Dilemmas of marketing history from a historiographical perspective

Abstract

The paper challenges historians by suggesting that writing the economical and social history from the last decades of the twentieth century is in a sense unavoidably writing the history of marketing. The content, nature and pure existence of marketing history including its beginnings, is dependent on how we define marketing. Finally the author makes a clear distinction between writing the history of marketing as a profession and marketing thought as a decisive factor in shaping the society and behaviour in the late twentieth century and onwards.