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The Self-organisation of the Economy
Abstract
Self-organisation of the economy is an old topic. But what is its nature? Is it akin to a valve which regulates a machine through a feedback loop, to the dynamic stability of a thermodynamic system, to the evolution of spontaneous order or to the self-reproduction of biological systems? In this chapter, I will introduce a particularly radical form of self-organisation. We will assume that the economy continues through a process of ongoing self-reproduction. Very much like a biological cell, the economy not only structures but generates the elements of which it consists. More precisely: the economy is defined as a network of elementary operations that recursively reproduces elementary operations.
... xxxviii. These include random processes [433], systems exhibiting self organised criticality [44,45], dynamical systems [47], self organising systems [261,270,404,405,435] and chaotic systems [43,46,49,81,82,103,272,325,326,355,406,407]. xxxix. ...
This paper proposes some requirements for the successful application of evolutionary algorithms in economic modelling. It describes a mechanism of social evolution analogous to biological evolution, and complementary to the process of 'rational' action proposed in economic theory. It uses ideas from a number of disciplines to illustrate the possibilities and difficulties of constructing models of social evolution. It concludes that a synthesis of these techniques may provide a coherent and powerful approach to the study of social processes.
... It is generated inside the conversation. The distinction itself-and here lies a technical difficulty of theory construction -cannot be reflected by the conversation which uses it because it appears in the semantic form of paradox (Krippendorff 1984, Luhmann 1988, Hutter 1989, 1990). ...
Zusendungen: Alle den redaktionellen Teil der Zeitschrift betreffenden Zusendungen sind zu richten an: Dr. Theodor W. Beine, Universitat-Gesamthochschule Essen, Fachbereich 1, UniversitatsstraBe 12, 4300 Essen, oder an die Herausgeber. Urheber-und Verlagsrechte: Die Zeitschrift und alle in ihr enthaltenen einzelnen Beitrage und Abbildungen sind urheberrechtlich geschUtzt. Jede Verwertung, welcher Art auch immer, auBerhalb der engen Grenzen des Urheberrechtsgesetzes bedarf der Zustimmung des Verlages. Das gilt auch fur Ubertragungen in eine von Maschinen insbes. Datenverarbeitungs-anlagen verwendbare Sprache. Manuskripte: Eine Haftung fUr unverlangt eingereichte Manuskripte wird nicht Ubernommen. Eine RUckgabeerfolgt nur, wenn RUckporto beigeftigt ist. Die Einreichung des Manuskripts stellt ein Angebot an Verlag und Redaktion zur Ubertragung des ausschlieBlichen Verlagsrechts fiir die Zeit bis zum Ablauf des Urheberrechts dar. Die AnnahmeerkHi-rung kann fOrmlich erfolgen, sie kann aber auch implizit durch Abdruck des Manu-skripts ausgesprochen werden. Das tibertragene Verlagsrecht schlieBt auch die Befug-nisse zur Einspeicherung in eine Datenbank sowie zu weiteren VervieWiltigungen zu gewerblichen Zwecken in jedem mOglichen Verfahren ein. Dem Autor verbleibt die Befugnis, nach Ablauf eines Jahres anderen Verlagen eine einfache Abdruckgenehmi-gung zu erteilen; ein eventuelles Honorar hieraus steht dem Autor zu. Erscheinungsweise: Die Zeitschrift erscheint zweimal ji:ihrlich im Gesamtumfang von 256 Seiten. Bez·ugspreis: Jahrlich DM 128,-(incl. DM 8,37 Mwst.) zuzUglich Versandkosten. Bestellungen: kOnnen tiber jede Buchhandlung oder direkt an den Verlag gerichtet werden. Abbestellungen: mUssen 6 Wochen vor Jahresende erfolgen. Verlag: Duncker &
... Despite the instability and contingency of sin~le events, the fabric of society is perceived as a coherent stream of conversation wh1ch reproduces itself continuously through new communication events. The "system" consists of language, and it is organized as a play, i.e. as a self-organizing process of selfreferential communication acts (Hutter 1990). In our society's history, religion was the only accepted self-sufficient play, the only source of "ultimate meaning" until the 16th century. ...
Our thesis of history of the economic analysis concerns the taking into account of the individual economic behaviours in the Austrian theoretical tradition, through the work, essentially, of C.Menger, F.Wieser, J.A.Schumpeter, F.A.Hayek and L.Von Mises. Our study initially establishes the original features of this tradition, in the field of the treatment of the concept of economic agent. Thus, one of the major elements characterizing the Austrian approach is the study of the behaviors, through the analysis between the individual behaviors and the social interactions, by the means of the social rules and the organizations. Our thesis then aims at analyzing how this tradition could reveal two forms different of rationality, one characteristic of innovating behaviors, the other of mimetic behaviors and/or creatures of habit. In the studied Austrian authors, the interactions between these two typical forms of behavior are at the origin of the explanation of the emergence of the institutions or economic dynamics. Lastly, our study up to what point analyzes this distinction between two types of rationality can make it possible to clarify the problems of creation and diffusion of the technological innovations within the modern economies. It shows in particular that technical progress does not answer only one purely economic efficiency or a logic of selection, but also depends on the installation of institutions. Our work thus exceeds the framework of the only history of the economic thinking, since it has outlets in the fields of the economy of the knowledge and the economy of the innovation.
This 1994 collection of interdisciplinary essays was the first to investigate how images in the history of the natural and physical sciences have been used to shape the history of economic thought. The contributors, historians of science and economics alike, document the extent to which scholars have drawn on physical and natural science to ground economic ideas and evaluate the role and importance of metaphors in the structure and content of economic thought. These range from Aristotle's discussion of the division of labour, to Marshall's evocation of population biology, to Hayek's dependence upon evolutionary concepts, and more recently to neoclassical economists' invocation of chaos theory. Resort to such images, contributors find, was more than mere rhetorical flourish. Rather, appeals to natural and physical metaphors serve to constitute the very subject matter of the discipline and what might be accepted as the 'economic'.
Die Produktion von Recht
- M Hutter
Soziale Systeme (Frankfurt: Suhrkamp)
- N Luhmann
Argumente für den dritten Weg
- O Sik
Die Wirtschaft der Gesellschaft (Frankfurt: Suhrkamp)
- N Luhmann
The Wealth of Nations, Books I–III (Harmondsworth: Penguin)
- A Smith
Information und Risiko in der Marktwirtschaft (Frankfurt: Suhrkamp)
- D Baecker
Music as a Source of Growth
- M Hutter