Institutional Economics and Business History: A Way Forward?

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Abstract
Analytical business history requires a synthesis of theories of transaction cost, entrepreneurship and firm-specific competence. These theories can be integrated using the concept of information cost. Economies of information cost explain the emergence of market-making intermediation in capitalist economies. Economists have been so preoccupied with production that they have ignored the role of market-making intermediation, despite the fact that market-making intermediation has a crucial impact on the strategy and organisation of the firm. This essay charts the historical emergence of market-making intermediation, and analyses its effects using a diagrammatic technique specially developed for this purpose. It is suggested that the concept of information cost, and the techniques of analysis allied with it, offer a useful way forward for business historians.

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