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Entrepreneurship and institutional change

Author

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  • Pavel Kuchař

    (Universidad de Guanajuato)

Abstract

Entrepreneurs do more than just buy low and sell high; they sometimes also change our institutions, including our categories of thought. New institutional economics has been examining incentives that drive individuals to bring about market-supporting institutional arrangements. There is, however, an aspect of entrepreneurship conducive to institutional changes that has been neglected by contemporary institutionalist theories and that remains underdeveloped in entrepreneurship research. When and how does entrepreneurship bring about institutional change? I suggest that entrepreneurs are agents of institutional change when cultural categorization is ambiguous with regard to the proper and permissible applications of novel artifacts. Motherhood, for example, used to be a simple category, but surrogacy changed that radically. Examining newspaper evidence, social surveys, statutory law, and judicial cases, I show how entrepreneurs, by provoking a change in interpretation and judgment, challenged the existing institutional legal ordering of procreation turning a technically feasible method of surrogacy into current practice.

Suggested Citation

  • Pavel Kuchař, 2016. "Entrepreneurship and institutional change," Journal of Evolutionary Economics, Springer, vol. 26(2), pages 349-379, May.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:joevec:v:26:y:2016:i:2:d:10.1007_s00191-015-0433-5
    DOI: 10.1007/s00191-015-0433-5
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    Cited by:

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    2. Darcy W.E. Allen, 2019. "Entrepreneurial Exit: Developing the Cryptoeconomy," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Melanie Swan & Jason Potts & Soichiro Takagi & Frank Witte & Paolo Tasca (ed.), Blockchain Economics: Implications of Distributed Ledgers Markets, Communications Networks, and Algorithmic Reality, chapter 10, pages 197-214, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
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    4. Magnus Henrekson & Anders Kärnä & Tino Sanandaji, 2022. "Schumpeterian entrepreneurship: coveted by policymakers but impervious to top-down policymaking," Journal of Evolutionary Economics, Springer, vol. 32(3), pages 867-890, July.
    5. Yugank Goyal & Klaus Heine, 2021. "Why do informal markets remain informal: the role of tacit knowledge in an Indian footwear cluster," Journal of Evolutionary Economics, Springer, vol. 31(2), pages 639-659, April.
    6. Anthony J. Evans, 2024. "Information, classification and contestability: a cultural economics approach to Uber’s entry into the taxi industry," The Review of Austrian Economics, Springer;Society for the Development of Austrian Economics, vol. 37(4), pages 421-442, December.
    7. Marta Podemska-Mikluch, 2021. "Taxonomy of Entrepreneurship – A Means-Oriented Approach," Studies in Public Choice, in: David J. Hebert & Diana W. Thomas (ed.), Emergence, Entanglement, and Political Economy, pages 63-72, Springer.
    8. Bylund, Per L. & McCaffrey, Matthew, 2017. "A theory of entrepreneurship and institutional uncertainty," Journal of Business Venturing, Elsevier, vol. 32(5), pages 461-475.
    9. Giraudo, Marco, 2020. "Legal Bubbles: A Primer in the Economics of 'Legal Creative Destruction," Department of Economics and Statistics Cognetti de Martiis. Working Papers 202028, University of Turin.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Institutional change; Entrepreneurship; Surrogate motherhood; Persuasion; Political processes;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • B52 - Schools of Economic Thought and Methodology - - Current Heterodox Approaches - - - Historical; Institutional; Evolutionary; Modern Monetary Theory;
    • D02 - Microeconomics - - General - - - Institutions: Design, Formation, Operations, and Impact
    • D72 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - Political Processes: Rent-seeking, Lobbying, Elections, Legislatures, and Voting Behavior
    • F16 - International Economics - - Trade - - - Trade and Labor Market Interactions
    • K40 - Law and Economics - - Legal Procedure, the Legal System, and Illegal Behavior - - - General
    • L26 - Industrial Organization - - Firm Objectives, Organization, and Behavior - - - Entrepreneurship

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