Hostname: page-component-848d4c4894-ttngx Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-05-27T06:51:54.845Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Hayek's Theory of Cultural Evolution: An Evaluation in the Light of Vanberg's Critique

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 December 2008

Geoffrey M. Hodgson
Geoffrey M. Hodgson
Affiliation:
Newcastle upon Tyne Polytechnic
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

The application of evolutionary ideas to socioeconomic systems has been an increasingly prominent theme in the work of Friedrich Hayek, and the motif has become dominant in his recent book (Hayek, 1988). In an earlier issue of this journal, Viktor Vanberg (1986) raises two substantive criticisms of Friedrich Hayek' theory of cultural evolution that invoke some important questions concerning use of the evolutionary analogy in social science.

Type
Essays
Information
Economics & Philosophy , Volume 7 , Issue 1 , April 1991 , pp. 67 - 82
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1991

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Arnold, Anthony J., and Kurt, Fristrup. 1982. “The Theory of Evolution by Natural Selection: A Hierarchical Expansion.” Paleobiology 8:113–29. Reprinted in Brandon and Burian (1984).Google Scholar
Becker, Gary S. 1976. The Economic Approach to Human Behavior. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Bertalanffy, Ludwig von. 1952. Problems of Life: An Evaluation of Modern Biological Thought. New York: Wiley.Google Scholar
Bertalanffy, Ludwig von. 1971. General System Theory: Foundation Development Applications. London: Allen Lane.Google Scholar
Boehm, Stephan. 1989. “Hayek on Knowledge, Equilibrium and Prices: Context and Impact.” Wirtschaftspolitische Blatter 36:201–13.Google Scholar
Brandon, Robert N. 1982. “The Levels of Selection.” In Philosophy of Science Association 1982, Vol. 1, edited by Asquith, P. D. and Nickels, T., pp. 315–22, East Lansing, MI: Philosophy of Science Association. Reprinted in Brandon and Burian (1984).Google Scholar
Brandon, Robert N., and Burian, Richard M. (editors). 1984. Genes, Organisms, Populations: Controversies Over the Units of Selection. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Dawkins, Richard, 1976. The Selfish Gene. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Dawkins, Richard, 1982. The Extended Phenotype: The Gene as the Unit of Selection. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Dunbar, M. S. 1960. “The Evolution of Stability in Marine Environments: Natural Selection at the Level of the Ecosystem.” American Naturalist 94:129–36.Google Scholar
Dupré, John (editor). 1987. The Latest on the Best: Essays on Evolution and Optimality. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Eldredge, Niles. 1985. Unfinished Synthesis: Biological Hierarchies and Modern Evolutionary Thought. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Gould, Stephen Jay. 1980a. The Panda's Thumb. New York: Norton.Google Scholar
Gould, Stephen Jay. 1980b. “Is a New and General Theory of Evolution Emerging?” Paleobiology 6:119–30.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gould, Stephen Jay, and Lewontin, Richard C.. 1979. “The Spandrels of San Marco and the Panglossian Paradigm: A Critique of the Adaptionist Programme. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London, Series B, 205:581–98. Reprinted in Sober (1984b).Google Scholar
Gray, John. 1984. Hayek on Liberty. Oxford: Basil Blackwell.Google Scholar
Hayek, Friedrich A. 1948. Individualism and Economic Order. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Hayek, Friedrich A. 1967. Studies in Philosophy, Politics and Economics. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul.Google Scholar
Hayek, Friedrich A. 1982. Law, Legislation and Liberty. 3 vols, combined edition. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul.Google Scholar
Hayek, Friedrich A. 1988. The Fatal Conceit: The Errors of Socialism, Collected Works of F. A. Hayek, Vol. 1. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Hodgson, Geoffrey M. 1984. The Democratic Economy: A New Look at Planning, Markets and Power. Harmondsworth: Penguin.Google Scholar
Hodgson, Geoffrey M. 1988. Economics and Institutions: A Manifesto for a Modern Institutional Economics. Cambridge: Polity Press.Google Scholar
Lewontin, Richard C. 1970. “The Units of Selection.” Annual Review of Ecology and Systematics 1:1–18.Google Scholar
Mayhew, Anne. 1987. “Culture: Core Concept Under Attack.” Journal of Economic Issues 21:587–603.Google Scholar
Maynard Smith, John. 1964. “Group Selection and Kin Selection.” Nature 201:1145–47.Google Scholar
Maynard Smith, John. 1976. “Group Selection.” Quarterly Review of Biology 51:277–83. Reprinted in Readings in Sociobiology, edited by T. H. Clutton-Brock and P. H. Harvey, 1978. Reading: W. H. Freeman. Reprinted also in Brandon and Burian (1984).Google Scholar
Maynard Smith, John. 1980. “The Concepts of Sociobiology.” In Morality as a Biological Phenomenon, edited by Stent, G. S., pp. 21–30. Berkeley: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Mayr, Ernst. 1963. Animal Species and Evolution. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Menger, Carl. 1963. Problems of Economics and Sociology, translated by Nock, F. J. from the German edition of 1983, with an introduction by Louis Schneider. Urbana: University of Illinois Press.Google Scholar
Mises, Ludwig von. 1949. Human Action: A Treatise on Economics. London: William Hodge.Google Scholar
Oster, George F. and Wilson, Edward O.. 1978. Caste and Ecology in the Social Insects. Princeton: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Prisching, M. 1989. “Evolution and Design of Social Institutions in Austrian Theory.” Journal of Economic Studies 16:47–62.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sober, Elliott. 1981. “Holism, Individualism, and the Units of Selection.” In Philosophy of Science Association 1980, edited by Asquith, P. D. and Giere, R. N., Vol. 2, pp. 93–121. East Lansing, MI: Philosophy of Science Association. Reprinted in Sober (1984b).Google Scholar
Sober, Elliott. 1984a. The Nature of Selection: Evolutionary Theory in Philosophical Focus. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Sober, Elliott. (editor). 1984b. Conceptual Issues in Evolutionary Biology: An Anthology. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Sober, Elliott, and Lewontin, Richard C.. 1982. “Artifact, Cause, and Genic Selection.” Philosophy of Science 49:157–80. Reprinted in Sober (1984b).Google Scholar
Spencer, Herbert. 1969. Principles of Sociology, edited by Andreski, S., London: Macmillan.Google Scholar
Stanley, Steven M. 1975. “A Theory of Evolution Above the Species Level.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, U.S.A. 72:646–50.Google Scholar
Trivers, Robert L. 1985. Social Evolution. Menlo Park, CA: Benjamin-Cummings.Google Scholar
Van Valen, Leigh. 1975. “Group Selection, Sex, and Fossils.” Evolution 29:87–94.Google Scholar
Vanberg, Viktor. 1986. “Spontaneous Market Order and Social Rules: A Critique of F.A. Hayek's Theory of Cultural Evolution.” Economics and Philosophy 2:75–100.Google Scholar
Wade, Michael J. 1976. “Group Selection Among Laboratory Populations of Tribolium.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, U.S.A. 73:4604–07.Google Scholar
Wade, Michael J. 1977. “An Experimental Study of Group Selection.” Evolution 31:134–53.Google Scholar
Wade, Michael J. 1978. “A Critical Review of the Models of Group Selection.” Quarterly Review of Biology 53:101–14. Reprinted in Brandon and Burian (1984).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Weber, Max. 1978. The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism. London: Allen and Unwin.Google Scholar
Weiss, Paul A. 1971. Hierarchically Organized Systems in Theory and Practice. New York: Hafner.Google Scholar
Williams, George C. 1966. Adaptation and Natural Selection. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Williams, George C. 1986. “A Defence of Reductionism in Evolutionary Biology.” In Oxford Surveys in Evolutionary Biology, edited by Dawkins, R. and Ridley, M., Vol. 2, pp. 1–27. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Wilson, David Sloan. 1975. “A General Theory of Group Selection.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, U.S.A. 72:143–46.Google Scholar
Wilson, David Sloan. 1977. “Structured Demes and the Evolution of Group Advantageous Traits.” American Naturalist 111:157–85.Google Scholar
Wilson, David Sloan. 1980. The Natural Selection of Populations and Communities. Menlo Park, CA: Benjamin/Cummings.Google Scholar
Wilson, David Sloan. 1983. “The Group Selection Controversy: History and Current Status.” Annual Review of Ecology and Systematics 14:159–88.Google Scholar
Wilson, David Sloan, and Sober, Elliott. 1989. “Reviving the Superorganism.” Journal of Theoretical Biology 136:337–56.Google Scholar
Wilson, Edward O. 1975. Sociobiology. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Wimsatt, William C. 1980. “Reductionist Research Strategies and Their Bases in the Units of Selection Controversy.” In Scientific Discovery, Volume II, Historical and Scientific Case Studies, edited by Nickles, T., pp. 213–59. Dordrecht, Holland: Reidel. Extracted in Brandon and Burian (1984) and reprinted in Sober (1984b).Google Scholar
Wright, Sewall. 1931. “Evolution in Mendelian Populations.” Genetics 16:97–159.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Wright, Sewall. 1956. “Modes of Selection.” American Naturalist 90:5–24.Google Scholar
Wright, Sewall. 1959. “Physiological Genetics, Ecology of Populations, and Natural Selection.” Perspectives on Biological Medicine 3:107–51.Google Scholar
Wynne-Edwards, V. C. 1962. Animal Dispersion in Relation to Social Behavior. Edinburgh: Oliver and Boyd.Google Scholar
Wynne-Edwards, V. C. 1978. “Intrinsic Population Control: An Introduction.” In Population Control by Social Behavior, edited by Ebling, F. J. and Stoddart, D. M.. London: Institute of Biology.Google Scholar
Wynne-Edwards, V. C. 1986. Evolution Through Group Selection. Oxford: Basil Blackwell.Google Scholar