IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/kap/revaec/v35y2022i4d10.1007_s11138-020-00529-2.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Malcom McLean, containerization and entrepreneurship

Author

Listed:
  • Rosolino A. Candela

    (George Mason University)

  • Peter J. Jacobsen

    (Ottawa University)

  • Kacey Reeves

    (George Mason University)

Abstract

Does the entrepreneurial market process reflect an equilibrating or disequilibrating tendency in the allocation of resources? We address this question by utilizing the case of Malcom McLean, who pioneered and introduced container shipping to international trade. We argue that Schumpeterian and Kirznerian entrepreneurship are distinct, yet complementary activities that drive the market process towards an equilibrating tendency. By realizing containerization as a lower cost method of shipping goods internationally, we argue that McLean acted simultaneously as a Schumpeterian and Kirznerian entrepreneur, illustrating that these two notions of entrepreneurship are different segments of the same equilibrating market process. Containerization had a disruptive effect on previous methods of ocean shipping, but its adoption was introduced through an act of arbitrage, namely by redeploying existing resources, such as cranes, ships, ports, and storage facilities from lower-valued uses to perceived higher-valued uses. In the process, McLean was able to realize previously unnoticed profit opportunities by correcting previously existing inefficiencies in intermodal transport.

Suggested Citation

  • Rosolino A. Candela & Peter J. Jacobsen & Kacey Reeves, 2022. "Malcom McLean, containerization and entrepreneurship," The Review of Austrian Economics, Springer;Society for the Development of Austrian Economics, vol. 35(4), pages 445-465, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:kap:revaec:v:35:y:2022:i:4:d:10.1007_s11138-020-00529-2
    DOI: 10.1007/s11138-020-00529-2
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s11138-020-00529-2
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s11138-020-00529-2?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Sjostrom William, 2004. "Ocean Shipping Cartels: A Survey," Review of Network Economics, De Gruyter, vol. 3(2), pages 1-28, June.
    2. Douglas A. Irwin, 2015. "Free Trade under Fire Fourth edition," Economics Books, Princeton University Press, edition 4, number 10486.
    3. Boettke, Peter J. & Coyne, Christopher J., 2009. "Context Matters: Institutions and Entrepreneurship," Foundations and Trends(R) in Entrepreneurship, now publishers, vol. 5(3), pages 135-209, March.
    4. Israel Kirzner, 1999. "Creativity and/or Alertness: A Reconsideration of the Schumpeterian Entrepreneur," The Review of Austrian Economics, Springer;Society for the Development of Austrian Economics, vol. 11(1), pages 5-17, January.
    5. Dahlman, Carl J, 1979. "The Problem of Externality," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 22(1), pages 141-162, April.
    6. Bernhofen, Daniel M. & El-Sahli, Zouheir & Kneller, Richard, 2016. "Estimating the effects of the container revolution on world trade," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 98(C), pages 36-50.
    7. Wayne K. Talley, 2000. "Ocean Container Shipping: Impacts of a Technological Improvement," Journal of Economic Issues, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 34(4), pages 933-948, December.
    8. Israel M. Kirzner, 1997. "Entrepreneurial Discovery and the Competitive Market Process: An Austrian Approach," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 35(1), pages 60-85, March.
    9. Rosolino A. Candela & Vincent J. Geloso, 2020. "The Lighthouse Debate and the Dynamics of Interventionism," The Review of Austrian Economics, Springer;Society for the Development of Austrian Economics, vol. 33(3), pages 289-314, September.
    10. Armen A. Alchian, 1950. "Uncertainty, Evolution, and Economic Theory," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 58(3), pages 211-211.
    11. Kirzner, Israel M, 1999. "Creativity and/or Alertness: A Reconsideration of the Schumpeterian Entrepreneur," The Review of Austrian Economics, Springer;Society for the Development of Austrian Economics, vol. 11(1-2), pages 5-17.
    12. Henry Manne, 2014. "Resurrecting the ghostly entrepreneur," The Review of Austrian Economics, Springer;Society for the Development of Austrian Economics, vol. 27(3), pages 249-258, September.
    13. Loasby, Brian J, 1982. "The Entrepreneur in Economic Theory," Scottish Journal of Political Economy, Scottish Economic Society, vol. 29(3), pages 0223-0223, November.
    14. Douglass C. North, 1968. "Sources of Productivity Change in Ocean Shipping, 1600-1850," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 76(5), pages 953-953.
    15. Rosolino A. Candela & Vincent J. Geloso, 2018. "The lightship in economics," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 176(3), pages 479-506, September.
    16. David Hummels, 2007. "Transportation Costs and International Trade in the Second Era of Globalization," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 21(3), pages 131-154, Summer.
    17. Ennio E. Piano & Louis Rouanet, 2020. "Economic calculation and the organization of markets," The Review of Austrian Economics, Springer;Society for the Development of Austrian Economics, vol. 33(3), pages 331-348, September.
    18. Peter Klein & Per Bylund, 2014. "The place of Austrian economics in contemporary entrepreneurship research," The Review of Austrian Economics, Springer;Society for the Development of Austrian Economics, vol. 27(3), pages 259-279, September.
    19. Coşar, A. Kerem & Demir, Banu, 2018. "Shipping inside the box: Containerization and trade," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 114(C), pages 331-345.
    20. Marc Levinson, 2016. "The Box: How the Shipping Container Made the World Smaller and the World Economy Bigger," Economics Books, Princeton University Press, edition 2, number 10724.
    21. Michel Fouquin & Jules Hugot, 2016. "Two Centuries of Bilateral Trade and Gravity data: 1827-2014," Vniversitas Económica, Universidad Javeriana - Bogotá, vol. 0(0), pages 1-39, August.
    22. Israel Kirzner, 2009. "The alert and creative entrepreneur: a clarification," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 32(2), pages 145-152, February.
    23. Arielle John & Virgil Henry Storr, 2018. "Kirznerian and Schumpeterian entrepreneurship in Trinidad and Tobago," Journal of Enterprising Communities: People and Places in the Global Economy, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 12(5), pages 582-610, October.
    24. Paul Krugman, 1995. "Growing World Trade: Causes and Consequences," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 26(1, 25th A), pages 327-377.
    25. Rosolino A. Candela & Vincent Geloso, 2019. "Coase and transaction costs reconsidered: the case of the English lighthouse system," European Journal of Law and Economics, Springer, vol. 48(3), pages 331-349, December.
    26. Baier, Scott L. & Bergstrand, Jeffrey H., 2001. "The growth of world trade: tariffs, transport costs, and income similarity," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 53(1), pages 1-27, February.
    27. Baird, Charles W, 2000. "Alchian and Menger on Money," The Review of Austrian Economics, Springer;Society for the Development of Austrian Economics, vol. 13(2), pages 115-120, September.
    28. Marc Levinson, 2016. "The World the Box Made," Introductory Chapters, in: The Box: How the Shipping Container Made the World Smaller and the World Economy Bigger, Princeton University Press.
    29. John J. Wallis & Douglass North, 1986. "Measuring the Transaction Sector in the American Economy, 1870-1970," NBER Chapters, in: Long-Term Factors in American Economic Growth, pages 95-162, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Peter J. Boettke & Rosolino A. Candela & Peter J. Jacobsen, 2023. "Economic calculation and transaction costs: The case of the airline oversales auction system," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 89(3), pages 708-731, January.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Virgil Henry Storr & Stefanie Haeffele-Balch & Laura E. Grube, 2015. "Community Revival in the Wake of Disaster," Perspectives from Social Economics, Palgrave Macmillan, number 978-1-137-31489-5, June.
    2. Ennio E. Piano & Rania Al-Bawwab, 2023. "The artist as entrepreneur," The Review of Austrian Economics, Springer;Society for the Development of Austrian Economics, vol. 36(1), pages 23-41, March.
    3. Darcy W E Allen, 2020. "When Entrepreneurs Meet:The Collective Governance of New Ideas," World Scientific Books, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., number q0269, September.
    4. Steffen Korsgaard & Henrik Berglund & Claus Thrane & Per Blenker, 2016. "A Tale of Two Kirzners: Time, Uncertainty, and the “Nature†of Opportunities," Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, , vol. 40(4), pages 867-889, July.
    5. Andreas Baur & Lisandra Flach & Jasmin Katrin Gröschl, 2021. "Containerschifffahrt in stürmischen Zeiten – Analyse und Ausblick," ifo Schnelldienst, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich, vol. 74(05), pages 59-65, May.
    6. Lanivich, Stephen E. & Smith, Adam & Levasseur, Ludvig & Pidduck, Robert J. & Busenitz, Lowell & Tang, Jintong, 2022. "Advancing entrepreneurial alertness: Review, synthesis, and future research directions," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 139(C), pages 1165-1176.
    7. Berg, Nathan, 2014. "Success from satisficing and imitation: Entrepreneurs' location choice and implications of heuristics for local economic development," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 67(8), pages 1700-1709.
    8. Ludvig Levasseur & Jintong Tang & Masoud Karami & Lowell Busenitz & K. Michele Kacmar, 2022. "Increasing alertness to new opportunities: the influence of positive affect and implications for innovation," Asia Pacific Journal of Management, Springer, vol. 39(1), pages 27-49, March.
    9. Jeroen de Jong & Orietta Marsili, 2015. "The distribution of Schumpeterian and Kirznerian opportunities," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 44(1), pages 19-35, January.
    10. Grafström, Jonas, 2020. "An Austrian economic perspective on failed Chinese wind power development," Ratio Working Papers 336, The Ratio Institute.
    11. James Lee Caton, 2019. "Creativity in a theory of entrepreneurship," Journal of Entrepreneurship and Public Policy, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 8(4), pages 442-469, September.
    12. Peter J. Boettke & Rosolino A. Candela & Peter J. Jacobsen, 2023. "Economic calculation and transaction costs: The case of the airline oversales auction system," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 89(3), pages 708-731, January.
    13. Srivastava, Smita & Sahaym, Arvin & Allison, Thomas H., 2021. "Alert and Awake: Role of alertness and attention on rate of new product introductions," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 36(4).
    14. Trofimov, Ivan, 2017. "Entrepreneurship and policy dynamics: a theoretical framework," MPRA Paper 79497, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    15. Olaf M. Merk, 2020. "Quantifying tax subsidies to shipping," Maritime Economics & Logistics, Palgrave Macmillan;International Association of Maritime Economists (IAME), vol. 22(4), pages 517-535, December.
    16. Loïc Sauce, 2017. "Market process(es) and (un)knowledge," The Review of Austrian Economics, Springer;Society for the Development of Austrian Economics, vol. 30(3), pages 305-321, September.
    17. Raymond J. March & Adam G. Martin & Audrey Redford, 2016. "The substance of entrepreneurship and the entrepreneurship of substances," Journal of Entrepreneurship and Public Policy, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 5(2), pages 201-220, August.
    18. Lutz Kilian & Nikos Nomikos & Xiaoqing Zhou, 2023. "Container Trade and the U.S. Recovery," International Journal of Central Banking, International Journal of Central Banking, vol. 19(1), pages 417-450, March.
    19. Theo Notteboom & Jean-Paul Rodrigue, 2023. "Maritime container terminal infrastructure, network corporatization, and global terminal operators: Implications for international business policy," Journal of International Business Policy, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 6(1), pages 67-83, March.
    20. Takuma Matsuda & Suguru Otani, 2022. "Unified Container Shipping Industry Data From 1966: Freight Rate, Shipping Quantity, Newbuilding, Secondhand, and Scrap Price," Papers 2211.16292, arXiv.org, revised Apr 2023.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Containerization; Entrepreneurship; Malcom McLean;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • B53 - Schools of Economic Thought and Methodology - - Current Heterodox Approaches - - - Austrian
    • N70 - Economic History - - Economic History: Transport, International and Domestic Trade, Energy, and Other Services - - - General, International, or Comparative
    • O31 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Innovation; Research and Development; Technological Change; Intellectual Property Rights - - - Innovation and Invention: Processes and Incentives
    • R40 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - Transportation 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:kap:revaec:v:35:y:2022:i:4:d:10.1007_s11138-020-00529-2. 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.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with 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: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    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.