IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/beh/jbepv1/v5y2021is1p73-81.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Entrepreneurship, discovery and search

Author

Listed:
  • Shinji Teraji

    (Department of Economics, Yamaguchi University)

Abstract

This paper analyzes the theory of the firm by clarifying the relationship between Israel Kirzner's notion 'discovery' and Herbert Simon's notion 'search.' In the problem of ignorance, the paper argues how Kirznerian entrepreneurship differs from Simonian entrepreneurship. Kirzner emphasizes the quality of perception for recognizing a profit opportunity, while Simon emphasizes the search for possibilities. In the paper, ignorance can be classified into two categories: 'lack of information' and 'lack of awareness.' The former is attributable to scarce knowledge in an organization. Agents in search activities know the extent of their ignorance and can be informed about the missing information. On the other hand, the latter corresponds to unnoticed opportunities in the market. Discovery is always accompanied by surprise in disequilibrium where agents are ignorant and are often ignorant of their ignorance. Discovery replaces ignorance with newly identified feasible states.

Suggested Citation

  • Shinji Teraji, 2021. "Entrepreneurship, discovery and search," Journal of Behavioral Economics for Policy, Society for the Advancement of Behavioral Economics (SABE), vol. 5(S1), pages 73-81, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:beh:jbepv1:v:5:y:2021:i:s1:p:73-81
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://sabeconomics.org/journal/RePEc/beh/JBEPv1/articles/JBEP-5-S1-6.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    More about this item

    Keywords

    entrepreneurship; ignorance; discovery; search;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • B25 - Schools of Economic Thought and Methodology - - History of Economic Thought since 1925 - - - Historical; Institutional; Evolutionary; Austrian; Stockholm School
    • B41 - Schools of Economic Thought and Methodology - - Economic Methodology - - - Economic Methodology
    • D90 - Microeconomics - - Micro-Based Behavioral Economics - - - General

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:beh:jbepv1:v:5:y:2021:i:s1:p:73-81. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: SABE (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/sabeeea.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.