Evolution and Learning

Abstract

Evolutionary theories are a class of theories, models, or arguments that explain how companies evolve and why successful companies differ from each other. They explain the generation and renewal of variation by random elements and winnowing. Internal forces provide continuity to whatever survives the winnowing. Many of the economic evolutionary theories assume that individual learning, organizational adaptation, and the environmental selection of organizations are processes going on at the same time (Nelson and Winter, 1982; Nelson, 1994, 1995).