ABSTRACT
The aim of this chapter is to revisit Lionel Robbins’s famous definition of economics from a business school perspective and in the light of postRobbins developments in neoclassical economic theory, evolutionary economics and management scholarship. The thrust of our argument is that while economics in its Robbinsian “economizing” guise contains important lessons for business school audiences, his insistence on economic analysis proceeding by taking means-resources—what he calls the “ultimate data” of “technique” and institutions (such as property rights)—as givens, may actually divert attention from or even obscure various other issues of central importance from a business school perspective. The reason for this is that while business leaders and managers are certainly interested in questions of economizing, they are also interested in questions of innovation and strategy. Many of the issues involved here are ones that have less to do with the efficient allocation of given resources than with addressing questions of how resource constraints might be reduced (i.e., with technological change, increasing returns, intertemporal efficiencies and the productivityenhancing effects of the co-evolutionary character of market structures, organizations and technological change. These factors are vital determinants of intertemporal efficiency and sustainable economic performance, and therefore cannot be treated simply as parameters that are only interesting insofar as they affect relative scarcities.
