to overcome other threats to survival. Our findings show how socio-political factors affect the survival of organizations in stigmatized industries.