【正文】 building a strategic management based on creative action, therefore, would call for theories that explain the selection of goals as endogenous to the strategic management process. In strategic management, researchers such as Mintzberg have called for a research program to examine strategies that were intended as well as those that were realized despite intentions (Mintzberg, 1978). One such theory, the theory of effectual (as opposed to causal) reasoning has recently been developed in entrepreneurship and as will be seen in the following sections, will bring additional new answers to the other three fundamental questions in strategic management. While creativity in causal reasoning consists in generating alternative means for the achievement of prespecified goals, creativity in effectual reasoning involves the generation of possible goals, given limited means and constraints within dynamic and interactive environments. The theory of effectuation suggests that the solution to goal ambiguity need not lie in random and equivocal efforts or in dumb luck. 2. Firm Differentiation Emphasizing effectuation rather than causationWhy are firms different? Or, what sustains the heterogeneity in resources and performance among close petitors despite petition and imitative attempts?Differentiating between generalized aspirations and specific goalsThe issue of differentiation is even an issue only if we assume homogeneity of goals, especially goals that are determined prior to choice. In reality, however, human beings do not begin with specific goals – only with vague and generalized aspirations, that are themselves contingent upon a host of situational and temporal factors. This intrinsically pluralizing role of contingent aspirations affects both demandside and supplyside choices. For example, on the demand side, most hungry customers do not start with the “need” for a specific food such as hamburgers. Instead they start with a generalized hunger for something to eat. The entrepreneur induces the customer to transform that generalized aspiration into a concrete demand for a specific product such as the hamburgers manufactured by a particular pany. There are two types of choice here. The first one involves the transformation of a vague aspiration such as hunger into the specific desire for a hamburger. The second one involves the choice between possible hamburger joints, given the desire for a hamburger. As proponents of the resourcebased theory of the firm have pointed out, in mainstream economics and management, we tend to model the latter type of choice (., choice between means to achieve a particular goal) rather than the earlier one – ., the choice between possible ends, given particular means and very generalized aspirations (Ulrich amp。 Vanberg, 1991). In that paper, they argue for the usefulness of a perceptual construct of the market as a creative process, rather than as a discovery process, or the more familiar allocative process. Their arguments are based on a fundamental assumption of the future that is not merely unknown, but essentially unknowable. Only speculations and conjectures are possible about the future because the future is created by the choices that human beings make: “Entrepreneurial activity, in particular, is not to be modeled as discovery of that which is “out there.” Such activity, by contrast, creates a reality that will be different subsequent on differing choices. Hence, the reality of the future must be shaped by choices yet to be made, and this reality has no existence independent of these choices. With regard to a “yet to be created” reality, it is surely confusing to consider its emergence in terms of the discovery of “overlooked opportunities.” (178)Creative actionPursuant to the detailed arguments advanced by Buchanan and Vanberg, we propose the following answer to the first fundamental issue in strategic management: Firms behave creatively. Firms not only use rational and analytical decision making, they also use creative action as a way to figure out both goals and strategies in an intrinsically dynamic process. If we are to build theories of strategic management and entrepreneurship based on creative rather than rational action We use the terms “rational action” and “creative action” in their precise philosophical/sociological meanings – such as those used by Parsons and Joas respectively (Parsons, 19xx。s General Electric, UHaul, AES Corporation, Netscape, Beanie Babies, and the MIR space resort.Historically, opportunities have been supposed to exist and the entrepreneur either is alert to them (Kirzner, 1979) or somehow goes about discovering them (Hayek, 1945 and Schumpeter, 1976). But the idea we will explore in this chapter is that entrepreneurial opportunities often have to be created by using the entrepreneurial imagination to embody human aspirations in concrete products and markets.THE CREATIVE ENTREPRENEURIAL ASPECTS OFFUNDAMENTAL ISSUES IN STRATEGIC MANAGEMENT1. Firm Behavior Emphasizing the creativity of human actionHow do firms behave? Or, do firms really behave like rational actors, and, if not, what models of their behavior should be used by researchers and policy makers?Rational ActionEconomics has long rested on foundations of rational action。 and (b) actions based on those beliefs. In sum, an entrepreneurial opportunity consists of:1. Supply side: New or existing idea/s or invention/s。 Sarasvathy, 2001). Depending upon the pleteness and/or consistency of the larger environment, entrepreneurial opportunities may have to be recognized or discovered or created. In this chapter, we first examine these three types of action connected with entrepreneurial opportunities through a framework based on the preconditions for their existence. Thereafter, we explore the four fundamental issues of strategic management listed above from an entrepreneurial opportunity perspective.