Capitalism as a complex adaptive system and its growth

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Author(s)
Witt, Ulrich
Griffith University Author(s)
Year published
2017
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Complex adaptive systems consist of a multitude of agents from whose individual adaptation efforts the adaptive behavior of the system as a whole emerges. In this paper it will be argued that capitalism is a complex adaptive system. Except for its particular mode of production many of its features are typical for such a system. A case in point is the way in which economic growth emerges as a collective outcome of individual adaptation strategies. The complex adaptive systems perspective offers a particular explanation for why the successive extension of the bounds of existing production possibilities is unsteady and rather ...
View more >Complex adaptive systems consist of a multitude of agents from whose individual adaptation efforts the adaptive behavior of the system as a whole emerges. In this paper it will be argued that capitalism is a complex adaptive system. Except for its particular mode of production many of its features are typical for such a system. A case in point is the way in which economic growth emerges as a collective outcome of individual adaptation strategies. The complex adaptive systems perspective offers a particular explanation for why the successive extension of the bounds of existing production possibilities is unsteady and rather wasteful in capitalism. Moreover, the strategies by which the agents try to adapt to crises – many of which imply some form of innovations – do not necessarily contribute to a re-emergence of new growth impulses. It is shown that the empirical record of economic growth in the most developed economies indeed reveals a trend of declining growth rates. This seems to suggest that successfully creating new economic growth through innovative strategies is the more difficult, the more prosperous an economy becomes. The paper discusses what can be conjectured to be the cause of this development and what to do about it.
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View more >Complex adaptive systems consist of a multitude of agents from whose individual adaptation efforts the adaptive behavior of the system as a whole emerges. In this paper it will be argued that capitalism is a complex adaptive system. Except for its particular mode of production many of its features are typical for such a system. A case in point is the way in which economic growth emerges as a collective outcome of individual adaptation strategies. The complex adaptive systems perspective offers a particular explanation for why the successive extension of the bounds of existing production possibilities is unsteady and rather wasteful in capitalism. Moreover, the strategies by which the agents try to adapt to crises – many of which imply some form of innovations – do not necessarily contribute to a re-emergence of new growth impulses. It is shown that the empirical record of economic growth in the most developed economies indeed reveals a trend of declining growth rates. This seems to suggest that successfully creating new economic growth through innovative strategies is the more difficult, the more prosperous an economy becomes. The paper discusses what can be conjectured to be the cause of this development and what to do about it.
View less >
Journal Title
Journal of Open Innovation: Technology, Market, and Complexity
Volume
3
Copyright Statement
© The Author(s). 2017 Open Access This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International
License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium,
provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and
indicate if changes were made.
Subject
Commerce, Management, Tourism and Services not elsewhere classified
Other Technology
Other Commerce, Management, Tourism and Services