Towards a new theory of the firm: The collaborative enterprise

Is it sufficient to analyze and study partnerships within a “business as usual” framework? The prevailing “competitive model”, in which most of the literature on partnerships is rooted, fosters a negativistic view of human nature in which economic agents are self-interested and want to maximize their own profit or utility at the expense of others, nature, society, and future generations. The current structural crisis confirms the unsustainability of this perspective. If we really want to unleash the full potential of partnerships to foster the common good and contribute to change the course we need completely different theoretical foundations. Therefore, in this Chapter we advance an alternative approach, framed around a collaborative attitude of doing business, where economic agents care about others and themselves and aim to create values for all the participants in their business ecosystems. The “collaborative enterprise” has important implications for academia and business. In particular, this perspective allows scholars and practitioners to reinvent partnerships beyond reductionist and instrumental approaches to make them a transformative agent of change.