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Entrepreneurship & Regional Development
  Publisher:  Routledge, part of the Taylor & Francis Group
  Issue:  Volume 13, Number 1 / January 1, 2001
  Pages:  47 - 63
  URL:  Linking Options
  DOI:  10.1080/089856201750046801

Small enterprises as complex adaptive systems: a methodological question?

Ted Fuller, Paul Moran

Abstract:

Complexity science constitutes an emerging post-positivist interdisciplinary field of investigation of dynamical systems in the natural and physical worlds. The central concept of complexity is that interactions between parts of open systems create novel, unpredictable patterns, and that while the history of the system is relevant in understanding its dynamic, the isolation of individual parts of the system (analysis) does not reveal the casual mechanisms in the system. It is suggested that complexity science can inform our methodologies for investigating the social sciences. The paper explores whether complexity science offers ways of theory building that can take account of pluralistic or interdisciplinary research in enterprise dynamics. The authors offer a model of six theorized ontological layers, derived from the canon of research literature within a small enterprise domain, with boundaries at each end. It is suggested that dynamical concepts of agency (adaption, evolution, fitness, interdependence) coupled with the theory of evolutionary autopoietic structures generate a plausible field for the study of enterprise dynamics. A focus on ontological and experimental adequacy is necessary to develop theory within this framework. An appropriate methodology involves iterations between experimental forms of scientific analysis and the grounding of emergent or evolving theories.


Keywords:

Complexity Complex Adaptive Systems Methodology Enterprise Dynamics Small Business Entrepreneurship Smes


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