Author: Richard R. Nelson Publisher: Harvard University Press ISBN: 9780674041431 Category : Business & Economics Languages : en Pages : 456
Book Description
This book contains the most sustained and serious attack on mainstream, neoclassical economics in more than forty years. Nelson and Winter focus their critique on the basic question of how firms and industries change overtime. They marshal significant objections to the fundamental neoclassical assumptions of profit maximization and market equilibrium, which they find ineffective in the analysis of technological innovation and the dynamics of competition among firms. To replace these assumptions, they borrow from biology the concept of natural selection to construct a precise and detailed evolutionary theory of business behavior. They grant that films are motivated by profit and engage in search for ways of improving profits, but they do not consider them to be profit maximizing. Likewise, they emphasize the tendency for the more profitable firms to drive the less profitable ones out of business, but they do not focus their analysis on hypothetical states of industry equilibrium. The results of their new paradigm and analytical framework are impressive. Not only have they been able to develop more coherent and powerful models of competitive firm dynamics under conditions of growth and technological change, but their approach is compatible with findings in psychology and other social sciences. Finally, their work has important implications for welfare economics and for government policy toward industry.
Author: Stanley L. Brue Publisher: Thomson South-Western ISBN: 9781133434900 Category : Economics Languages : en Pages : 580
Book Description
This textbook presents the history of economics and the philosophies that drive the economic way of thinking. It explains the ideas of the great economic thinkers and their logical connections to the world of today and tomorrow.
Author: Phyllis Deane Publisher: Cambridge University Press ISBN: 9780521293150 Category : Business & Economics Languages : en Pages : 260
Book Description
An introduction to the history of economics for undergraduate students. Puts some of the current theoretical controversies into long-term perspective by tracing their historical antecedents and parallels.
Author: Kurt Dopfer Publisher: Routledge ISBN: 1134466870 Category : Business & Economics Languages : en Pages : 153
Book Description
The first book to chart the development of the field of evolutionary economics, this book provides an integrated generic framework to define the rules of an economic system; how they are coordinated and the causes and consequences of their change. Packed with pedagogical features including essay and tutorial questions, case studies and an extensive bibliography, this book: proposes a new analytic framework for the study of the nature and causes of long run economic growth and development in market systems analyzes the foundations of the neoclassical tradition, before developing a thesis through micro, meso and macro domains drawing conclusions as to what can be learned from the point of view of policy analysis focuses on an open-systems analytical framework and successfully formulates and refines the analytical foundations of a new general theory of economic evolution. This volume is essential reading for scholars and students of economic evolution and as well as for anyone who seeks to better understand the complex evolutionary nature of the structure and dynamics of the knowledge-based economy in today’s society.
Author: Patrick Spread Publisher: Routledge ISBN: 1317303318 Category : Business & Economics Languages : en Pages : 349
Book Description
It is clear even to casual observation that economies evolve from year to year and over centuries. Yet mainstream economic theory assumes that economies always move towards equilibrium. One consequence of this is that mainstream theory is unable to deal with economic history. The Evolution of Economies provides a clear account of how economies evolve under a process of support-bargaining and money-bargaining. Both support-bargaining and money-bargaining are situation-related - people determine their interests and actions by reference to their present circumstances. This gives the bargaining system a natural evolutionary dynamic. Societies evolve from situation to situation. Historical change follows this evolutionary course. A central chapter of the book applies the new theory in a re-evaluation of the industrial revolution in Britain, showing how specialist money-bargaining agencies, in the form of companies, evolved profitable formats and displaced landowners as the leading sources of employment and economic necessities. Companies took advantage of the evolution of technology to establish effective formats. The book also seeks to establish how it came about that a ‘mainstream’ theory was developed that is so wildly at odds with the observable features of economic history and economic exchange. Theory-making is described as a process of ‘intellectual support-bargaining’ in which theory is shaped to the interests of its makers. The work of major classical and neoclassical economists is contested as incompatible with the idea of an evolving money-bargaining system. The book reviews attempts to derive an evolutionary economic theory from Darwin’s theory of evolution by natural selection. Neoclassical economic theory has had enormous influence on the governance of societies, principally through its theoretical endorsement of the benefits of ‘free markets’. An evolutionary account of economic processes should change the basis of debate. The theory presented here will be of interest immediately to all economists, whether evolutionary, heterodox or neoclassical. It will facilitate the work of economic historians, who complain that current theory gives no guidance for their historical investigations. Beyond the confines of professional theory-making, many will find it a revelatory response to questions that have hitherto gone unanswered.
Author: Geoffrey Schneider Publisher: Routledge ISBN: 0429678886 Category : Business & Economics Languages : en Pages : 230
Book Description
In order to fully understand the evolution and future growth of economic systems, we must draw on the lessons of economic history. The 2008 Financial Crisis, for example, mirrored past economic meltdowns with uncanny accuracy. Just like the Great Depression of the 1930s and the Savings and Loan Crisis of the 1980s, it featured deregulated lenders taking incredible risks with other people’s money. Historical analysis is crucial to understanding trends and patterns that can help us predict the future. This text presents a ground-breaking, pluralistic introduction to economic history and the history of economic thought. Tracing the development of economic systems and economic thought, the text introduces students to the story from ancient times to contemporary capitalism, and also its critics. Focusing in particular on Smith, Marx, Veblen, and Keynes, the text encourages students to consider which ideas and systems are still relevant in the modern world. This book can be used as a standalone text for relevant classes or as a supplement in any principles course.
Author: Richard R. Nelson Publisher: Cambridge University Press ISBN: 1108660789 Category : Business & Economics Languages : en Pages : 285
Book Description
Evolutionary economics sees the economy as always in motion with change being driven largely by continuing innovation. This approach to economics, heavily influenced by the work of Joseph Schumpeter, saw a revival as an alternative way of thinking about economic advancement as a result of Richard Nelson and Sidney Winter's seminal book, An Evolutionary Theory of Economic Change, first published in 1982. In this long-awaited follow-up, Nelson is joined by leading figures in the field of evolutionary economics, reviewing in detail how this perspective has been manifest in various areas of economic inquiry where evolutionary economists have been active. Providing the perfect overview for interested economists and social scientists, readers will learn how in each of the diverse fields featured, evolutionary economics has enabled an improved understanding of how and why economic progress occurs.
Author: Andreas Pyka Publisher: Springer ISBN: 3319132997 Category : Business & Economics Languages : en Pages : 637
Book Description
This book is at the cutting edge of the ongoing ‘neo-Schumpeterian’ research program that investigates how economic growth and its fluctuation can be understood as the outcome of a historical process of economic evolution. Much of modern evolutionary economics has relied upon biological analogy, especially about natural selection. Although this is valid and useful, evolutionary economists have, increasingly, begun to build their analytical representations of economic evolution on understandings derived from complex systems science. In this book, the fact that economic systems are, necessarily, complex adaptive systems is explored, both theoretically and empirically, in a range of contexts. Throughout, there is a primary focus upon the interconnected processes of innovation and entrepreneurship, which are the ultimate sources of all economic growth. Twenty two chapters are provided by renowned experts in the related fields of evolutionary economics and the economics of innovation.
Author: Kurt Dopfer Publisher: Springer ISBN: 1349111538 Category : Business & Economics Languages : en Pages : 288
Book Description
Honouring Ota Sik's economics, political life, and his social and humane concerns, this book brings together contributions from economists from East and West. It examines principally the evolution of different economic systems.
Author: Richard R. Nelson
Author: Stanley L. Brue
Author: Phyllis Deane
Author: Kurt Dopfer
Author: Patrick Spread
Author: Geoffrey Schneider
Author: Richard R. Nelson
Author: Andreas Pyka
Author: Kurt Dopfer
Author: Daniel Berkowitz