Title: From Budapest to Berlin - the role of reputation in the market economy

Authors: Sarah Philipson; Joakim Philipson

Addresses: Linnaeus University, SE-351 95 Växjö, Sweden ' The National Library of Sweden, Kungl. Biblioteket, Box 5039, SE-102 41 Stockholm, Sweden

Abstract: During a trip from Budapest to Berlin in 1990, Joakim Philipson made observations about a grey market trade between Rumanian Roma and Vietnamese guest students in Berlin. It was seemingly inexplicable how the two groups could enter into business relationships without a common language. This paper uses the narrative as a basis for a discussion and interpretation of conditional trust and validates classical economic value theory. As "...research on trust... is relatively diverse and multidisciplinary" (Dirks and Ferrin, 2001; Lewicki et al., 1998; both after Gordon, 2007), we are drawing on research in as diverse fields as sociology, game theory, anthropology, and classical economics to question the paradigm that is the basis of both transaction cost economics and relationship management. As such the paper is a narrative case used for conceptual discourse.

Keywords: conditional trust; reputation; market economy; informal economy; society; Hungary; Germany; shadow economy; informal sector; economic value theory; sociology; game theory; anthropology; classical economics; transaction cost economics; TCE; relationship management.

DOI: 10.1504/IJESB.2016.076647

International Journal of Entrepreneurship and Small Business, 2016 Vol.28 No.2/3, pp.310 - 322

Received: 13 May 2015
Accepted: 15 Aug 2015
Published online: 18 May 2016 *

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