Journal of Macromarketing

A framework is proposed to examine the process of knowledge development in marketing and macromarketing. To this end, various approaches for developing new knowledge are specified and discussed: theory applications, effects applications, and replication/extensions. This framework is used to highlight differences between micro- and macromarketing. A content analysis of North American journal articles published over the past 10 years demonstrates where the knowledge development focus has been in recent years and facilitates recommendations to guide future knowledge development.

At a given time, the organizational structure of a channel shapes the flow of marketing activity. Over time, the flow of marketing activity shapes the organizational structure of the channel. This article explains how activity shapes organizational structure. It draws on recent advances in analyzing the dynamics of systems and research in urban dynamics. Different types of dynamic models are described and illustrated, and research implications are outlined.

An overview of the market system as a cultural institution is presented, and the concept of cultural meaning for material artifacts is discussed. The authors propose a system for representing cultural meaning of objects; this system can summarize the convergence of meaning for most material objects across individuals, subcultures, and time.

Scholars have often conceptualized a relationship between economic development and channel structure, but the few empirical investigations have been severely limited in scope. This study conceptualizes a multidimensional relationship in terms of eight domains of development and three elements of channel structure. An empirical test of the conceptualization used secondary data on economic development and primary data on the structure of the channel for cereal grains from 53 countries. Based on 17 measures of development, the findings indicate all eight domains are related to at least one of these elements of channel structure: wholesaler size, retailer size, or channel length.

Ethnic domination of marketing channels is very common throughout the developing work. The phenomenon often has become closely associated with volatile political issues, such as unequal distribution of wealth or perceived foreign domination of the national economy. Ethnodomination arises when an external commercially oriented economy penetrates a subsistence agricultural economy. Historical records on Oman show in detail how such a system functioned before the era of modern economic development. A cultural boundary separates market-oriented outsiders who operate wholesale and retail firms from the subsistence farmers who are brought into the market economy as petty producers and consumers. Such trade contact starts a process of cultural assimilation.

Fieldwork and historical records from Sudan show how such systems can evolve under development. When the cultural boundary has shifted downward in the marketing channel, local people begin to acquire commercially oriented values which allow them to participate more fully in economic activities. However, actually moving into marketing channel activities requires capital, most of which is still controlled by the ethnic group dominating the channels. Modern development brings infusions of capital from outside the marketing system, and local people can begin moving into lower level channel activities easily. Once that happens, successful small retailers accumulate capital to move into wholesaling, and so on. The ethnic group which traditionally had controlled channels shifts investments from marketing into industrial production, and eventually ethnodomination of marketing will decline.