Technology as Problem-Solving Procedures and Technology as Input-Output Relations: Some Perspectives on the Theory of Production

Giovanni Dosi and Marco Grazzi

LEM Papers Series from Laboratory of Economics and Management (LEM), Sant'Anna School of Advanced Studies, Pisa, Italy

Abstract: In this work, inspired by Winter [2006], in fact of vintage 1968, we discuss the relation between three di erent levels of analysis of technologies, namely as (i) bodies of problem-solving knowledge, (ii) organizational procedures, and (iii) input-output relations. We begin by arguing that the "primitive" levels of investigation, "where the action is", are those which concern knowledge and organizational procedures, while in most respects the I/O representation is just an ex post, derived, one. Next, we outline what we consider to be important advances in the understanding of productive knowledge and of the nature and behaviors of business organizations which to a good extent embody such a knowledge. Finally, we explore some implications of such "procedural" view of technologies in terms of input-output relations (of which standard production functions are a particular instantiation). We do that with the help of some pieces of evidence, drawing both upon incumbent literature and our own elaboration on micro longitudinal data on the Italian industry.

Keywords: Theory of Production; Organizational Routines; Problem-solving Knowledge; Production Function; Micro-heterogeneity (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2005-12-13
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-ino and nep-tid
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.lem.sssup.it/WPLem/files/2005-26.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ssa:lemwps:2005/26

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in LEM Papers Series from Laboratory of Economics and Management (LEM), Sant'Anna School of Advanced Studies, Pisa, Italy Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by ( this e-mail address is bad, please contact ).