The question of what kind of innovations can secure our future is in this paper put in perspective with the unknown risks which innovations may imply. Innovations sometimes turn out to cause severe negative externalities after they have successfully passed the market test. In such cases, the...

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...

In den letzten Jahren ist in der Ökonomik verstärkt darüber diskutiert worden, ob mit einem evolutorischen Ansatz ein verbessertes Verständnis wirtschaftlicher Abläufe und Veränderungen zu erreichen ist. Die Debatte fällt zusammen mit der Renaissance Schumpeterscher Ideen, stützt sich...

Das wirtschaftliche Geschehen aus einer Perspektive zu betrachten und zu erklären, die seine evolutionären Seiten hervorhebt, ist an sich ein altes Anliegen in der Volkswirtschaftslehre. Durch die Vorherrschaft statischer Konzepte lange Zeit in den Hintergrund gedrängt, findet eine solche...

The fact that innovative capitalism needs institutional co-evolution has widely been recognized with respect to pro-active institutional adaptations. Examples are the rearrangement and safeguarding of supply chains or the creation of public institutions providing indispensable systemic...

An evolutionary tool kit is applied in this paper to explain how innate social behavior traits evolved in early human groups. These traits were adapted to the particular production requirements of the group in human phylogeny. They shaped the group members' attitudes towards contributing to the...

In constitutional political economy, the citizens' constitutional interests determine the social contract that is binding for the post-constitutional market game. However, following traditional preference subjectivism, it is left open what the constitutional interest are. Using the example of...

The intellectual histories of economics and evolutionary biology are closely intertwined because both subjects deal with living, complex, evolving systems. Because the subject matter is similar, contemporary evolutionary thought has much to offer to economics. In recent decades theoretical...

To assess whether and when the equation economic growth = better life holds, it is necessary to understand what human motivations drive the economic growth process. The preference subjectivism of canonical welfare economics is of little help here as it treats the motivations underlying...

Persistently rising energy prices have revived interest in the economic impact of changing energy costs. We explore the effects of these costs on sectoral change, particularly in relation to the rise and future prospects of the service economy. Following Baumol's cost disease hypothesis,...