The Porter Model of Competitive Advantage for Inner-City Development: An Appraisal

Abstract

Harvard’s Michael Porter has joined the growing number of academics in search of a model that will solve the problems of material deprivation and degradation of racial minorities in the inner cities. We should add, however, that this search is not merely for a model, but for a model that is “politically” acceptable to the majority. This condition of political acceptability is not unique to the inner city. Recently, we read that Presidential candidate, Senator Bob Dole, importuned Jack Kemp, chairman of a Committee on Tax Reform, to keep the Committee’s report free of incendiary specifics, presumably to prevent loss of support among voters—the devil remains in the details. But a politically acceptable model does not necessarily solve the problem. Indeed, it may impair the efficacy of the model and exacerbate the problem. Hence, perhaps, the enduring nature of inner-city poverty. This is, therefore, an important problem in political economy. To be sure, political economists do not necessarily provide the “solution key” to this problem. But, we are informed, neither do sociologists or historians, both of whom tend to be pessimists because, unlike economists, “they take their bearings from past failure.” Economists, on the other hand, cannot be characterized as a dismal lot; actually, they are optimists, “because they suffer from almost total historical amnesia.” 1 The British political scientist, Kenneth Minogue, mused that economists (the problem solvers) consider themselves equipped with a portable science, and he therefore pointedly raised the following question: “Does the world consist merely of societies navigating their way through history in terms not of religion or morality or philosophy but of whatever model currently happens to impress economists and politicians?” Alas, for the most part, response to this query may very well be in the affirmative. In this essay, we appraise the applicability of the Porter model to the inner city by addressing the following: Can the model be 132deemed politically acceptable, and if so, what are its implications for inner-city development? Can Porter be considered merely a champagne socialist, in the sense of a patrician who assumes that he knows what is best for the inner-city residentiary better than the residents themselves know? And, if emulating material success is the basic drive of the inner-city populace, will the Porter model effect or subvert achievement of this objective?