The Resource‐based View
The field of strategic management, like other social science disciplines, is organized around a central research question. That question is: “Why do some firms persistently outperform others?” This question does not presume that there will always be persistent performance differences between firms. Rather, it presumes only that it may be the case that, in some situations, persistent performance differences will exist between firms, and that those differences cannot be explained by traditional economic theories of firm performance. These traditional economic theories suggest, in general, that performance differences between firms should be unusual, will almost certainly not be persistent, and if they exist, are most likely a manifestation of anti-competitive collusive or monopolistic actions on the part of firms.