Competitive Interfirm Dynamics within an Industrial Market System

This paper develops a conceptual framework within which the fundamental resource dynamics of an economy may be investigated. The framework has heterogeneous firms at its center, and the dynamics governing their competitive, evolutionary and entrepreneurial interactions are made the object of analysis. This approach is motivated by the desire to penetrate to the resource dynamics of a capitalist economy, and to bring out the significance that interfirm resource networks play in the way that economies adapt and respond to novel situations. The management of these relational assets - resources, routines and interfirm relations - is seen as a critical issue in the success of individual firms and of whole economies. The paper embarks on this project through the synthesis of four current business perspectives, in the belief that rapid changes in the global economy call for renewed efforts towards theoretical integration. The four perspectives are the dynamic capabilities perspective on the firm (incorporating the resource-based view) as developed in the strategic management literature; the markets-as-networks view, as developed in the industrial marketing and purchasing literature; the evolutionary economic view, as developed by Nelson and Winter; and the entrepreneurial discovery view, as developed by Schumpeter and the Austrian school. It is contended that a synthesis of these perspectives will reinforce each, and lead to novel insights.