Intellectual Capital Creation Research Articles

Theory and method on intellectual capital creation

Intellectual capital is a diverse and multidisciplinary field where there is much scope for interdisciplinary research. Such interdisciplinarity demands that we first transcend boundaries between IC researchers and disciplines and then transcend any subsequently perceived ontological and/or methodological barriers. Moving from the particular to the general, this paper draws on the contours of the Habermasian communicative relation to present some theoretical insights on how intellectual capital is created linguistically in social space. The ontological and methodological implications of this particular approach to research lead to the general argument for adopting a “relative view” on both ontology and methodology in order to craft navigational routes into interdisciplinary social space in the IC field. Such an approach allows IC researchers to draw on extant, and seemingly incommensurable, methodologies and techniques from analytical positivism, systems theory and the hermeneutic tradition in a scientifically justifiable post‐foundationalist manner.

Strategic alliances: a valuable way to manage intellectual capital?

Considers two forms of strategic alliances, technological and marketing, and examines how these alliances foster formation and maintenance of intellectual capital. Empirical evidence suggests that on average, strategic alliances do create value for shareholders that is consistent with the creation of intellectual capital. Between the two, technological alliances are potentially more beneficial than marketing alliances, and more likely to create intellectual capital. Empirical evidence is consistent with the notion that the gains from alliances are not shared equally by all the partners. When intellectual capital is created by the smaller or financially weaker partner, the return may be appropriately captured by the owner of such capital through strategic alliances. However, if the intellectual capital is created by the larger or financially stronger firm which moves first in an alliance relationship, the return on this intellectual capital may be subject to opportunistic exploitation by the late moving partner.

Intellectual capital: a Habermasian introduction

Intellectual capital creation is theorised in this conceptual paper as a dynamic process of collective knowing that is capable of being leveraged into market value. The tacit, intangible and socially unconscious nature of substantive parts of this dynamic process presents some daunting theoretical challenges. Adopting a broadly social constructionist epistemology and a pluralist ontology, the point of departure introduced here is the set of symmetric and reciprocal relations presupposed in Jürgen Habermas’ theory of communicative action. In this worldview, interaction, as distinct from individual action, becomes the germ‐cell or basic unit of theoretical analysis. The relations and validity claims built into the medium of communicative action, viewed here as the nexus of intellectual capital creation, are substantive and real phenomena; they are thus open to empirical investigation.