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Scholars have primarily focused on how language represents categories. We move beyond this conception to develop a discursive perspective of market categorization focused on how categories are constructed through communicative exchanges. The discursive perspective points to three under-researched mechanisms of category evolution: (1) the interaction between market participants, (2) the power dynamics among market participants and within the discourse, and (3) the cultural and material context in which categories are constructed. In this theoretical paper, we discuss how each of these mechanisms shed light on different phases of category evolution and the methods that could be used to study them.

Entrepreneurship, Money, and Coordination begins with a single page introduction by the editor, Jurgen Backhaus, a well known economist now at the University of Erfurt, in which we learn that the contribution by Horst Feldmann (Hayek's theory of cultural evolution: A critique of the critiques) provided the impetus for the book's remaining six chapters, a mélange of papers by Brian J. Loasby,¹ Jurgen G. Backhaus, Christian Schubert, Alexander Ebner, Martin T. Bohl and Jens Holscher, and Walter W. Heering. Unfortunately, the papers assembled here do not cohere well and in some instances are not altogether “reader-friendly.” The papers by Bohl and Holscher (a six-page overview and econometric analysis of Hayek's theory of competing currencies) and Heering (on monetary theory) seem rather disconnected from the main theme of the book. Surprisingly, Backhaus’ “Introduction” does not provide a useful integrating overview of the book's subject matter and papers, something readers surely would have appreciated from so eminent a scholar.

Culture shapes economic action and, as such, impacts economic life. Although there is a growing recognition amongst economists that culture matters, there is nothing approaching a universal agreement on how to incorporate culture into economic analysis. We provide a brief summary of how economists have discussed culture and then argue that Austrian School Economics is particularly well suited to contribute to our understanding of the relationship between culture and economic action. Indeed, Austrian economics has an advantage (1) because of its links to Max Weber’s approach to social science and (2) because of its emphasis on economics as a science of meaning. A Weber-inspired Austrian economics that stresses meaning, we argue, brings a focus on culture to the fore of economic analysis and opens the door for a progressive research program within cultural economics. Austrian economists can and have made significant contributions to our understanding of the relationship between culture and economic action. Moreover, we argue, explorations of the connection between culture and economic action can be a fruitful field of study within Austrian economics.

Culture is important to many aspects of business life, especially when a business must interface with people, either as customers, employees, suppliers, or stakeholders.– M. L. Jones (2007, p. 2)

Neo-institutional theory has been criticized for equating the macrolevel with the realm of unconsciously constraining institutions and the microlevel with the realm of actors’ reflexive agency and the origin of change. Considering the co-constitution of the macro and micro, the authors propose that change can be explained through reflexivity at the microlevel and through unconscious processes that affect the macrolevel. This chapter contributes to neo-institutional theory’s microfoundation by distinguishing four types of institutional changes. It will help institutionalists to become more explicit about what cognitive processes and what field conditions are related to what kinds of agency and change.

In much of philosophy and social theory since classical antiquity, human belief and reason have been placed in the driving seat of individual action. In particular, social theory has often taken it for granted, or even by definition, that action is motivated by reasons based on beliefs. In contrast, a minority has criticized the adoption of this ‘folk psychology’ that explains human action wholly in such ‘mind first’ terms. Critics point out that such explanations are a mere gloss on a much more complex neurophysiological reality. These dualistic and ‘mind-first’ explanations of human behavior are unable to explain adequately such phenomena as sleep, memory, learning, mental illness, or the effects of chemicals or drugs on our perceptions or actions (Bunge, 1980; Churchland, 1984, 1989; Churchland, 1986; Rosenberg, 1995, 1998; Kilpinen, 2000).

Purpose – How did cooperation emerge in large-scale, fluid societies? Standard theories based on direct and indirect reciprocity among self-regarding agents cannot explain the high level of impersonal exchange observed in developed market economies.

Approach and findings – Drawing upon recent research from across the behavioral sciences, we attribute the emergence of cooperation in early trade to an evolved characteristic of human psychology that makes revenge sweet: people are willing to pay a price to punish those who betray their trust. Once cooperative expectations became fixed, institutions such as the law merchant and ethnic trading networks, as well as certain “bourgeois virtues,” helped sustain and extend trade during the medieval period.

Contribution of the paper – Our argument continues the tradition begun by F.A. Hayek in The Sensory Order (1952), by providing an integrated explanation for the rise of the market based upon the coevolution of human psychology, culture, and institutions. In our conclusion, we revisit Hayek's (Hayek, 1976, 1978, 1988) analysis of the conflict between our instincts and the institutions that have created the market order.