Abstract
Foss (2002, p. 148) says ‘Penrose’s work is, in the crucial dimensions, at variance with economic orthodoxy … It should be thought of as a contribution to economic heterodoxy’ Penrose and Pitelis (2002, pp. 19 et seq.), in describing Fritz Machlup as ‘Edith’s supervisor’ at Johns Hopkins says ‘A fascinating paradox is how Machlup, a doyen of neo-classical economics, should have been partially responsible for a work so far removed from the mainstream’. Penrose has also been claimed as a feminist economist (Best and Humphries, 2003). Our argu- ment is that Penrose sought to create a theory of the growth of the firm which was logically consistent and empirically tractable. Her sub- sequent adoption as grandmother of the resource based view has only limited validity, based on a selective reading of her work and in defiance of its holistic qualities. See the debate between Rugman and Verbeke (2002, 2004) and Kor and Mahoney (2004) and Lockett and Thompson (2004), the latter based on Penrose’s (1960) analysis of the Hercules Powder Company.
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© 2010 Peter J. Buckley and Mark Casson
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Buckley, P.J., Casson, M. (2010). Edith Penrose’s Theory of the Growth of the Firm and the Strategic Management of Multinational Enterprises. In: Foreign Direct Investment, China and the World Economy. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230248328_5
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