THE SOCIAL CONSTRUCTION OF NEW MARKETING PARADIGMS:

THE INFLUENCE OF PERSONAL PERSPECTIVE

Adrian Palmer

Gloucestershire Business School

Sharon Ponsonby,

University of Ulster, Magee College,

ABSTRACT

Marketing is no stranger to "big new ideas" which purport to be new paradigms for the study of the discipline. Relationship marketing, one-to-one marketing and postmodern marketing typify recent ideas which have gained much support. However, it widely recognised that, compared to the natural sciences, the marketing discipline has created relatively little knowledge which can be described as genuinely new. In the absence of any objective reality, marketing knowledge reflects the interpretation of reality by individuals. Surprisingly, relatively little analysis has been undertaken into the source of new marketing ideas and the influence of social construction on these ideas. This paper presents a review of contemporary "new marketing" paradigms and uses a framework of time, place and role to explain the derivation of these ideas. It is concluded that proclomations of new marketing may say more about the proclaimer than the subject being proclaimed.

INTRODUCTION

In recent years, marketing has matured as a discipline. One sign of this maturity is an increasing willingness of marketing academics and practitioners to look inwardly and become more self-critical of their discipline. An abundance of scholarly research and practitioner proclamations have suggested that marketing is undergoing a fundamental, epoch breaking change (Brady and Davis, 1993; Gronroos, 1997). Talk about new paradigms has been interspersed with gloomy predictions about the future of the marketing department and the triumph of chaos where previously there was order (Gummesson, 1997; Murray and O'Driscoll, 1997). "One-to-one marketing", "Postmodern Marketing" and "New Marketing Manifestos" typify recent debate (Pepper and Rodgers, 1995; Brown, 1995; Grant, 1999). Wilson and Gilligan (1997, p. 25) declared that “There has been an increasing recognition over the past few years that marketing is, or may be facing what is loosely referred to as a mid life crisis…due to the widespread concern that something is amiss”. In addition, Brown (1995, p. 42) proclaimed that the “Marketing concept is deeply, perhaps irredeemably flawed, that its seemingly solid theoretical foundations are by no means secure and that the specialism is teetering on the brink of serious intellectual crisis”. The Relationship Marketing paradigm has been hailed as a long awaited solution to the limitations of existing marketing theory and practice, despite there being no universally accepted definition for this phenomenon (Kandampully and Duddy, 1999).

Despite the volume of literature predicting the terminal decline of marketing, evidence of its plight and the benefits of new paradigms is mixed. Consider the following evidence from the UK grocery retail sector: Traditional methods of mass marketing have been proclaimed by many as being outdated in an age when information technology allows individual targetting and dialogue with customers. Yet research has shown that the most profitable retailers are not those with a personalised loyalty programme, but ones which offer standardised, low prices for all (Knox, 1998; Murphy, 1998). It is reported that the market share of Asda has increased since it abolished its trial customer loyalty programme (Curtis, 1999). Similarly, in the airline sector, adopters of new marketing paradigms might have expected operators who finely tailor their operations to the needs of multiple small segments to win out over airlines which offer one standard of service to all. During one week in 1999, British Airways (which has made great efforts at customisation of its services) reported a loss while the low fares, no frills, minimal segmentation airline Ryanair reported sharply increased sales and profits (Times, 1999a). Reports of innovatory one-to-one dialogue between fmcg companies and their end-user consumers run ahead of the reality, as witnessed by the Heinz company's climbdown from its dialogue with consumers in favour of a more traditional mass communication appeal (Tylee, 1998). Even talk of the fragmentation of brands to meet niche segments may not be reflected in reality, as evidenced by Unilever's decision to cut the number of brands it offers to a few mainstream brands (Times, 1999b).

While the management of change is a fundamental task of a marketing manager (Salaman, 1996; Beer and Eisenstat, 1996; Waterman, 1988), is discussion of new marketing paradigms a useful contribution to knowledge? Alphonse Karr, the French writer and editor of Figaro (1893) stated in his satirical review, Les Guepes, (1849), “Plus ca change, plus c’est la meme chose” - “The more things change the more they stay the same”. Are suggested changes to marketing transitory and lacking any deep-seated shift in foundations, or do they really represent a paradigm shift? Alternatively, could discussion of new marketing paradigms say more about the social construction of the individuals making the proclamations, than the subject being discussed? Observation of reality cannot be separated from the observer's perception of that reality (Bauman, 1998). Much human communication is not accepted literally, but decoded in the context of the position that a communicator and recipient are coming from, and this is particularly important with marketing which essentially deals with social constructs rather than absoloute truths. Discussion of changing marketing phenomena is subject to individual interpretation and it is therefore important to understand the position that a proclaimer of a new marketing paradigm is coming from. Hermeneutics presents a view of human understanding and interpretation. Unwritten social and cultural meaning systems define social reality and behaviour and educators are frequently held responsible for developing social constructs (DiMaggio, 1988; Scott, 1987; Handelman and Arnold, 1999).

The central proposition of this paper is that claims of new marketing paradigms should be deconstructed in the context of three phenomena: time, place and role.

The time dimension refers to the observation that many apparently "new" marketing practices have strong antecedents which proponents do not fully recognise or acknowledge. This paper explores the breadth of contemporary new marketing ideas which are firmly rooted in very long-standing practices. The place dimension refers to the fact that much of what is claimed to be new, is extant in distant cultures, and newness represents a novelty from the perspective of the proclaimer, rather than a new insight into human behaviour. The third dimension of role recognises that proclamations of new marketing ideas may reflect a relatively narrow perspective of individuals making the claim, for whom new marketing ideas reflect a personal role shift as much as the development of new knowledge. It can be likened to the stonemason lifting his gaze from individual bricks and gaining a holistic vision of the cathedral he is building.

The aim of this paper is to provide a critical counter balance to proclamations of "big new ideas" in marketing. While recognising the clarity of exposition of many of their proclaimers and the contribution that has been made to increasing levels of marketing knowledge and awareness, the paper explores whether "new" marketing paradigms are a discovery by some sectors of the marketing community of phenomena which have been long established elsewhere. The scenario may emerge of an academic view of marketing that regards new frameworks such as relationship marketing as an ideal paradigm, while practitioners are compromised by the realities of operationalising the concepts. Reactions of practitioners to Relationship Marketing approaches, for example, have varied from a familiarity with the basic principles that they encapsulate, to incredulity at how the basic propositions could be operationalised.

This paper initially offers an overview of the contemporary debate about "new marketing". It then proceeds to explore the following propositions:

i. contemporary "new" marketing paradigms are based on principles that are fundamentally unchanged over centuries of market mediated trading

ii. the principles of new marketing ideas have contemporary and recent

antecedents in other trading systems

iii. attitudes towards new marketing paradigms are influenced by the role of those making claims of paradigm shifts.

A further aim of this paper is to address the issue of whether claims of new marketing paradigms widen or help to bridge the apparent gap between marketing academics and practitioners.

What Is The "New Marketing"?

Current literature has bestowed a plethora of "new marketing" theories. Much of the recent debate has been associated with the need for marketing to escape from the apparent straitjacket imposed by the scientific framework of marketing mix approaches to marketing management. Gronroos (1997) stated that ‘the major problem with the marketing mix and its 4P’s has been their position as the major, and in many situations as the only acceptable marketing paradigm’. He asked why the marketing mix management paradigm and the 4Ps model have become such a straitjacket for marketers and noted that the ‘main reason is for pedagogical virtues’. The marketing mix is atheoretical and has formed the basis for the overwhelming majority of texts on marketing. Its defendants point to two principal reasons for its continuing domination of the literature: the pedagogic benefits of using a highly structured approach around which discrete lessons and class discussion can be focused and the apparent lack of suitable alternatives.

The theoretical limitations of marketing mix approaches have been widely noted. Van Waterschoot and Van den Bulte (1992) pointed out that the properties that are the basis for classification have not been identified, and the categories are not mutually exclusive. Bennett (1997) stated that an emphasis on the 4P’s model (McCarthy, 1964) might lead to too narrow a focus on internal variables and does not include some of the process variables which also form part of the marketing planning system. The reduction in the marketing mix to four elements might have improved the elegance and simplicity of the framework, but lost its substance and validity (Gummesson, 1994). In response, there have been numerous attempts to expand the basic mix framework, most popularly the 7 Ps framework developed by Booms and Bitner to incorporate decisions which are of relevance to services marketing. Further refinements have been proposed by Collier (1991), Nickels and Jolson (1976), Reneghan (1981) and Christopher, Payne and Ballantyne (1991). It has been pointed out by Gummesson (1999), who himself has proposed a "32 Rs" list of relationships, that many of these reformulations are contrived and designed to fit around beginning with the same letter of the alphabet.

Talk about a "new marketing" has attracted considerable interest. In his "new marketing manifesto", Grant (1999) defined new marketing in terms of being: driven by insight, not analysis; favouring constant change over conservatism; being humanistic rather than scientific; and being essentially creative. The literature has been rich in colourful description, with analogies drawn with a car journey (O’Malley and Patterson, 1998), eschatological biblical behaviour (Brown, 1997; O'Shaughnessy, 1997) and medicine (Baker, 1991). Alternative paradigms have been presented based on a holistic overview of marketing in which strength derives from a diversity of approaches and breaking of rules (Brown, 1995; Gronroos, 1997; Murray and O’ Driscoll, 1997). The term Postmodern marketing has frequently been applied to this approach and extensive use made of analogies with postmodernism in other discipline areas, such as architecture (Jencks, 1987), art (Burgin, 1986), anthropology (Nencel and Pels, 1991), civil engineering (Platten, 1986), economics (McCloskey, 1985), geography (Soja, 1989), to name but a few, has witnessed, according to Brown (1995), the pervasiveness of postmodernism. Postmodernism is essentially a reaction to the presumed certainty of scientific or objective efforts to explain reality. New marketing ideas emanate from the opinion that ‘reality’ is not plainly reflected in human understanding of scientific efforts to explain it. Postmodernists ‘Do not agree with hermeneutics, if in its search for explanation, it assumes that one interpretation is better than others, if its goal is to recover a singular meaning for any political or social act’ (Rosneau, 1992, p. 14). "Rules" of market segmentation give way to a realisation that each consumer-producer transaction is unique and one-to-one relationships supersede segmentation approaches based on logical empiricism.

Chaos marketing theory, defined as a “Conceptual framework to describe how the world around us should react to change whether the systems are stable, unpredictable within boundaries or controllable” (Nilson, 1995, p. 7), has been presented as a new framework to reflect the reality of marketing in a turbulent environment.

Despite the emergence of a plethora of "new" marketing ideas which stress the need to break rules and provide a holistic approach to individual buyer-seller relationships, a scientific approach to problem analysis remains a vital and growing part of a marketing manager's task. Wilson and Gilligan (1997, p.10) state that scientific theories in marketing enable us to “Explain and understand the behaviour of marketing variables and their interrelationships, predict the future behaviour patterns of marketing variables and their interrelationships, produce prescriptions and achieve control over the outcomes of interactions of marketing variables”. Some indication of the drive for the scientific approach to measurement is indicated by the growth of the market research industry, with more than £300m worth of quantitative studies and £150m of continuous tracking studies and omnibus surveys conducted annually in the UK (Gofton, 1999). Wierenga and Van Bruggen (1997, p. 21) wrote that “There is an increasing need for tools that assist marketing decision makers in carrying out their tasks. Because of the proliferation of products and brands, ever larger numbers of market segments, fierceness of competition, and overall acceleration of change, marketing decision situations have become complex, and decisions must be made under increasing time pressure".

Recent developments in direct marketing are based on a scientific method of enquiry which is essentially rules-based. New methods of profiling customer databases have used expert systems to provide insights into customer potential, share of wallet, attrition, cross selling and the lifetime value of a customer. The analysis of large volumes of data offers the capability of giving results which are statistically significant representations of the populations from which they are drawn (e.g. Koslowsky, 1999; Pearce, 1997). O’Malley, Patterson and Evans (1997), for example, in their survey of UK retailers found an overwhelming use of databases particularly in the areas of site assessment and trade area analysis. Most of the respondents used a combination of marketing and customer databases to support their decision-making activities.

Further evidence of a greater scientific approach is provided by the Marketing Metrics research project, sponsored among other organisations by the Chartered Institute of Marketing. It set out in 1997 to look at real-world marketing performance assessment and has sought to develop a culture in which marketing effectiveness is measured as objectively as possible. Placing a value on brand equity as an outcome is one such approach (Ambler, 1998). The desire for accountability in the private and public sectors has fuelled a desire for objective standards of measurement. It has been pointed out, for example, by Beenstock (1998) that the desire to develop objective methods of brand valuations in companies' balance sheets will become much greater in the UK with the enforcement of Financial Reporting Standards 10 and 11.

In his introduction to the Oxford volume Theories of Explanation, Joseph Pitt (1988, p.6) claims that "What is crucial is the insight that the kind of knowledge science produces...it permits the development of explanations, and it is those explanations that are the real payoff." Innovation and creativity are required to keep up with the fast pace of business today. It is through the reconciliation of both scientific and artistic approaches, that true creativity is gained (Campbell, 1975).

Has the cycle of marketing evolution embarked on a backward journey to its origins? Current scepticism about scientific, rules based approaches to marketing is frequently informed by reference to simpler historical systems of exchange. Indeed, the origins of many "new" ideas have frequently been acknowledged by their proponents. It is, for example, clearly stated by Peppers and Rodgers (1995) that their vision of a one-to-one future is based on the pattern of exchanges commonly found among small traders in previous decades.

The Perspective of Time: Historical antecedents of new marketing

Marketing as a recognised discipline of study is relatively new, having emerged during the 1960’s. The reasons for its emergence are clear enough to see - increasingly competitive markets called for sellers to put more effort into the process of selling relative to the effort that buyers were required to expend in the process of buying. From its inception, the discipline of marketing has been dominated by a set of values that are American in origin (Dholakia et al, 1980), but have since permeated western economies.

Despite its new found status from the 1960’s, the philosophies of marketing have a long heritage and numerous scholars have described activities in ancient history which have resemblance to modern theories of marketing (e.g. Orlin, 1970; Larsen, 1976; Aubet, 1987). The very long history of marketing is acknowledged in most introductory marketing texts. Moore and Lewis (1998), for example, described the Assyrian international trade organisation of the second millennium B.C. Early rulers, such as Ilu-shuma and his son Erishum I (c.1939-1900 B.C.), did much to exploit the commercial potential offered by the geographic location of Ashur and its supply of tin. It has been noted that the Old Assyrian commercial expansion of this age had many characteristics of what we would today describe as marketing, including market segmentation, targeting, distribution and communication (Larsen, 1976, p. 86).

Many apparently "new" phenomena in marketing have quite clear historical antecedents. What is today called relationship marketing has been noted as the customary practice of small traders in pre-modern marketing times (Peppers and Rodgers, 1995). Clegg (1956) noted the complex networks of commercial relationships that existed between traders in Victorian England, bearing many resemblences to strategic alliances. There is a fundamental familiarity between some of the business practices of ancient civilisations and those practised today. The Ancient Sumerian society's values mirror topical marketing themes pertinent to the formation of relationships; the elements of trust, loyalty and reciprocity were evident in their co-operation with neighbours and strangers in the trading of goods, despite fact that they could not immediately appreciate the benefits of their actions.

The ancient Egyptians imported timber for boat building from Syria and Lebanon, copper from Cyprus, tin from Asia and/or Europe, raw materials such as plants from Africa and the Far East for the production of medicine while they exported yarn, fine linen cloth, glass bottles, vases, embroidered work and paper to Europe (Trigger et al, 1983). These civilisations were constantly developing, innovating and flourishing and the “learning organisation” epitomises this culture contemporarily. Today, organisational culture and learning have become one of the most active research areas in the marketing discipline (Slater and Narver, 1995).

Marketing practices may change, but the philosophy is more enduring. In the evolution of modern-day marketing thought, it may seem that ideas have a habit of going round in circles. One of the earliest advocates of marketing, Drucker, noted in 1954 that ‘Marketing was not really a separate management function, but rather a whole business as seen from the customer’s point of view’ (Drucker, 1954). Fifty years later, new marketing paradigms essentially appear to be rediscovering this fact.

The Perspective Of Place: International Comparisons

What is often described as "new" marketing in western countries represents firmly established practice in many cultures. A marketing philosophy has been associated with eastern cultures, most especially with Japanese marketing practices, where it has been observed that the marketing mix approach never took hold to the extent that it has in the west (Genestre, Herbig and Shao, 1995; Kotler and Fahey, 1982; Doyle Wong and Saunders, 1992). Genestre, Herbig and Shao (1995) wrote that “Japanese marketing management has been described as the classic textbook case of applying the marketing philosophy - carefully studying customer wants and needs in international markets, developing products incorporating desired features and putting effective marketing programmes in place to support them”.

The concept of relationship marketing is presented as new in western countries, but has substantial precedent in China in the form of guanxi. Relationship marketing in ancient China depicted interpersonal relationships which over time have become more focused on the organisational level in the form of guanxi, meaning “relationship" (Tsang, 1998). Campbell wrote that “the belief that mind and matter were separate and had nothing to do with each other, may have been a factor in the coming to birth of the principle of objectivity which was considered to be Western in character, whilst the Easterners considered both mind and body to be one and the same" (Campbell , 1975, p. 12). SME’s have possessed relationships similar to that of guanxi, which is usually considered at the individual level although it exists at the organisational level (Tsang, 1998) and ganqing which is a measure of the emotional commitment of the parties involved. Trust, face or public image and credibility according to Tsang (1998) are also important “ingredients” of guanxi, mirroring the constructs discussed in contemporary debate about relationship marketing.

The Chinese are said to be naturally good at business. A related explanation is that Chinese have learnt to live frugally, to plough profits back into their businesses, to plan more for the long-term, and to sacrifice profit today for market share in the future. With economic prosperity in many Asian countries, there is a tendency to reinterpret their cultures as being somehow development promoting and pro-entrepreneurial (Billig, 1994). The traditional formula for success among the overseas Chinese has emphasised the entrepreneurial spirit, family businesses with autocratic and paternalistic leadership and guanxi (personal relationships). Decision making processes and a lack of bureaucratic regulation give a competitive advantage when quick responses or deal-making skills are critical. In modern western language, this would be interpreted as the discovery of flatter organisational structures, empowerment and efficient consumer response (Drucker, 1988; Kanter, 1989; Randolph, 1995; Kurt Salmon Associates, 1993).

It has been noted that much of the recent obsession with developing shared values among an organisation's employees has clear antecedents in large Japanese organisations (Wagner and Hollenbeck, 1995). Their cultural emphasis on loyalty is prevalent in work environments in the form if the “nenko” system and loyalty and respect for others in the form of “oyabun-kobun” which reflects the family relationship. Wagner and Hollenbeck (1995) also note that new managers in Japan attend entering classes in order to acquire a generalist's view of the history and culture of the organisation being joined. When this process has been completed, they have learned the importance of followership or tsukiai (Atsumi, 1979).

By looking east, marketers may find practices that look remarkably like big new ideas currently being hailed in the west. By analogy, a New Yorker arriving in remote Africa where a new branch of McDonalds has just opened might wonder what all the local excitement is about.

The Perspective Of Place: Evidence Of New Marketing In Small And Medium Size Enterprises

The originality of new marketing paradigms may be questioned by many owners of small and medium sized enterprises, who have shown less inclination to use the scientific approaches of their counterparts in larger organisations. Brian Aldiss, the British science-fiction writer once said, “Science fiction is no more written for scientists than ghost stories are written for ghosts”. There is an apparent opinion that historically, marketing theories have not been embraced by marketing practitioners, most especially within SMEs, yet small businesses survive and grow and compete in the marketplace.

Managers of SMEs have been criticised in the past for their lack of commitment to strategic planning and their resistance to prescribed marketing tools and techniques (McDonald, 1992; Brooksbank, 1991; Lancaster and Waddelow, 1998; Leppard, 1987; Wilson and Gilligan, 1997). Leppard's study into why there was a widespread resistance to strategic marketing planning showed that “acceptance of marketing planning is largely conditioned by the stage of development of the organisation and the behaviour of the culture carriers” (Leppard, 1987).

There is other evidence that small businesses are very aware of the need for marketing, even if they do not always undertake it (Beam and Carey, 1989). In many instances small business owners perceive marketing as being purely "selling, advertising or promotion" (Patten, 1989). Stanworth and Gray (1991) pointed out that in small businesses one person is directly involved in every decision - from everyday issues such as customer enquiries, financial control and production matters, to less recurrent problems such as employee recruitment and rent reviews. Their research emphasised that small business owner-managers are "generalists" and it would be totally wrong to suggest that they should become "marketing specialists". This means that complex theories or sophisticated formal processes are inappropriate for small businesses - they would not achieve any greater understanding of the markets in which small businesses operate. This observation seems quite consistent with new marketing ideas that all individuals within an organisation should be boundary-spanners and perform the role of "part-time marketers" (Gummesson, 1999).

Mitchell (1998) stated that for SMEs, working with a small number of customers, operating locally or with few distribution outlets - marketing's essential task of winning and keeping customers necessarily takes a very different form and may not even be seen as marketing at all. For example, in his study of 'hidden champions' - smaller firms which quietly excel - Simon noted that most don't have marketing departments or staff with 'marketing' job titles. Yet, he notes, proportionately more employees in these firms regularly spend more time with their customers than their larger rivals. While the hidden champions are not marketing professionals, 'they are closeness-to-customer professionals' (Simon, 1996). Cavanagh and Clifford (1986) on smaller companies stated that they had a ‘sheer dedication to serving customers better than anyone else’. Goodwin stated that consumers today are being “bombarded by confusion marketing” and that “whereas we have all become accustomed to the sharpest, fastest-moving marketing ideas coming from small, entrepreneurial companies, it is clear that the giants of UK industry have caught up and are rivalling their smaller companies” (Goodwin 1998, p. 15). The entrepeneurship of the small business is being rediscovered in large corporations. Vandermerwe and Birley (1997), spoke of the Corporate Entrepreneur, stating that the typical “bureaucratic” executive can be expected to behave enptrepreneurially and corporations are transforming “so as to own customers” and to attack “problems creatively” and that entrepreneurs can today be expected to be able to manage the large corporation too.

SMEs have been noted for traditionally undertaking processes which are today considered novel by their larger competitors. For example a small greengrocer is likely to have had direct contact with customers; personally knowing them; had a mental profile of each customer; and knew the market’s needs and satisfied them on time and to customers' specification. Out of this, mutually beneficial relationships developed (Peppers and Rodgers, 1995; Kahil and Harcar, 1995). Larger firms have tried hard to create similar conditions for themselves, and when they have been achieved may think incorrectly that they have discovered a "new" way of doing business.

Ernest Hemingway once said “If one can distinguish between good advice and bad advice, one does not need advice.” Is it any wonder then, that the small and medium enterprise has relinquished academic jargon when flexibility, market knowledge,

close customer relationships and common sense has prepared it for alternative business approaches? Would many of the ideas of new marketing paradigms be little more than well established practice for them?

The Perspective Of Role: The Influence Of Personal Perspective

Another line of enquiry to explain proclamations of "new marketing" may be to examine the role of individuals who make such proclamations. Ylva Eggehorn once said “Our position determines what we see”. There are many historic cases of individuals who have escaped from their mundane lives to see the "promised land". The Bhuddist temple of Borobudur provides a useful analogy. A series of friezes on the lower levels of the temple depict labourers working hard in fields with their minds focused clearly on the technical task in hand. Ascent of the temple is likened to the process of growing up and sees the focus of the friezes changing, until at the top of the temple the wise old man sits with a view over everything around him.

This contrast between the narrowly focused practitioner and the visionary leader has been referred to in many marketing related analogies. It has for example been noted in the context of developing staff motivation within the people-intensive services sector that the situation is analogous to a stonemason and a cathedral - the leader has the vision of the cathedral while the stonemason sees only individual bricks. Smith and Saint-Onge (1996) refer to Henry Adams who said of the stone mason: “He does not say “I’m carving a stone” but rather “I’m building a cathedral”. Similarly, The Buddha (Siddhartha Gotama) once said, “Drillers shape holes, bow makers, arrows, carpenters shape wood and the wise shapes himself”.

It has been noted that an important characteristic of a chief executive is to have a "helicopter view" (Starkey, 1998; Dobbins and Pettmann, 1997; Chan, 1997) allowing him or her to see the connections within a complex environment which may be absent from individuals who have a specified role within a management hierarchy. Creativity and vision have been seen as important characteristics of business leaders (Hamlin, Reidy and Stewart, 1997; Kaye and Dyason, 1999) with many pointing to such inspirational leaders as Richard Branson, Benjamin Rosen (Compaq), the late Ferdinand Peich (Volkswagen, Porsche AG and Porsche Holding), Philippe Foreil-Destezet (Adecco S.A.), Kjeld Kirk Kristiansen (Lego), Alan Wertheimer (Chanel), and Akia Morita (Sony). Of course, whether visionary leaders are able to translate their vision into a commercial success will be partly conditioned by the extent to which they area able to take their organisation with them.

The “Visionary Leadership Model” (McDonald, 1992) pertains that it is not necessary for ideas to be created by the leader, but their “Commitment to it, his personal credibility and how he articulates it to others can provide the necessary momentum”. This leads to the next point about the relationship between visionary thinking and accountability. Proclaiming an idea without having the responsibility for implementing it involves relatively little risk. Academics and writers who talk about new marketing paradigms may have the independence to think the unthinkable and this independence has resulted in much high quality "blue sky" research which may find no immediate use within commercial organisations. However, academics are not held to account if their ideas do not work, unlike managers of businesses who are accountable to boards of directors and shareholders for results (Davis and Moe, 1997; Burns, 1989).

Is Marketing Academia Leading Or Following Current Development?

Are academics using their opportunities for free and creative thinking to develop useful knowledge and frameworks? Are they simply following reality or overlooking the long traditions on which new marketing is based? Henry Ford once said “Do not search for the faults, search for the cure”; - are marketers good at providing an analysis of historical weakness, but short on providing solutions which can be operationalised?

The need to understand the interface between academia and practitioners has been highlighted by the American Marketing Association which noted the importance of educators in developing new thinking (American Marketing Association, 1988). It noted that academics bear a heavy responsibility for defining and shaping what is known about marketing. The contribution of academics to marketing thought has been acknowledged in a number of fields, for example the conceptualisation and measurement of service quality (Parasuraman, Zeithaml and Berry, 1988). In other areas it has been noted that academics have lagged significantly behind practitioners, especially in some applied subject areas such as direct marketing (Nadherny, 1998).

There is also the question of whether academics' personal backgrounds influence the way they see marketing. In many cases, a lack of recent experience with business may imply that some academics learn from academic articles without the benefit of historical personal experience of implementing marketing activities. Previous research has indicated the diverse background of marketing academics. McDonagh highlighted the fact that since “most powerful marketing academics are predominantly logical empiricists.... the debate will just continue to fester and marketing will remain a one sided discipline which is continually criticised not only by those in other academic disciplines but also by marketing practitioners themselves” (McDonagh, 1995, pp. 676). It was noted above that academics are typically not accountable for their actions, which allows an independence of thought, but may also cause a disengagement from the reality of implementation.

If small businesses have in fact been practising many aspects of "new" marketing, but not in the way presented by traditional marketing academics, where does this leave the role of business schools? One view is that business schools should operate more theoretically than at practitioner level, in order to find new solutions to problems (Wills, 1976). On the other hand, it has been noted by Leppard and Mc Donald (1991) that the abstractions of academia have created an unbridgeable gap for practitioners in industry. These barriers can take the form of perceptual, cultural, intellectual, expressive, emotional and environmental barriers (Boydell, 1977).

Maharishi Mahesh Yogi once said “teaching which confuses the way of the recluse with the way of the person who is active in the world, has caused the backward condition of modern India”. This may parallel the SME owner manager’s (the person who is active in the world), confusion with the way in which the recluse (Academic) teaches and prescribes. Academics who resent the non-acceptance of marketing by practitioners may be creating backwardness in their own discipline.

CONCLUSIONS

Very little in marketing theory can be considered to be completely new. Unlike researchers in the natural sciences, who are continually isolating previously unrecognised genes or extending our understanding of living organisms, marketers have made relatively few genuinely new discoveries. Genetic engineering, the development of digital television and pentium processors cannot be compared to the "discovery" of a "new" relationship marketing paradigm, whose antecedents can be quite clearly traced.

Could there be a case that in the absence of genuinely new opportunities for discovery, marketers resort - wittingly or unwittingly - to recirculating old ideas as though they were new? The management of change is a vital management function and marketing academics have contributed towards an understanding of factors underlying change in the business environment and responses to that change. Academics' freedom from day to day financial accountability has given an impartiality and credibility which may be missing from practising managers who have an explicit or hidden agenda for change. "No change" limits the potential for academics to contribute towards academic debate, and as with popular journalism, "no change" may not be considered newsworthy. By implication, the evolution of new ideas is essential for academics to achieve a position as promulgators of useful information. Marketing academics and practitioners have written of many "big new ideas" which have created considerable interest but eventually faded into oblivion when it was realised that the idea was basically an old idea which had been dressed up in new language and still subject to the weaknesses which had caused failure in the past. Total Quality Management and Management by Objectives typify this life cycle of ideas.

This paper began with three propositions stating that the validity of new marketing ideas can be assessed in terms of three phenomena: time, place and role. From the review of literature reported here, it does indeed appear that statements about paradigm shifts must be considered in the context of the perspective of the person making such claims. Educators and practitioners express their differing philosophies due to their discordant backgrounds and cultures which shape their opinions and personalities. Talk of paradigm shifts are pertinent to the individual, their social conditions and their motivations. This paper has suggested that believers will be those who can associate their time, place and role with the statements being made about the current state of the marketing discipline through socialisation. One cannot understand the goals of people without understanding their social relations just as one cannot understand cultural institutions, practices and values divorced from individual motivation (Westen, 1985). It is implicit in new marketing ideas that there is no such thing as objective truth, but all observations of reality are subject to the observer's interpretation of that reality (Bauman, 1998).

The debate about whether marketing is going through a paradigm shift will probably be as inconclusive as such perennial debates as those between the power of nature versus nurture or between science and religion. In both these cases, argument is frequently used to support an established political position (for example with regard to issues of racial equality or education policy) and the position of a proponent is likely to be recognised in evaluating their argument. It would seem remarkable that debate about marketing paradigm shifts has taken place with relatively little attention given to the positions of those advancing a proposition. This paper has suggested that a good basis for evaluating claims of new marketing paradigms is to ask about the role and position that the claimant is coming from.

Finally, this paper has emphasised the social construction of marketing paradigms and the difficulty of separating objective reality from personal interpretation. This paper cannot claim to be free of bias which is inhrent in such interpretation of reality and is just as likely to reflect the background of the authors as claims of new marketing paradigms reflect their respective authors' backgrounds.

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