Semantic Networks and the Market Interface: Lessons from Luxury Watchmaking

Abstract

The conception of markets as interfaces connecting semi-autonomous systems of producers and customers has led to an extensive use of social network analysis. So far, the network focus has been on connections among people, paying less attention to the crucial role played by connections between cultural elements (e.g., concepts, representations, ideas) in the way markets are formed and sustained. Such connections constitute “semantic networks” and are the focus of the present article. We attend to them by developing a network view of the cultural dimension of markets and apply it in an empirical setting where culture plays a crucial role – luxury watchmaking – to illustrate the impact of market semantic networks on a major outcome: price.

Citation

Godart, F.C. and Claes, K. (2017), "Semantic Networks and the Market Interface: Lessons from Luxury Watchmaking", Structure, Content and Meaning of Organizational Networks (Research in the Sociology of Organizations, Vol. 53), Emerald Publishing Limited, Bingley, pp. 113-141. https://doi.org/10.1108/S0733-558X20170000053006