IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/taf/revpoe/v29y2017i2p190-208.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

P.W.S. Andrews' Revisited

Author

Listed:
  • Lowell Jacobsen

Abstract

P.W.S. Andrews (1914–1971) was a remarkable industrial economist at Oxford University, prominently as a member of the Oxford Economists’ Research Group (OERG) and Nuffield College. In the final few years of his life, he held a professorship at Lancaster University. As a self-described ‘practical theorist’, Andrews thought economists, particularly in the 1930s, inappropriately extended Marshall in a more formal, technical manner whereby the detailed reality of industrial economics was overshadowed. Such a ‘methodological mistake’ of a priori reasoning trumping the inductive method was countered by the OERG’s emphasis on grounded empiricism featuring extensive primary research on real businesses. A product of this research was Andrews’ Manufacturing Business that proffers a novel theory of the business firm. This article revisits Andrews’ signature book, paying particular attention to its apparent curiously harsh reviews by Austin Robinson and Arnold Plant, two distinguished Marshallian industrial economists. Moreover, Manufacturing Business is considered as a possible precursor of business strategy, a nascent discipline in the 1960s.

Suggested Citation

  • Lowell Jacobsen, 2017. "P.W.S. Andrews' Revisited," Review of Political Economy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 29(2), pages 190-208, April.
    • Handle: RePEc:taf:revpoe:v:29:y:2017:i:2:p:190-208
    DOI: 10.1080/09538259.2017.1311095
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/09538259.2017.1311095
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1080/09538259.2017.1311095?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. Frederic S. Lee & Peter E. Earl (ed.), 1993. "The Economics of Competitive Enterprise," Books, Edward Elgar Publishing, number 279.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. John Finch, 2000. "Is post-Marshallian economics an evolutionary research tradition?," The European Journal of the History of Economic Thought, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 7(3), pages 377-406.
    2. John Finch, 2001. "The role of grounded theory in developing economic theory," Journal of Economic Methodology, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 9(2), pages 213-234.
    3. Chakravarty, Sugato & Feinberg, Richard & Rhee, Eun-Young, 2004. "Relationships and individuals' bank switching behavior," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 25(4), pages 507-527, August.
    4. Tiziano Raffaelli, 2004. "Whatever happened to Marshall's industrial economics?," The European Journal of the History of Economic Thought, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 11(2), pages 209-229.
    5. Russell Smyth & Dic Lo, 2000. "Theories of the Firm and the Relationship between Different Perspectives on the Division of Labour," Review of Political Economy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 12(3), pages 333-349.
    6. Jamee K. Moudud, 2010. "Strategic Competition, Dynamics, and the Role of the State," Books, Edward Elgar Publishing, number 4241.
    7. Downward, Paul, 2004. "Post Keynesian pricing theory: Alternative foundations and prospects for future research," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 25(5), pages 661-670, October.
    8. Brian Loasby, 2002. "Content and method: an epistemic perspective on some historical episodes," The European Journal of the History of Economic Thought, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 9(1), pages 72-95.
    9. Stephanie Blankenburg, 2011. "On Sraffa, post-Keynesian theories of pricing and capitalist competition: Some observations," European Journal of Economics and Economic Policies: Intervention, Edward Elgar Publishing, vol. 8(1), pages 183-200.
    10. Peter Earl & Tim Wakeley, 2010. "Alternative perspectives on connections in economic systems," Journal of Evolutionary Economics, Springer, vol. 20(2), pages 163-183, April.

    More about this item

    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:taf:revpoe:v:29:y:2017:i:2:p:190-208. 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: Chris Longhurst (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.tandfonline.com/CRPE20 .

    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.