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This double volume presents a collection of 23 papers on how institutions matter to socio-economic life. The papers delve deeply into the practical impact an institutional approach enables, as well as how such research has the potential to influence policies relevant to critical institutional changes unfolding in the world today. In Volume 48A, the focus is on the micro foundations of institutional impacts. In Volume 48B, the focus is on the macro consequences of institutional arrangements. Our introduction provides an overview to the two volumes, identifies points of contact between the papers, and briefly summarizes each contribution. We close by noting avenues for future research on how institutions matter. Overall, the volumes provide a cross-section of cutting edge institutional thought and empirical research, highlighting a variety of fruitful directions for knowledge accumulation and development.

The purpose of the paper is to introduce the themed issue about qualitative research in the business and management field

The paper considers some issues about how to define the term “qualitative research”, and then introduces each of the papers in the themed issue.

The contents of this themed issue demonstrate the insights that qualitative research can make into the management field.

A large amount of interest was generated in the themed issue. As a consequence, Emerald Publishing Group are launching a new journal which specifically focuses on qualitative research in this field.

This chapter assesses the doctrine of reasonable interchangeability through the lens of the US Department of Justice’s (DOJ’s) successful effort to enjoin the megamerger of two of the largest national insurance companies, Aetna and Humana. The DOJ focused its challenge on the companies’ Medicare Advantage business, arguing that it is a separate product market from original Medicare and the merger would substantially reduce competition in the market for Medicare Advantage in many geographic markets across the country. The case turned on whether there was reasonable interchangeability between original Medicare and Medicare Advantage in the eyes of consumers. The judge relied on both practical indicia of interchangeability, including evidence of how likely Medicare beneficiaries were to switch between Medicare Advantage and Original Medicare, along with econometric evidence. The decision provides a useful roadmap of how a knowledgeable judge reviewing a merger will consider both Brown Shoe factors and econometric evidence in assessing reasonable interchangeability.

WHEN David Laing, sometime the learned librarian of the Library of the W.S., wrote that a very good social record of most countries possessing a romance literature of any fair extent could be written from their popular songs and ballads and historical tales, he made no very debatable postulate. He merely showed a greater appreciation of the value of romance literature than most people—even librarians—would on first thought consider it deserving of. But his opinion of its value as historical material was shared by no less eminent a literary scholar than Sir Walter Scott, who drew from the springs of romance when compiling his Tales of a Grandfather, and that this work did not suffer through Scott's utilization of romance literature in its compilation is proved by the fact that it is, despite its eighty years of existence, the most popular, as well as “the soundest thing” (to quote Saintsbury) that exists on the matter of Scottish history.

“What was it like over there?” we were asked from the instant we got off the Freedom Bird. And then:

THE Scot, I have noticed in international gatherings, is peculiarly liable to be chaffed about his country. One reason is the association of Scotland with whisky and the kilt. Another reason is the Scot's self‐consciousness about Scotland. When he hears it derided, he gives a wry smile, or enters on a flustered defence. Praise of Scotland specially annoys him, because it is generally praise of the wrong things,—and he is not quite sure what are the right things.

The purpose of this research paper is to explore the decline of subsistence entrepreneurship in a “Scottish Fishing Community”, namely the village of Gourdon in Kincardineshire, Scotland over a 60‐year period.

Presents the material in a historical perspective, as remembered by two persons who lived through the experience. Using two ethnographic accounts the paper reconstructs a vivid picture of a thriving form of subsistence type entrepreneurship, in a bygone era, when enterprise was more closely bonded to community activities, the work ethic and pride.

This paper narrates a dramatic story relating to the economic decline visited upon a living community by the forces of market change affecting multiple income streams. In this tale, there are no heroes or villains, as is normal in narrative accounts, merely victims of changing circumstances and changing patterns of social action.

The results of this research paper have obvious limitations, because of the methodology employed, and because of the limited number of respondents interviewed. However, socio‐historical studies such as this have their place in developing an understanding of entrepreneurship as enacted in individual communities.

This paper tackles an under‐researched area of rural entrepreneurship using narrative methods which bring the subject to life.

The ideology of the New Right draws many of its foundational concepts from the work of Adam Smith. This appropriation and vulgarization of Smith′s work constitutes a major injustice to this seminally important theorist. In particular, the moral underpinnings of Smith′s project are often ignored, as are his insights on the potential dysfunctions and pathologies a capitalist society might foster. Most critiques of capitalism are launched from a Marxian‐based perspective. Finds, however, that by examining post‐Rogernomics New Zealand in light of the potential dysfunctions identified by Smith, the father of capitalism himself proves to be the most trenchant critic of the current order.