Rethinking the paradigm of enterprise: A global and evolutionary perspective

The most elementary law of nature, the principle that best explains how the world works, is that actions have consequences. The consequences of enterprise (or business) will be as profitable or detrimental as the actions behind them. The rapidly approaching new millennium forces society to assess where we are (the consequences) and how we got here (the actions). The standard of living in the western world is a direct consequence of past and present enterprise, but the actions taken to get to this plateau and their associated costs may far over‐shadow the gains. A major issue facing those who study the development and evolution of enterprise is whether past merits and mistakes can be used to develop a new paradigm that is more reflective of what is currently experienced and most likely to occur in the future.

This paper discusses some of the shortcomings in current economic thinking, how current developments in economic thinking need to become the norm and the future of socio‐ecologically behavior and patterns of growth for enterprise.