Penrose's book <italic>The Theory of the Growth of the Firm</italic> presents a growth theory that overwhelmingly relates to organic growth, with little explicit focus on acquisitive growth. This article addresses the gap in her growth theory by drawing on the historical case of Enodis, and insights from the...

This paper assesses the role of historical analysis in the development of the RBV, focusing on the work of Edith Penrose. Drawing on Penrose's own work, and her correspondence with her teacher and colleague Professor Fritz Machlup, the article argues that historical analysis was central to the...

Firms that are able to shift their trajectory from continual failure to sustained success are rare, yet turnarounds do occur and are part of the business landscape. Little progress has been made over the last two decades in discovering the key factors that can lead to firms escaping from...

This paper explores the co-evolution of third stream activities in UK higher education from 1970 to 2008. Drawing on interviews and archival analysis it identifies four distinct periods through which third stream activities have co-evolved. The research suggests that the co-evolution of the...

Each summer milk processors around the country participate in sealed bid procurements for the right to provide public schools with milk throughout the subsequent academic year. School district contracts are an important part of vehicle routing problems that milk processors solve on an ongoing...

In its attempts to deter and prosecute big rigging, U.S. antitrust authorities have focused on sealed-bid procurements, rather than on ascending-bid auctions. One possible justification for this focus is the idea, supported by the existing theoretical literature, that collusion creates...

Planning, as a form of state intervention administered at the local level, is inevitably subject to the pressures and vagaries of governmental and societal change. The recent past has been a particularly turbulent period for local governance and this has inevitably impacted on the role of...

This paper investigates the performance of district local authorities in their delivery of nature conservation in the 1990s, both through the land use planning system and in their wider operational functions. Studies conducted in the 1980s revealed a large gap in performance between the best and...

The concept of justice is central to a political activity such as planning. This is reflected in the initial influence of consequentialism, particularly utilitarian conceptualizations, in planning thought and more recently in the application of Rawls' notion of “justice as fairness” and...