Economic Sociology and Capitalism in Schumpeter

Abstract

This paper aims to comprehend the means by which Schumpeter applied economic sociology to understand capitalism, which constitutes one of the analytical tools of economic science. Characterized as an evolutionary and institutional analysis of economic phenomena, economic sociology in Schumpeter’s work is taken as a current originating in the historicist research program of the German Historical School, which he had contact with. It is expounded how he understands capitalism as a specific economic-institutional reality whose dynamism, resulting from endogenous causes, is understood in light of his economic sociology, elaborating the institutional transformations which capitalism goes through.