Richard E. Wagner - Mind, Society, and Human Action: Time and Knowledge in a Theory of Social Economy (Routledge Foundations of the Market Economy)

Mind, Society, and Human Action

Economics originated as a branch of the humane studies that was concerned with trying to understand how some societies flourish while others stagnate, and also how once-flourishing societies could come to stagnate. Over the major part of the twentieth century, however, economists mostly turned away from these humane and societal concerns by importing mechanistic ideas from nineteenth-century physics. This book seeks to show how that original humane and social focus can be renewed.

The many particular topics the book examines can be traced to two central ideas. Firstly, that economic theory, like physics, requires two distinct theoretical frameworks. One treats qualities that are invariant across time and place: this is the domain of equilibrium theory. The other treats the internal generation of change in societies through entrepreneurial action that continually transforms the ecology of enterprises that constitutes a society. Secondly, economic theory is treated as a genuine social science and not a science of rationality writ large. The book also explores ways in which life in society is understood differently once economics is treated as a social science.

The book is aimed at professional audiences who work with economic theory and who find that much of the hyper-formality that comprises economic theory these days fails to make reasonable contact with reality. It will be of interest to sociologists, political scientists, and researchers in law, public policy, Austrian economics, evolutionary economics, institutional economics and political economy.

Richard E. Wagner is Holbert L. Harris Professor of Economics at George Mason University, Fairfax, USA.

Edited by Mario J. Rizzo
New York University
and

Lawrence H. White
University of Missouri at St. Louis

A central theme in this series is the importance of understanding and assessing the market economy from a perspective broader than the static economics of perfect competition and Pareto optimality. Such a perspective sees markets as causal processes generated by the preferences, expectations and beliefs of economic agents. The creative acts of entrepreneurship that uncover new information about preferences, prices and technology are central to these processes with respect to their ability to promote the discovery and use of knowledge in society.

The market economy consists of a set of institutions that facilitate voluntary cooperation and exchange among individuals. These institutions include the legal and ethical framework as well as more narrowly economic patterns of social interaction. Thus the law, legal institutions and cultural and ethical norms, as well as ordinary business practices and monetary phenomena, fall within the analytical domain of the economist.

Previous books in this series include:

1. The Meaning of Market Process

Essays in the development of modern Austrian Economics

Israel M. Kirzner

2. Prices and Knowledge

A market-process perspective

Esteban F. Thomas

3. Keynes General Theory of Interest

A reconsideration

Fiona C. Maclachlan

4. Laissez-Faire Banking

Kevin Dowd

5. Expectations and the Meaning of Institutions

Essays in economics by Ludwig Lachmann

Edited by Don Lavoie

6. Perfect Competition and the Transformation of Economics

Frank M. Machovec

7. Entrepreneurship and the Market Process

An enquiry into the growth of knowledge

David Harper

8. Economics of Time and Ignorance

Gerald ODriscoll and Mario J. Rizzo

9. Dynamics of the Mixed Economy

Toward a theory of interventionism

Sanford Ikeda

10. Neoclassical Microeconomic Theory

The founding of Austrian vision

A. M. Endres

11. The Cultural Foundations of Economic Development

Urban female entrepreneurship in Ghana

Emily Chamlee-Wright

12. Risk and Business Cycles

New and old Austrian perspectives

Tyler Cowen

13. Capital in Disequilibrium

The role of capital in a changing world

Peter Lewin

14. The Driving Force of the Market

Essays in Austrian economics

Israel Kirzner

15. An Entrepreneurial Theory of the Firm

Frdric Sautet

16. Time and Money

The macroeconomics of capital structure

Roger Garrison

17. Microfoundations and Macroeconomics

An Austrian perspective

Steven Horwitz

18. Money and the Market

Essays on free banking

Kevin Dowd

19. Calculation and Coordination

Essays on socialism and transitional political economy

Peter Boettke

20. Keynes & Hayek

The money economy

G. R. Steele

21. The Constitution of Markets

Essays in political economy

Viktor J. Vanberg

22. Foundations of Entrepreneurship and Economic Development

David A. Harper

23. Markets, Information and Communication

Austrian perspectives on the Internet economy

Edited by Jack Birner & Pierre Garrouste

24. The Constitution of Liberty in the Open Economy

Lder Gerken

25. Liberalism Against Liberalism

Javier Aranzadi

26. Money and Markets

Essays in honor of Leland B. Yeager

Edited by Roger Koppl

27. Entrepreneurship and Economic Progress

Randall G. Holcombe

28. The Theory of Dynamic Efficiency

Jess Huerta De Soto

29. Mind, Society, and Human Action

Time and knowledge in a theory of social economy

Richard E. Wagner

Mind, Society, and Human Action

Time and knowledge in a theory of social economy

Richard E. Wagner

LONDON AND NEW YORK

First published 2010
by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN

Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada
by Routledge
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This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2010.

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2010 Richard E. Wagner

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