ENTREPRENEURIAL CULTURE: TO THE PROBLEM OF DEFINITION OF THE CONCEPT IN THE CONTEXT OF URBANIZATION PROCESSES OF THE SECOND HALF OF THE XIX – EARLY XX CENTURY

The author reveals the essence of the concept of "entrepreneurship" and "culture of entrepreneurship" – in general, and in the context of modernization transformations of the second half of the XIX – early XX century. The article emphasizes that the concepts of "entrepreneurship" and "entrepreneurship culture" are contextual while retaining standard features. Views on the essence of entrepreneurship by Josef Schumpeter, Alfred Chandler (founder of business history), Franco Amateur, etc., are analyzed. The author refers to the works of Max Weber, Werner Sombart, Rolf Ruttinger in the analysis of the concept of "entrepreneurial culture". In the context of the study, the author defines the culture of entrepreneurship as synonymous with a new system of norms and symbols, forms, methods of entrepreneurial activity, even a new goal (the new author understands as modern, industrial, as opposed to traditional). Entrepreneurship culture is object-subjective and cannot be reduced to socio-psychological, value or motivational components. It includes a set of rules and tools for solving external adaptation and internal integration of resources. The conclusions noted the key features of entrepreneurial culture – eclecticism, instability, low level of innovation, confrontational style of relations with workers, short-sightedness and prevalence of motives for self-affirmation, in relations with the authorities – dependence. Even though the culture of entrepreneurship depends on specific historical factors, it is still an umbrella term.Key words: business history, history of entrepreneurship, the culture of entrepreneurship, modernization. Авторка розкриває сутність поняття «підприємництво» та «культура підприємництва» – загалом та в контексті модернізаційних перетворень другої половини ХІХ – початку ХХ століття. Акцент у статті зроблений на тому, що поняття «підприємництво» та «культура підприємництва» є контекстуальними, втім, зберігаючи загальні спільні риси. Аналізуються погляди на сутність підприємництва Йозефа Шумпетера, Альфреда Чандлера (засновника напряму бізнес-історії), Франко Аматорі тощо. Авторка звертається до доробку Макса Вебера, Вернера Зомбарта, Рольфа Рюттінгера при аналізі поняття «культура підприємництва». В контексті дослідження культуру підприємництва авторка визначає як синонім нової системи норм і символів, форм, методів підприємницької діяльності, навіть нового цілепокладання (нове розуміється в якості модерне, індустріальне, на противагу традиційному). Культура підприємництва носить об’єктно-суб’єктний характер і не може бути зведена лише до соціально-психологічних, ціннісних чи мотиваційних компонентів. Вона включає набір правил та засобів вирішення про-блем зовнішньої адаптації й внутрішньої інтеграції ресурсів. У висновках відмічені ключові риси культури підприємництва – еклектичність, нестабільність, низький рівень інноваційності, конфронтаційний стиль взаємин із робітниками, недалекоглядність та поширеність мотивів самоствердження, у відносинах із владою – залежність. Попри те, що культура підприємництва залежить від конкретно-історичних факторів, це все ж парасольковий термін. Ключові слова: бізнес-історія, історія підприємництва, культура підприємництва, модернізація.

Leontief and his German period

Wassily Leontief jun. (1905–1999) moved to Berlin in April 1925 after getting his first academic degree from the University of Leningrad. In Berlin he mainly studied with Werner Sombart and Ladislaus von Bortkiewicz who were the referees of his Ph.D. thesis “The economy as a circular flow” (1928). From spring 1927 until April 1931 Leontief was a member of the research staff at the Kiel Institute of World Economics, interrupted by the period from April 1929 to March 1930 when he was an advisor to the Chinese Ministry of Railroads. In the journal of the Kiel Institute, Weltwirtschaftliches Archiv, Leontief had already published his first article “Die Bilanz der russischen Volkswirtschaft. Eine methodologische Untersuchung” [The balance of the Russian economy. A methodological investigation] in 1925. In Kiel Leontief primarily worked on the statistical analysis of supply and demand curves. Leontief’s method triggered a fierce critique by Ragnar Frisch, which launched a heavy debate on “pitfalls” in the construction of supply and demand curves. The debate started in Germany but was continued in the USA where Leontief became a researcher at the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) in summer 1931. The Leontief–Frisch controversy culminated in the Quarterly Journal of Economics (1934), published by Harvard University, where Leontief made his subsequent career from 1932–1975. His later analysis of the employment consequences of technological change in the 1980s had some roots in his Kiel period.

The concept of rationality in the sociology of Max Weber and its impact on modern social sciences

The paper analyzes Max Weber’s concepts of rationality and rationalization as components of modernization processes in modern society. The author reconstructs Weber’s interpretation of “spiritual factors” of social development, which emerge in the ethos of Protestantism. The research demonstrates how Weber’s study of capitalism in terms of rationality corresponds with concepts of other classics of German sociology, such as Ferdinand Tönnies, Werner Sombart, Georg Simmel and others. The article emphasizes the relevance of Weber’s sociology for XX— XXI centuries and how its basic concepts and methodological approaches have been further developed by scholars, including Ukrainian ones. Weber’s concept of rationality is applicable not only to the mental-epistemological sphere, it also acquires a social meaning. This approach has gained recognition in phenomenological sociology, theory of social systems, communicative theory and more. In addition to the formal rationality of the economy, modern social sciences use such concepts as social, aesthetic, ethical, environmental, and practical rationality. Weber’s “diagnosis of the age” is still a component of the “diagnosis” of modern society. The gap between values and interests remains an integral feature of the “risks and threats society” in the XXI century. This situation is especially evident in international relations, when “real politics” (Realpolitik), based on interests, becomes insensitive to “value postulates”. The author also discovers ways of value (moral and ethical) reclamation of modern society, particularly in the concepts of “ethical economy”, universalist ethics of discourse, global ethos and more. Keywords: purposive rationality, rationality (formal, material, communicative, systemic), value, ethos.

Barbarian in the City Walls. Schumpeter’s ‘Entrepreneur’ as the Subject of a Historico-political Discourse

A common narrative about the recent reactionary turn in electoral democracies around the world highlights a fundamental lack in the heart of neoliberal rationality — a lack of political/ social in the version of critical theorists and a lack of morals/ traditions in the version of conservative critics. What if this lack is complemented by an excess, an antinomic element, that overdetermines this shift to the right? Following the mainstream version of neoliberal subject — an entrepreneurial self — this study reaches into the genealogy of the ‘entrepreneur’ concept in the theory of Joseph A.Schumpeter, tracing its roots to the conservative dichotomies of Werner Sombart and Friedrich von Wieser. By placing the ‘entrepreneur’ in the framework of Foucault’s theory of two discourses, I draw out the complex relationship between Schumpeterian concept and its analogues in the mainstream neoliberal theory. An outcome of this analysis is the hypotesis of polidiscoursivity: a problem of ‘barbarian subject’ at the gates (or within the city walls) of the Austrian school’s (neo)liberal utopia.

Towards a new ecological and human type of national accounting for developing economies (the CARE/TDL model)

The goal of this article is to propose a radical reform of the today’s financial accounting system of businesses accompanied by a corresponding reform of the system of national accounts. It transforms them into genuine ecological and human systems of accounts that can systematically conserve the three main types of capitals which are necessary for the functioning of any economic system. This is a radical means of overcoming the dramatic ecological and human crisis in which the humanity is buried today. This can be done by applying traditional weapons of capital conservation, invented at the end of the Middle Ages by big capitalists for the protection of their financial investments, to human and natural capital. We notably use the famous double entry accounting depicted by Werner Sombart and Max Weber like certain martial arts use the force of the adversary against him. As a result, we come to a complete redefinition of the main concepts of the economics, especially the concepts of capital, profit and market, and to the possibility of a new type of firm management that allows us to get out of the capitalist system.