Adriano Proenca (Engenharia de Produção - UFRJ)
The Creative Destruction Paradigm: Dynamic Capabilities and the Schumpeterian Corporation
Abstract
The seminar presents a first attempt by A. Proença and L. Burlamaqui for using
a “reconstructed Schumpeter” for the purposes of both analyzing capitalism as
an evolving dynamic, and out of equilibrium, system, and as a framework that
links neatly with the dynamic capabilities approach in management, e.g.: the
innovation-based corporations and their related capabilities and strategies.
Burlamaqui's recent work attempts to show that Schumpeter´s 1942 book,
“Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy” (CSD), provides us with a major rupture
within Schumpeter’s previous theoretical work and offers the seeds for a new
framework for economic analysis. The key proposition is that until CSD, where
the “creative destruction paradigm” is born, Schumpeter’s theory was an
incoherent attempt to merge equilibrium and evolution, Walras and Marx.
Burlamaqui offers a reinterpretation of Schumpeter’s development theory
through the “creative destruction paradigm” provided in CSD. By linking the core
propositions of the latter with the brilliant, but underdeveloped, innovations from
“Theory of Economic Development” and some largely ignored historical and
institutional insights provided in “Business Cycles”, both classic books by
Schumpeter, the seeds of a new analytical framework emerge. One which is
completely out of equilibrium, centered on finance, entrepreneurial action,
uncertainty, institutions, and competition by means of innovations.
Proença proposes that one of the ways to deepen such paradigm is by
exploring the perspective provided by Schumpeter in CSD on competition and
innovation, which is more complex than the usual simplification that is
widespread referred to in the literature; and by appropriating recent
contributions coming from the Dynamic Capabilities approach in strategic
management, with its emphasis in the necessary entrepreneurial character of
the firm management as a necessary theoretical component of any realistic
theory of the firm, as a way to establish a theoretical perspective on what would
be the “Schumpeterian Corporation”. A brief illustration of how a revised DC
framework relates to the Strategic Innovation Management playbook is offered,
and future research developments are pointed out.
