The Limits of Organization

The Limits of Organization

Author: Kenneth J. Arrow

Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company

Published: 1974-02-17

Total Pages: 61

ISBN-13: 0393355799

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The tension between what we wish for and what we can get, between values and opportunities, exists even at the purely individual level. A hermit on a mountain may value warm clothing and yet be hard-pressed to make it from the leaves, bark, or skins he can find. But when many people are competing with each other for satisfaction of their wants, learning how to exploit what is available becomes more difficult. In this volume, Nobel Laureate Kenneth J. Arrow analyzes why - and how - human beings organize their common lives to overcome the basic economic problem: the allocation of scarce resources. The price system is one means of organizing society to mediate competition, and Arrow analyzes its successes and failures. Alternative modes of achieving efficient allocation of resources are explored: government, the internal organization of the firm, and the 'invisible institutions' of ethical and moral principles. Professor Arrow shows how these systems create channels to make decisions, and discusses the costs of information acquisition and retrieval. He investigates the factors determining which potential decision variables are recognized as such. Finally, he argues that organizations must achieve some balance between the power of the decision makers and their obligation to those who carry out their decisions - between authority and responsibility.


The Limits of Organization

The Limits of Organization

Author: Kenneth Joseph Arrow

Publisher: W. W. Norton

Published: 1974

Total Pages: 96

ISBN-13:

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Monograph of lectures on the economics of resource allocation processes - examines the ethics and rationality of decision making, the role of pricing, and analyses alternative methods of achieving efficiency, etc., In government, in business organization and in various institutional frameworks. References.


Social Choice and Individual Values

Social Choice and Individual Values

Author: Kenneth Joseph Arrow

Publisher: Yale University Press

Published: 1963-01-01

Total Pages: 152

ISBN-13: 9780300013641

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The literature on the theory of social choice has grown considerably beyond the few items in existence at the time the first edition of this book appeared in 1951. Some of the new literature has dealt with the technical, mathematical aspects, more with the interpretive. My own thinking has also evolved somewhat, although I remain far from satisfied with present formulations. The exhaustion of the first edition provides a convenient time for a selective and personal stocktaking in the form of an appended commentary entitled, 'Notes on the Theory of Social Choice, 1963, ' containing reflections on the text and its omissions and on some of the more recent literature. This form has seemed more appropriate than a revision of the original text, which has to some extent acquired a life of its own.


The Arrow Impossibility Theorem

The Arrow Impossibility Theorem

Author: Eric Maskin

Publisher: Columbia University Press

Published: 2014-07-08

Total Pages: 164

ISBN-13: 0231153287

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Kenneth Arrow's pathbreaking Òimpossibility theoremÓ was a watershed in the history of welfare economics, voting theory, and collective choice, demonstrating that there is no voting rule that satisfies the four desirable axioms of decisiveness, consensus, nondictatorship, and independence. In this book, Amartya Sen and Eric Maskin explore the implications of ArrowÕs theorem. Sen considers its ongoing utility, exploring the theoremÕs value and limitations in relation to recent research on social reasoning, while Maskin discusses how to design a voting rule that gets us closer to the idealÑgiven that achieving the ideal is impossible. The volume also contains a contextual introduction by social choice scholar Prasanta K. Pattanaik and commentaries from Joseph E. Stiglitz and Kenneth Arrow himself, as well as essays by Sen and Maskin outlining the mathematical proof and framework behind their assertions.


Creating a Learning Society

Creating a Learning Society

Author: Joseph E. Stiglitz

Publisher: Columbia University Press

Published: 2015-10-06

Total Pages: 427

ISBN-13: 0231540620

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“A superb new understanding of the dynamic economy as a learning society, one that goes well beyond the usual treatment of education, training, and R&D.”—Robert Kuttner, author of The Stakes: 2020 and the Survival of American Democracy Since its publication Creating a Learning Society has served as an effective tool for those who advocate government policies to advance science and technology. It shows persuasively how enormous increases in our standard of living have been the result of learning how to learn, and it explains how advanced and developing countries alike can model a new learning economy on this example. Creating a Learning Society: Reader’s Edition uses accessible language to focus on the work’s central message and policy prescriptions. As the book makes clear, creating a learning society requires good governmental policy in trade, industry, intellectual property, and other important areas. The text’s central thesis—that every policy affects learning—is critical for governments unaware of the innovative ways they can propel their economies forward. “Profound and dazzling. In their new book, Joseph E. Stiglitz and Bruce C. Greenwald study the human wish to learn and our ability to learn and so uncover the processes that relate the institutions we devise and the accompanying processes that drive the production, dissemination, and use of knowledge . . . This is social science at its best.”—Partha Dasgupta, University of Cambridge “An impressive tour de force, from the theory of the firm all the way to long-term development, guided by the focus on knowledge and learning . . . This is an ambitious book with far-reaching policy implications.”—Giovanni Dosi, director, Institute of Economics, Scuola Superiore Sant’Anna “[A] sweeping work of macroeconomic theory.”—Harvard Business Review


Economic Foundations of Strategy

Economic Foundations of Strategy

Author: Joseph T. Mahoney

Publisher: SAGE

Published: 2005

Total Pages: 273

ISBN-13: 1412905435

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The theoretical foundations of management strategy are identified and outlined in this text. Five theories are considered in the light of questions about how organisations operate efficiently, cost minimization, wealth creation, individual self-interest, and continued growth.


Issues in Contemporary Macroeconomics and Distribution

Issues in Contemporary Macroeconomics and Distribution

Author: George R. Feiwel

Publisher: SUNY Press

Published: 1985-01-01

Total Pages: 512

ISBN-13: 9780873959421

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This important book and its companion volume, Issues in Contemporary Microeconomics and Welfare, capture and convey the spirit, fundamental issues, underlying tensions, rich variety, accomplishments, and failures in contemporary economics. It presents economics as a dynamic subject, showing its strengths and limitations, exploring alternative approaches, and tracing the sources of differences. The essays include original contributions by the theorists themselves; major interpretations, reflections, and assessments by leading economists, and evaluations of particular areas by rising young scholars.