Crises as impulses for changes in socio-economic systems (original) (raw)
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Our book is based on a number of theories. At the center stands the world-systems aspect of research. 1 It is not surprising due to the fact that many trends are more visible at the world-system level rather than at the level of a single country. The authors repeatedly show this with reference to different examples. But overall, this book is about a system of interrelated economic cycles (and crises as they are integral parts of those cycles). Our understanding of the nature of these cycles gives us the ability to anticipate crises and pitfalls that most certainly await us in the future. Perhaps the knowledge provided in this book will supply means to avoid falling into the deepest troughs of future economic crises No matter how attractive the idea of linear progress (that was actively developed since the second half of the eighteenth century Nisbet, 1980) is—nevertheless, it has become apparent that the world evolves in a nonlinear fashion. Among the nonlin-ear phenomena, cyclical movements in various forms constitute one of the most common patterns. It is obvious that the movement toward qualitatively new forms cannot continue end-lessly—linearly and smoothly. It always has limitations, accompanied by the emergence of imbalances, increasing resistance to environmental constraints , competition for resources , etc. These endless attempts to overcome the resistance of the environment created conditions for a more or less noticeable advancement in particular societies.
Crisis and complexity of economic and social systems: from synergy to exposition
2013
This paper analyses the crises that can effect a general economic and social system from an interdisciplinary point of view, focusing on the economic theories concerning the crisis of capitalist systems. Medical, epidemiological, psychological, sociological and political approaches are also considered. Any entity, from a single person or company to wider and more structured realities of modern capitalism (i.e. national economies, productive areas, financial systems, etc.) regarding their respective level of complexity, can be involved in different kinds of crises. The principal aims of the contribution are to understand how the systemic complexity affects both the development and the clearing of the crisis and to explore whether and in which way complex thought may influence a better investigation of crises in a general socioeconomic system.
Intellectual History of Economic Normativities, 2016
A highly topical history of the concept of crisis within European thought, and discusses how its normative use can best be understood. The chapter traces the journey of the concept from medicine to political philosophy and political economy via metaphors such as “body politic” and “social organism”. Engaging via Hegel in a critical discussion of Reinhart Koselleck’s and Istvan Hont’s seminal studies of the concept of crisis, Hansen argues that the “permanent crisis of modernity” is more usefully construed as a result of the normal, but crisis-ridden functioning of modern states and markets than of the Utopianism of free market or socialist thinkers. Hansen thus makes a methodological case for prioritizing the study of the pragmatic rather than Utopian sides of the history of economics.
Critical Social Analysis of Crisis
Praktyka Teoretyczna, 2021
In this article, we offer a critical social analysis of crisis in light of capitalist development and, above all, in the post-2008 world. We discuss five approaches in the social sciences that deal with the problem of crisis and develop some theoretical lines for a critical approach to the theme. We argue that precarity can be an important topic for grasping the current crises via critical approaches. The text also presents the six articles that are part of the issue we edited for Praktyka Teoretyczna entitled “Latency of the crisis.”
Rethinking Economics in Response to Current Crisis Phenomena
Ekonomia i Prawo
In seven years from the eruption of a global economic crisis, a noticeable change has taken place in the approach of economists, as well as international economic organisations (i.e. IMF and the World Bank), to analysing the occurring crisis phenomena. A purpose of the article is to present transformation of views and positions of the abovementioned communities in the context of experiences in overcoming crisis and of the modern challenges of post-crisis economy. In this scope, the article shows changes in economic theory and policy and proposals for the new state role, especially emphasizing the significance of institutional environment for socioeconomic development. The assumed research task, performed on the basis of a critical analysis of subject's literature, serves to verify an initial hypothesis of gradual formation of new rules of the game, i.e. institutional order, in the post-crisis world, of which Poland is a part. The postulated institutional order would constitute a connection of social, economic and political aspects. The analysis conducted in the article proved an influence of occurring crisis phenomena on evolution of economic science and policy. In this area, in order to increase explanatory and predictive power of macroeconomics, it is recommended to make use of a more heterodox approach which includes taking into account the financial markets' behavior and macroeconomic effects of income article details:
2021
At the end of 2019 the world was shocked by a severe pandemic that disrupted people's everyday life. Far from being just a health crisis, the COVID-19 pandemic has severe impacts on societies and economies, and it exacerbates existing human inequalities (UNSDG, 2020, p.3). It is forcing individuals and governments to reset priorities and to rethink how the new normal should look like. This critical moment in the history of humankind is characterized by the coexistence of multiple interconnected crises: a health crisis is complicated by an economic, a social, and last but not least, the environmental and climate ones. Scientifically, each crisis has its own unique specificities, but at the same time these crises are linked to each other by common factors. Some of them also originate from the same causes and provoke similar effects, having strong socio-economic repercussions on societal structures. While a dominant sentiment caused by the pandemic is the one of uncertaintly, we ar...
Imre Ungvári-Zrínyi: Crisis Factors and Perspectives of Responsibility (2012)
The crisis, in whatever form it manifests, is always at the same time the crisis of thinking, of interpretation and self-interpretation. But in the case of the economic crisis there also arises the question of correlation of the social activity systems upholding man's life, and the role of the normative (i.e. moral, legal, political) conditions of cooperation. Accordingly this is not only about the social and cultural role of the money (Simmel), or the autopoiesis of the autoreferential social systems (Luhmann), but also about what makes the critique of the market economy inevitable from an economic and systemic risk point of view (Polányi, U. Beck), or about the question of whether systemic problems could be solved in the frameworks of branch ethics of financial practice or of comprehensive ethics in the economy. It seems to us that the analysis of the evolvement of the crisis draws our attention on the fact that it is not the accidental errors or occasional disorderliness that we meet here, but that the financial guidance of the whole economic process (e.g. taking self-interest maximization as the sole measure of economic rationality or coordinating economic activities according to the consideration of the shortest term of revenue) is essentially problematic. If we are able to conceive the economic crisis also as the crisis of our thinking and our ways of leading a life, it may come to light that not only the economic system's characteristics are responsible for the crisis, but also the subjective expectations connected with the economic-financial system. Accordingly the annulment of the causes of the crisis isn't the special problem of the economists, entrepreneurs and politicians only, but also a first order problem for both the average people, and the humanities and philosophy.