%0 Journal Article
	%A Jürgen Beyer
	%D 2010
	%J International Journal of Humanities and Social Sciences
	%B World Academy of Science, Engineering and Technology
	%I Open Science Index 39, 2010
	%T The Same or Not the Same - On the Variety of Mechanisms of Path Dependence
	%U https://publications.waset.org/pdf/7260
	%V 39
	%X In association with path dependence, researchers often
talk of institutional “lock-in", thereby indicating that far-reaching
path deviation or path departure are to be regarded as exceptional
cases. This article submits the alleged general inclination for stability
of path-dependent processes to a critical review. The different
reasons for path dependence found in the literature indicate that
different continuity-ensuring mechanisms are at work when people
talk about path dependence (“increasing returns", complementarity,
sequences etc.). As these mechanisms are susceptible to fundamental
change in different ways and to different degrees, the path
dependence concept alone is of only limited explanatory value. It is
therefore indispensable to identify the underlying continuity-ensuring
mechanism as well if a statement-s empirical value is to go beyond
the trivial, always true “history matters".
	%P 186 - 196