J. W. Stoelhorst

The Implementation of a Market Orientation: A Review and Integration of the Contributions to Date

Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to review the market orientation literature from a managerial perspective and to discuss and integrate the implementation lessons that can be drawn from it. Design/methodology/approach - The paper starts with a review of the managerial implications of the market orientation literature. It then provides an overview of nine implementation approaches. It draws on an integrative model of marketing orientation to organize the implementation lessons from the literature into an actionable approach to implementing a market orientation. Findings - The paper finds that the literature offers a rich, yet fragmented, picture of what market orientation is, and how it can be improved. Research limitations/implications - The paper identifies a conceptual gap in the literature between market orientation and customer value generation and offers a model to bridge this gap that can serve as a guide for future theory development and empirical research. Practical implications - The paper identifies four design enablers and three development enablers that can guide managerial action to improve market orientation and offers practitioners a structured way to go about the implementation of a market orientation. Originality/value - Despite significant advances in the development of market orientation theory, there is still a void in the literature with respect to the implementation of a market orientation. This paper is the first to review the market orientation literature from a managerial perspective, to provide an overview of the implementation approaches published to date, and to integrate the managerial implications of the market orientation literature.

The Explanatory Logic and Ontological Commitments of Generalized Darwinism

The recent debate about the value of Darwinism as a source of ontological foundations for evolutionary economics reduces to a disagreement about whether or not the causal logic of Darwinism applies to economic evolution. However, this logic has not yet been fully specified. While the explanantia of Darwinism have been elaborately discussed, the explananda of Darwinism have not been given detailed consideration. It is shown how the specification of its explananda helps generalize Darwinism in a way that avoids biological analogies such as inheritance and replication mechanisms. It is furthermore shown that an explicit consideration of its explananda leads to a generalized Darwinism that acknowledges both the ontological continuity and ontological similarity of all evolutionary processes and that needs to be complemented with multi‐level selection logic. The ontological commitments of such a generalized Darwinism are consistent with those that have been proposed in the wider search for ontological foundations in evolutionary economics.

The emergence and evolution of the multidimensional organization

The M-form, in which a corporate parent manages relatively freestanding business units, was the most successful organizational design of the twentieth century. However, contemporary economic conditions call for designs that allow firms to exploit synergies across their business units and on this dimension the M-form is notoriously weak. We report on empirical research that highlights the fundamental tension between clear lines of authority and the exploitation of synergies that firms face as they move away from the M-form and implement shared service centers, corporate account management, and matrix organizations. However, we also found that a limited but substantial number of firms in our sample evolved organizational designs that signal a new way of resolving this tension. These firms are organized around multiple dimensions (e.g. region, product, and account) and are able to simultaneously hold different managers accountable for performance on these dimensions. We discuss the nature of this multidimensional organization form by contrasting it with the M-form and the matrix organization. The multidimensional organization is best understood as the next step in the evolution from a resource centric physical production model to a customer centric knowledge exploitation model. It is a way of organizing that seems particularly well adapted to stimulating the teamwork that is necessary to create economic value in complex markets on the basis of distributed knowledge and intangible resources.

The Role of Governance in Corporate Social Responsibility: Lessons from Dutch Finance

This article extends the corporate social performance (CSP) model by studying the role of governance structures and governance systems in shaping corporate social responsibility. The authors argue that a governance perspective offers a fruitful research strategy both to study empirically how firms balance the competing moral frameworks and political philosophies that are part and parcel of defining their role in society and to further the theoretical integration of the descriptive and normative perspectives in the business and society field. They illustrate the potential of this research strategy with a comparative case study of processes of responsiveness at four Dutch banks with markedly different governance structures. This study shows how governance systems and structures both enable and constrain corporate responsibility and responsiveness. The authors conclude with a proposal to reorient the CSP model to harness the integrative potential of studying corporate social responsibility through a governance lens.

Darwinian Foundations for Evolutionary Economics

Abstract This paper engages with the methodological debate on the contribution of Darwinism to Veblen’s (1898) evolutionary research program for economics. I argue that ontological continuity, generalized Darwinism, and multi-level selection are necessary building blocks for an explanatory framework that can fulfill the promise of Veblen’s program. I clarify the causal logic of generalized Darwinism and suggest an ontology for the study of economic development on the basis of multi-level selection theory. Conceptualizing economic development along these lines has interesting implications for the evolutionary analysis of institutions: institutions only become units of selection in the competition between groups of individuals.

Introduction to the special issue on the future of institutional and evolutionary economics

This special issue of the Journal of Institutional Economics on the future of institutional and evolutionary economics consists of this introduction, four full essays, and two sizeable comments. Menard and Shirley (2014) and Menard (2014) discuss the future of the new institutional economics, and their two essays are followed by a reflection by Hodgson. Winter (2014) and Witt (2014) discuss the future of evolutionary economics, and their essays are followed by a comment by Stoelhorst. Here, we introduce these essays and comments by putting them in a broader historical perspective. In particular, we trace the common origins of modern institutional and evolutionary economics, particularly in the work of Veblen, as well as important additional influences such as Schumpeter and Simon. We highlight how the two approaches became disconnected, and signal the possibility of, and need for, re-establishing closer connections between them. Possible elements of a future overlapping research programme are outlined.

The Future of Evolutionary Economics Is in a Vision from the Past

This essay comments on discussions of the future of evolutionary economics by Winter (2014) and Witt (2014). I agree with their assessment of evolutionary economics as a theoretically fragmented field that has had little success in effecting a paradigm shift in mainstream economics. However, I question if such a paradigm shift should be the primary goal of evolutionary economists. I argue that evolutionary economists could increase their impact if they would be willing and able to recast themselves as evolutionary social scientists. This was the vision for economics that Veblen held out more than a century ago. I lay out the theoretical building blocks for realizing this vision available today.

The naturalist view of Universal Darwinism: an application to the evolutionary theory of the firm

The purpose of this paper is to contribute to recent efforts to ground evolutionary theory in economics in the principles of Universal Darwinism. The paper will contrast two views of evolution, based on the Ultra-Darwinian and Naturalist theory of biological evolution, both of which are consistent with the principles of Universal Darwinism. It is argued that the specific characteristics of the Naturalist view make it the better starting point for the development of an evolutionary theory of the firm. This claim is substantiated empirically by analysing a crucial episode in the history of the semiconductor firm Intel. The paper concludes with a prospective outlook on the development of an evolutionary theory of the firm along the lines of a Naturalist view of Universal Darwinism.

Generalized Darwinism From the Bottom Up: An Evolutionary View of Socio-Economic Behavior and Organization

Institutional and evolutionary economists have recognized that organizations are social as well as economic entities, but in modern evolutionary theories of the firm the social aspect of economic organization is typically lost. This is a result of the fact that these theories take the existence of firms as given, focus on the explanation of market and industry level phenomena, and in doing so use notions such as routines to abstract from individual behavior within the firm. This paper takes another approach and reasons from the bottom up. It is argued that for both historical and ontological reasons, individual behavior should be seen as the starting point of theorizing about socio-economic organization. An evolutionary view of individual behavior that recognizes the social aspect of economic organization would see individuals as competing in a socio-economic environment, with their success depending on their socio-economic fitness. But what is socio-economic fitness? A concept of socio-economic fitness implies social as well as economic selection pressures, but what is the nature of these pressures? And is adaptation to socio-economic pressures not an ontogenetic rather than a phylogenetic process that defies explanation in terms of the population logic of evolutionary theories? The purpose of this paper is to answer these questions by applying Generalized Darwinism to the analysis of socio-economic behavior and organization. Its intended contributions are threefold. First, the paper presents an argument for the importance of building theories of socio-economic organization on an evolutionary understanding of what drives individual behavior. Second, the paper demonstrates how Darwinism can be used to understand the evolution of individual behaviors in socio-economic contexts. Third, the paper shows how such an understanding can be used to advance evolutionary theories of economic organization.

The evolution of institutional economics: Agency, structure and darwinism in american institutionalism

The article reviews the book “The Evolution of Institutional Economics: Agency, Structure and Darwinism in American Institutionalism,” by Geoffrey M. Hodgson.