IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/kap/revaec/v19y2006i2p189-201.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Does the invisible hand hold or lead? Market adjustment in an entrepreneurial economy

Author

Listed:
  • Randall Holcombe

Abstract

Adam Smith's “invisible hand” is one of the best-known phrases in economics, but its meaning is somewhat ambiguous. The invisible hand might be viewed as holding the economy close to equilibrium, yet Smith actually says that individuals are led by an invisible hand. Entrepreneurial forces lead an economy along a path that generates economic progress, and that path is determined by the disruptive forces of entrepreneurship. Rather than viewing an economy as tending toward an equilibrium, it is more accurate to view an economy as characterized by continuing progress, led by the invisible hand of entrepreneurial activity. Copyright Springer Science + Business Media, Inc. 2006

Suggested Citation

  • Randall Holcombe, 2006. "Does the invisible hand hold or lead? Market adjustment in an entrepreneurial economy," The Review of Austrian Economics, Springer;Society for the Development of Austrian Economics, vol. 19(2), pages 189-201, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:kap:revaec:v:19:y:2006:i:2:p:189-201
    DOI: 10.1007/s11138-006-7347-2
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1007/s11138-006-7347-2
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s11138-006-7347-2?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

    for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Arthur, W Brian, 1989. "Competing Technologies, Increasing Returns, and Lock-In by Historical Events," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 99(394), pages 116-131, March.
    2. Meir Kohn, 2004. "Value and Exchange," Cato Journal, Cato Journal, Cato Institute, vol. 24(3), pages 303-339, Fall.
    3. Holcombe, Randall G, 1999. "Equilibrium versus the Invisible Hand," The Review of Austrian Economics, Springer;Society for the Development of Austrian Economics, vol. 12(2), pages 227-243, November.
    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. Gabriel A. Giménez Roche & Didier Calcei, 2021. "The role of demand routines in entrepreneurial judgment," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 56(1), pages 209-235, January.
    2. Randall G. Holcombe, 2011. "Cultivating Creativity: Market Creation of Agglomeration Economies," Chapters, in: David Emanuel Andersson & Åke E. Andersson & Charlotta Mellander (ed.), Handbook of Creative Cities, chapter 19, Edward Elgar Publishing.

    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. Randall G. Holcombe, 2011. "Cultivating Creativity: Market Creation of Agglomeration Economies," Chapters, in: David Emanuel Andersson & Åke E. Andersson & Charlotta Mellander (ed.), Handbook of Creative Cities, chapter 19, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    2. Erik Reinert, 2007. "Towards an Austro–German theory of uneven economic development? A plea for theorising by inclusion," The Review of Austrian Economics, Springer;Society for the Development of Austrian Economics, vol. 20(2), pages 155-170, September.
    3. Randall Holcombe, 2008. "Advancing economic analysis beyond the equilibrium framework," The Review of Austrian Economics, Springer;Society for the Development of Austrian Economics, vol. 21(4), pages 225-249, December.
    4. Maria Minniti & William Bygrave, 2001. "A Dynamic Model of Entrepreneurial Learning," Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, , vol. 25(3), pages 5-16, April.
    5. Beomjin Choi & T. S. Raghu & Ajay Vinzé & Kevin J. Dooley, 2019. "Effectiveness of standards consortia: Social network perspectives," Information Systems Frontiers, Springer, vol. 21(2), pages 405-416, April.
    6. Zhang, Feng & Jiang, Guohua & Cantwell, John A., 2015. "Subsidiary exploration and the innovative performance of large multinational corporations," International Business Review, Elsevier, vol. 24(2), pages 224-234.
    7. Petersen, Alexander M. & Rotolo, Daniele & Leydesdorff, Loet, 2016. "A triple helix model of medical innovation: Supply, demand, and technological capabilities in terms of Medical Subject Headings," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 45(3), pages 666-681.
    8. Pascal Petit, 2010. "Innovation and Services: On Biases and Beyond," Chapters, in: Faïz Gallouj & Faridah Djellal (ed.), The Handbook of Innovation and Services, chapter 17, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    9. Yunyao Li & Yanji Ma, 2022. "Research on Industrial Innovation Efficiency and the Influencing Factors of the Old Industrial Base Based on the Lock-In Effect, a Case Study of Jilin Province, China," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(19), pages 1-23, October.
    10. Yunhui Wang & Yihua Chen & Zhiying Li, 2024. "Escaping poverty: changing characteristics of China’s rural poverty reduction policy and future trends," Palgrave Communications, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 11(1), pages 1-14, December.
    11. Wenjun Guo & Wei Zhao & Min Min, 2022. "Operation Scale, Transfer Experience, and Farmers’ Willingness toward Farmland Transfer-In: A Case Study of Rice–Crayfish Cultivating Regions in China," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(7), pages 1-16, March.
    12. McKelvey, Bill & Wycisk, Christine & Hülsmann, Michael, 2009. "Designing an electronic auction market for complex 'smart parts' logistics: Options based on LeBaron's computational stock market," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 120(2), pages 476-494, August.
    13. Steven N. Durlauf, 1996. "Statistical Mechanics Approaches to Socioeconomic Behavior," NBER Technical Working Papers 0203, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    14. Matteo Migheli & Giovanni B. Ramello, 2013. "Open Access, Social Norms & Publication Choice," ICER Working Papers 03-2013, ICER - International Centre for Economic Research.
    15. Elert, Niklas & Henrekson, Magnus, 2017. "Entrepreneurship and Institutions: A Bidirectional Relationship," Working Paper Series 1153, Research Institute of Industrial Economics, revised 05 May 2017.
    16. Kevin Lansing, 2009. "Time Varying U.S. Inflation Dynamics and the New Keynesian Phillips Curve," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 12(2), pages 304-326, April.
    17. Dietrich, Antje-Mareike, 2016. "Governmental platform intermediation to promote alternative fuel vehicles," Economics Department Working Paper Series 16, Technische Universität Braunschweig, Economics Department.
    18. Battke, Benedikt & Schmidt, Tobias S. & Stollenwerk, Stephan & Hoffmann, Volker H., 2016. "Internal or external spillovers—Which kind of knowledge is more likely to flow within or across technologies," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 45(1), pages 27-41.
    19. Andre Nassif & Carmem Aparecida Feijo & Eliane Araújo, 2016. "Structural change, catching up and falling behind in the BRICS: A comparative analysis based on trade pattern and Thirlwall’s Law," PSL Quarterly Review, Economia civile, vol. 69(279), pages 373-421.
    20. Giovanna Devetag, 2000. "Transfer, Focality and Coordination: Some Experimental Results," LEM Papers Series 2000/02, Laboratory of Economics and Management (LEM), Sant'Anna School of Advanced Studies, Pisa, Italy.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    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:19:y:2006:i:2:p:189-201. 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.