Strategic Management Journal Strat. Mgmt. J., 24: 279–284 (2003) Published online in Wiley InterScience (www.interscience.wiley.com). DOI: 10.1002/smj.285 RESEARCH NOTES AND COMMENTARIES REVISITING THE LOGICAL AND RESEARCH CONSIDERATIONS OF COMPETITIVE ADVANTAGE RICHARD J. AREND* College of Business, University of Nevada, Las Vegas, Nevada, U.S.A. This commentary addresses the main points made in the recent article by T. C. Powell on the logical and philosophical flaws in the main thesis of strategy research. Each one of Powell’s three points is refutable. The main thesis of strategy research retains logical causation given a reasonable definition of the main explanatory variable. Strategy theory is falsifiable when the implied assumptions of the theory are exploited and the endogeneity of its explanatory variables is considered. The characterization of strategy research as pragmatic instrumentalism void of progress to the objective truth is a proposition without any logical or empirical support. Copyright  2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Strategy may be as much the pursuit of superior returns as a game of language that allows decision- makers to better deal with the problems arising out of that pursuit. T. C. Powell’s (2001) article, ‘Competitive Advantage: Logical and Philosoph- ical Considerations’, is a three-part examination revealing both logical and philosophical flaws in the central thesis of strategy research. This com- mentary provides a critical and complementary analysis and discussion of the proposed flaws. Ironically, the language game that Powell accu- rately accuses some strategy research of being also applies to Powell’s article. The result is that strategy research need not be flawed in causation Key words: competitive advantage; strategy theory; phi- losophy of science * Correspondence to: Richard J. Arend, College of Business, University of Nevada, Las Vegas, 4505 Maryland Parkway, Box 456009, Las Vegas, NV 89154-6009, USA. E-mail: Richard.Arend@ccmail.nevada.edu and falsifiability; it need not be relegated to a being a pragmatic and instrumentalist philosophy of science. Powell’s article contributes three main points. The first is the most damaging—that one cannot logically infer that sustainable competitive advan- tages create sustained superior performance. The second is a more common criticism of strategy theory—that the hypotheses and propositions are tautological and analytic and, hence, of little sci- entific value because they are true by definition and not falsifiable. The third point is the redemp- tive one — there remains some value in the research stream despite the first two points. The argument is that such research at least provides a form of testing of its tenants, but it is through a competi- tion against alternative theories that are similarly problematic rather than through more scientific methods such as empirical falsification. Each of the three points is analyzed below and discussed. Copyright  2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Received 25 October 2001 Final revision received 9 April 2002