IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ags/midasp/11691.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Against Mechanism: Methodology For An Evolutionary Economics

Author

Listed:
  • Schmid, A. Allan
  • Thompson, Paul B.

Abstract

When the first economics departments were proposed at Cambridge and Oxford, the proponents thought acceptance would be improved if economics could be seen as incorporating the methods of physics. The enterprise was premised on the existence of economic laws that describe invariant relationships between events. These event regularities, like gravity, were not affected by human action. Humans could adapt and use them, but not change them. Thus the metaphor of "mechanism" seemed appropriate and became embedded in economists' language. It is common to use the term market mechanism to link prices and commodities. This suggests the economy is like turning a crank attached to a set of gears where there is a fixed relationship between the crank's motion and the last gear's motion. The gears have no ideas of their own, they don't get mad; there is no cognitive element between events and action.

Suggested Citation

  • Schmid, A. Allan & Thompson, Paul B., 1999. "Against Mechanism: Methodology For An Evolutionary Economics," Staff Paper Series 11691, Michigan State University, Department of Agricultural, Food, and Resource Economics.
    • Handle: RePEc:ags:midasp:11691
    DOI: 10.22004/ag.econ.11691
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://ageconsearch.umn.edu/record/11691/files/sp99-39.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.22004/ag.econ.11691?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Arrow, Kenneth J, 1986. "Rationality of Self and Others in an Economic System," The Journal of Business, University of Chicago Press, vol. 59(4), pages 385-399, October.
    2. Stephen Knack & Philip Keefer, 1997. "Does Social Capital Have an Economic Payoff? A Cross-Country Investigation," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 112(4), pages 1251-1288.
    3. Stiglitz, Joseph E, 1987. "The Causes and Consequences of the Dependence of Quality on Price," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 25(1), pages 1-48, March.
    4. Hausman, Daniel M., 1998. "Problems with Realism in Economics," Economics and Philosophy, Cambridge University Press, vol. 14(2), pages 185-213, October.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Kim, Seong Hee & Kim, Byung-Yeon, 2020. "Migration and trust: Evidence from West Germany after unification," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 179(C), pages 425-441.
    2. Eiji Yamamura, 2011. "How Do Neighbors Influence Investment in Social Capital? Homeownership and Length of Residence," International Advances in Economic Research, Springer;International Atlantic Economic Society, vol. 17(4), pages 451-464, November.
    3. Shagata Mukherjee, 2020. "What Drives Gender Differences in Trust and Trustworthiness?," Public Finance Review, , vol. 48(6), pages 778-805, November.
    4. Torgler, Benno & Schneider, Friedrich & Schaltegger, Christoph A., 2007. "With or Against the People? The Impact of a Bottom-Up Approach on Tax Morale and the Shadow Economy," Berkeley Olin Program in Law & Economics, Working Paper Series qt6331x6vz, Berkeley Olin Program in Law & Economics.
    5. Heineck, Guido & Süssmuth, Bernd, 2013. "A different look at Lenin’s legacy: Social capital and risk taking in the Two Germanies," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 41(3), pages 789-803.
    6. Niclas Berggren & Christian Bjørnskov, 2023. "Does legal freedom satisfy?," European Journal of Law and Economics, Springer, vol. 55(1), pages 1-28, February.
    7. Alexandra Benham & Lee Benham, 2010. "The Costs of Exchange," Chapters, in: Peter G. Klein & Michael E. Sykuta (ed.), The Elgar Companion to Transaction Cost Economics, chapter 11, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    8. Haile, Daniel & Sadrieh, Abdolkarim & Verbon, Harrie A.A., 2008. "Self-serving dictators and economic growth," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 67(3-4), pages 573-586, September.
    9. Ray, Jayant & Rivera-Batiz, Francisco L., 2002. "An Analysis of Sample Selection Bias in Cross-Country Growth Regressions," MPRA Paper 114753, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    10. Deininger, Klaus, 1995. "Collective agricultural production: A solution for transition economies?," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 23(8), pages 1317-1334, August.
    11. Daniel Horn & Hubert Kiss Janos & Sára Khayouti, 2020. "Does trust associate with political regime?," CERS-IE WORKING PAPERS 2013, Institute of Economics, Centre for Economic and Regional Studies.
    12. o'higgins, s. niall & Sbriglia, Patrizia, 2007. "measures of social capital and trust," MPRA Paper 6924, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    13. Benno Torgler & Friedrich Schneider, 2005. "What Shapes the Attitudes Towards Paying Taxes? Evidence from Switzerland, Belgium and Spain," CREMA Working Paper Series 2005-06, Center for Research in Economics, Management and the Arts (CREMA).
    14. Robert Jiro Netzer & Matthias Sutter, 2009. "Intercultural trust. An experiment in Austria and Japan," Working Papers 2009-05, Faculty of Economics and Statistics, Universität Innsbruck.
    15. Blaine G Robbins, 2012. "A Blessing and a Curse? Political Institutions in the Growth and Decay of Generalized Trust: A Cross-National Panel Analysis, 1980–2009," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 7(4), pages 1-14, April.
    16. Dong, Zhiqiang & Zhang, Yongjing, 2016. "Accumulated social capital, institutional quality, and economic performance: Evidence from China," Economic Systems, Elsevier, vol. 40(2), pages 206-219.
    17. Eric Fesselmeyer & Kiat Ying Seah, 2018. "Individual Payoffs and the Effect of Homeownership on Social Capital Investment," Journal of Housing Research, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 27(1), pages 59-78, January.
    18. Jan Tullberg, 2009. "Moral Compliance and the Concealed Charm of Prudence," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 89(4), pages 599-612, November.
    19. Becchetti, Leonardo & Degli Antoni, Giacomo & Ottone, Stefania & Solferino, Nazaria, 2013. "Allocation criteria under task performance: The gendered preference for protection," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 45(C), pages 96-111.
    20. Zakaria Babutsidze & Nobuyuki Hanaki & Adam Zylbersztejn, 2019. "Digital Communication and Swift Trust," Post-Print halshs-02409314, HAL.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ags:midasp:11691. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: AgEcon Search (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/damsuus.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.