Economic and Organisational Approaches to Distribution Research with Special Reference to Norway

Distribution research, both in Europe and in the United States, is fragmented into two seemingly disparate disciplinary orientations: an economic approach and an organisational approach. The former attempts to apply micro‐economic theory and industrial organisation analysis to the study of distribution systems, focusing on horizontal as well as vertical markets. The latter attempts to apply behavioural and organisational concepts and theories to vertical distribution channel phenomena. Typically, economic and organisational studies have made only occasional references to each other, and very little integration has been achieved. Sometimes the two approaches have been in rivalry, economic researchers ignoring organisational variables, and organisational researchers ignoring economic variables.