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This paper aims to develop a conceptual framework based on the identification and examination of the mechanisms (termed “viability mechanisms”) under which market-shaping activities yield the emergence of a viable market: one able to adapt to the changing environment over time while remaining stable enough for actors to benefit from it.

This paper uses extant literature to build a conceptual framework identifying viability mechanisms for market shaping and a case illustration examining how a viable market for Finnish timber high-rise buildings was created. The case exemplifies how the identified viability mechanisms are practically manifested through proactive market shaping.

The proposed conceptual framework incorporates four viability mechanisms identified in the extant literature: presence of dissipative structures, consonance among system elements, resonance among system elements and reinforcing and balancing feedback loops. It illustrates how these mechanisms are manifested in a contemporary case setting resulting in a viable market.

First, firms and other market-shaping organizations should look for, or themselves foster, viability mechanisms within their market-shaping strategies. Second, as failure rates in innovation are extremely high, managers should seek to identify or influence viability mechanisms to avoid premature commercialization of innovations.

This study identifies how these viability mechanisms permit markets to emerge and survive over time. Further, it illuminates the workings of the non-linear relationship between actor-level market-shaping actions and system-level market changes. As such, it provides a “missing link” to the scholarly and managerial discourse on market-shaping strategies. Unlike much extant market-shaping literature, this study draws substantively on the systems literature.

This paper aims to investigate two seminal market-scanning frameworks – the five-forces analysis and PESTEL environmental scanning tool – to assess their readiness for anticipating market-shaping acts.

Drawing on the market-shaping literature that conceptualizes markets as complex adaptive systems, this conceptual paper interrogates the underlying assumptions and “blind spots” in two seminal market-scanning frameworks. The paper showcases three illustrative vignettes in which non-industry actors catalyzed market change in ways that these market-scanning frameworks would not be able to anticipate.

Marketing strategists can be “blindsided” as seminal market-scanning frameworks have either too narrow an interpretation of market change or are too broad to anticipate specific types of market-shaping acts. The assumptions about markets that underpin these market-scanning frameworks contribute to incumbents being slow to realize market-shaping acts are taking place.

The authors extend market-scanning to include a type of managerial myopia that fails to register the socially embedded, systemic nature of complex contemporary markets. Furthermore, the paper provides an “actors-agendas-outcomes” scanning framework that offers awareness of market-shaping acts.

This paper is the first to consider market-scanning frameworks from a market-shaping perspective.

This study aims to identify institutional work mechanisms that public actors employ in market shaping.

The paper uses an abductive theorizing process, combining a literature review with an empirical exploration of three different market-shaping contexts.

The study identifies 20 granular mechanisms of institutional work that market-shaping public actors employ. These mechanisms are all potentially employable in creating, maintaining or disrupting markets. Institutional work vis-à-vis individual institutions may differ in direction from the institutional work vis-à-vis the market system. Public actors are not a homogeneous group but may have different values and support competing institutional logics even when operating in the same market.

The empirical data were limited to three cases in three small open economies. Data collected from other markets and with other methods would provide more rigorous insight into market-shaping public actors.

The findings revealed institutional work mechanisms that public actors can use to shape markets. Companies wanting to engage public actors in market shaping should be aware of the values and institutional logics that influence market-shaping public actors.

The paper unites and expands on the scattered knowledge regarding institutional work in market shaping. It illuminates and dissects the role of public actors in market shaping, challenging the reactive stance that is often assigned to them. The study provides a better understanding of how conflicting market views affect markets. It also brings insights into the interplay between market-shaping actions and the multiple levels of market systems.

The purpose of this paper is to extend the knowledge on business model transformation (BMT) by developing an integrative framework for BMT dilemmas, including strategies for shaping and stabilizing market structures.

The study uses a case-based approach, with data from the Swedish electric utility industry.

The findings uncover practices related to both shaping and stabilizing market structure. The study contributes with insights for firms to overcome the BMT dilemma. Shaping strategies involve disruptive innovations while stabilizing strategies concerns incremental improvements in existing structures; by balancing these efforts, firms can find ways toward successful BMT.

With a focus on incumbent firms and the balancing act of BMT in a network, the study covers areas that have scarcely been addressed in the existing literature. Even though most business model literature has focused on shaping consumer markets, the need to consider BMT as a dual-directional process in an industrial context is emphasized in this study.

Prior research acknowledges the lack of theorizing of markets within marketing. This paper aims to capture the emerging themes linked to different conceptualizations of the market and provide a language system for theorizing the market.

The paper conducts a bibliometric analysis of 177 articles and 22 keywords and adopts Mele et al.’s (2015) market conceptualization to interpret the results.

The bibliometric analysis detects five thematic clusters: market driving, market exchange, market shaping, market practices and macro-marketing. Based on their degrees of relevance and development, these are arranged into two groups. The analysis of these two language systems shows a shift toward a more comprehensive conversation on how the market is conceptualized. The authors synthesize this shift under the expression “from market driving to market shaping.”

The comparison of the two language systems allows the argument that market is a complex concept and that to understand it necessitates a rich set of terms.

The different ways of conceptualizing the market mean that managers face a choice when analyzing their market situations (what language system to use). This choice will be consequential for their subsequent actions.

This paper contributes to the identification of two rival language systems and narratives: market driving and market shaping.