In my presentation of the Research Handbook on the Sociology of Emotions (Edgar Elgar, 2024) I will depart from a definition of institutions understood in a post-Weberian manner as a complex of organizational structures, featuring a (mostly hierarchical) division of labor, a set of tasks, a dynamic relationship with (equal and dependent, variously defined) outsiders as well as the foundational and new, legitimating myths, beliefs, rituals and (cultural) practices. In contrast to the normative-cognitivist neo-institutionalists and “institutional work” advocates, I will argue that institutions and more specifically their emergence, maintenance and destruction are intensely emotional and greatly affect the emotional rule
regimes characterizing these institutions. I will also show how to think of institutions and emotional rule regimes in different nation-states and policy areas.