Competition as a Discovery Procedure: A Rejoinder to Professor Kirzner and Others on Coordination and Discovery

42 Pages Posted: 30 Jun 2011

See all articles by Daniel B. Klein

Daniel B. Klein

George Mason University - Department of Economics; George Mason University - Mercatus Center

Date Written: June 30, 2011

Abstract

The Fall 2010 issue of the Journal of Private Enterprise featured a complicated set of papers (link to the issue). The lead article was a long paper by Jason Briggeman and me, on Israel Kirzner’s work on coordination and discovery. The thrust of our paper was an affirmation of Kirzner’s central claims, but with two alterations. First, we propose that the coordination that figures into the central issues ought to be understood as what we call concatenate coordination. Second, the central statements at issue ought not be asserted as holding 100 percent of the time, but rather should be by-and-large statements, making for a strong presumption, not a categorical result. Israel Kirzner then replied to our paper. The pair of papers was then the object of commentary by Peter Boettke and Daniel D’Amico, Steven Horwitz, Gene Callahan, and Martin Ricketts. Here, I respond to Kirzner, and, in an appendix, more briefly to the others.

Keywords: coordination, concatenation, discovery, entrepreneurship

JEL Classification: A10, B00, C7, D2

Suggested Citation

Klein, Daniel B., Competition as a Discovery Procedure: A Rejoinder to Professor Kirzner and Others on Coordination and Discovery (June 30, 2011). GMU Working Paper in Economics No. 11-30, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=1875243 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.1875243

Daniel B. Klein (Contact Author)

George Mason University - Department of Economics ( email )

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United States

HOME PAGE: http://economics.gmu.edu/people/dklein

George Mason University - Mercatus Center ( email )

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Arlington, VA 22201
United States

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