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Cooperative strategy
Author(s) -
Nielsen Richard P.
Publication year - 1988
Publication title -
strategic management journal
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 11.035
H-Index - 286
eISSN - 1097-0266
pISSN - 0143-2095
DOI - 10.1002/smj.4250090507
Subject(s) - variety (cybernetics) , contingency , government (linguistics) , value (mathematics) , game theory , economics , evolutionarily stable strategy , microeconomics , industrial organization , foundation (evidence) , strategic management , evolutionary game theory , marketing , business , computer science , political science , artificial intelligence , philosophy , linguistics , machine learning , law
This article develops a classification scheme for mutual gain cooperative strategies between and among different organizations. The cooperative strategies considered are pool, exchange, de‐escalate, and experiment/contingency. These cooperative strategies are considered in four types of game/market environmental life cycle situations: positive‐sum growth, zero‐sum mature, negative‐sum decline, and transformable to positive‐sum growth. Cases from domestic and international business, nonprofit and government organizations are illustrated. Literature examples from strategic management, evolutionary biology, game theory and ecosystems theory are synthesized and used as foundation and explanation. Positive and negative public policy implications of cooperative strategy are also considered. In most, but not all, cases, cooperative strategy appears to improve value‐added efficiency in a wide variety of environments and situations.