European Journal of Marketing: Volume 36 Issue 3

Revisiting the marketing domain

Sidney J. Levy

The two debates about the domain of marketing and the division between theory and practice are old, recurring and endless. Nevertheless, it is indubitable that marketing pervades…

Marketing as a profession: on closing stakeholder gaps

Shelby D. Hunt

Historically, “closing the gap” or “bridging the divide” between marketing academe and marketing practice has been one of the most hotly debated issues in marketing. This article…

Vote, vote, vote for Philip Kotler

Stephen Brown

Thirty years ago, Philip Kotler drafted the modern marketing constitution and most would agree that it has served the discipline well. A generation on from Kotler’s conceptual…

Practical value of adequate marketing management theory

Evert Gummesson

This is a critical discourse on marketing management textbooks and their presentations of general marketing theory. These books claim to be general, complete and up‐to‐date…

Research in marketing: teasing with trivia or risking relevance?

Nigel F. Piercy

There are many suggestions that marketing is a discipline in decline and distress, or experiencing a “mid‐life crisis” (though one from which it may not recover). At the heart of…

Is marketing knowledge useful?

Kjell Grønhaug

Market knowledge is usually believed to be useful. Both the concepts of “knowledge” and “useful” are, however, rather ambiguous and used in multiple ways. The concepts are…

Discovering diversity in marketing practice

John A. Murray, Aidan O’Driscoll, Ann Torres

Marketing practice varies among firms. However, the prescriptive literature emphasises a universal view of practice, a “one‐size‐fits‐all” view. This paper addresses the issue of…

A bridge over troubled water?

Robin Wensley

Much of the discussion about the relationship between marketing academe and practice assumes that there is a wide, and indeed sometimes widening, gap between these two domains…