Repugnant Innovation
Allen, D. W. E., Berg, C., and Davidson, S. (forthcoming), Repugnant Innovation, Journal of Institutional Economics.
18 Pages Posted: 22 Nov 2021 Last revised: 21 Sep 2022
Date Written: September 29, 2021
Abstract
Repugnant innovation is a form of evasive entrepreneurship that occurs in repugnant markets. Repugnance is an informal institution – controlled by long-lived norms, attitudes, customs and traditions – and repugnant innovation acts to shift institutions at the lowest level of the institutional stack. The paper considers three examples of repugnant innovation: e-cigarettes, online gambling, and webcam modelling. Each repugnant innovation challenges the complex mixture of material and moral concerns that contributes to repugnance in their respective markets. The paper adds to and expands on a body of evidence about innovation in apparently unsupportive institutional environments.
Keywords: Innovation Economics, Repugnant Markets, Repugnant Innovation, Institutional Entrepreneurship, Evasive Entrepreneurship
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