Economic style
Economic style is a category for the classification of historical economic systems and economic orders, which comes from the world of thought of the historical school of economics of the 19th century and is taken up again today. It should characterize the conditions and features of economic coexistence observed in history, and thus show that there is a specific design of economic activity in a (style) epoch, similar to the styles in art history. With the category economic style, the terms economic order , economic system , economic constitution and economic form are assigned a perspective that sharpens the perspective of economic analysis for historical and cultural issues. The idea of the economic style is based on the view that the prevailing worldview in an epoch - i.e. the moral, religious and ideological constitution of a society as zeitgeist - is reflected in institutions that have a formative power for the formation of the state, economy and society . The style idea is thus oriented towards the historical uniqueness, the individuality of the economic system and the economic order. Alfred Müller-Armack expressed this in his monograph “Genealogy of Economic Styles” as follows: “Style is ... the unity of expression and attitude that is visible in the various areas of life at a time.” The concept of economic style defines the connection between culture and The economy came to the fore and the influence of different cultures on the development of national welfare emphasized.
Representative
Friedrich List , Bruno Hildebrand and Karl Bücher are among the representatives of the business level theory of the older historical school . The outstanding exponent of the Younger Historical School is Gustav von Schmoller . In the generation, sometimes referred to as the Third Historical School, Werner Sombart and Arthur Spiethoff developed their own concepts for business level teaching. Your considerations were significantly influenced by Max Weber and his work on the “spirit of capitalism”. In the 1940s and 1960s, Alfred Müller-Armack and Walt Whitman Rostow revived the economic style and economic level idea.
Business level theory
The idea of the economic style epochs was often linked to an economic level theory, which is based on a constant, legal development or improvement of the economic systems observed. First, economic historical epochs are examined according to certain criteria and principles, e.g. B. the mode of production as agricultural or goods production, the type and organization of exchange, the length of the sales channels. Then a predominant economic style is linked to the chronological, step-like sequence, so that the individual economic steps differ in their respective economic styles. The development progresses from the low to the higher level.
Walt Whitman Rostov divided the process of economic growth into 5 phases.
1. The traditional society
A very high proportion of the workforce is represented in agriculture . Due to the unavailable or unused technologies or sciences, production per capita cannot increase any further.
2. Society in transition
In this phase the prerequisites for economic advancement are created, i. H. profound changes in the economic, technical, social, psychological, political are created.
3. The economic rise ("take off")
The economy turns into a dynamic growth. To achieve this self-sustaining growth process, the investment rate increases by up to 10%. Leading industries are developing with high growth rates. These provide impulses for other economic sectors.
4. Development in maturity
In this phase, technology and science are used to make better use of resources. The investment rate increases up to 20% of the national income. This increases the national income and the lead industries (coal mining, iron, steel industry) are replaced by new economic sectors (machine industry, electrical industry).
5. Age of mass consumption
At this stage, the economy cannot expand any further.
Rostov's economic level theory is strongly aligned with the development of England.
Concepts
Gustav Schmoller (1838–1917) saw “natural-technical causes” as the foundation of the national economy and identified causes originating from the “psychological-moral life of peoples” as an intermediate structure of an economy. He emphasized that "the nature of custom and law, the power of moral feelings and cultural ideas" also dominate the national economy. With Schmoller as doyen, the historical school reached the climax of the international effectiveness of a culture-oriented, German-speaking national economy. According to Werner Sombart (1863–1941), economic styles differ in three characteristics: economic ethos, order and organization, and technology. Arthur Spiethoff (1873–1957) examined historical economic systems based on the characteristics of the spirit, constitution and course of the economy. Alfred Müller-Armack (1901–1978) delimits the concept of the economic system developed by Werner Sombart from the concept of economic style . "Almost every time is ... a mixture of styles. In the following, the term economic system will be used when referring to the concrete mixture of styles in a country, while we assign the term economic style to those ideally pure form ideas that can only be found in times and countries who fully achieved what they were aiming for, coinciding with the actual economic system ". According to Müller-Armack, there is no regular process and it is not assumed that there was only one specific economic style in one era. Rather, it is assumed that there were always dominant styles, alongside which other, less important ones existed, and that these gradually changed and subsequently became new styles. Alfred Müller-Armack's approach is characterized by the dominance of the spiritual and religious. His work forms the prerequisite for a stylistic idea that he propagated as an Irish formula for a lasting and fruitful reconciliation of liberal, socialist and Christian ideas - the social market economy . Walt W. Rostow (1916–2003) distinguished in his monograph The Stages of Economic Growth: A Noncommunist Manifesto according to the importance of five economic stages as growth stages: traditional society, transition, advancement, maturity and mass consumer society.
criticism
In the opinion of many scientists, the representatives of the theory of style have not succeeded in grasping the specific basic structures of economic systems and on this basis to explain their functioning in reality. This is often first ascribed to ordoliberalism under Walter Eucken . He criticized the method of the historical school as a conceptual national economy: the method of concept formation and concept linking give the appearance of a theoretical system observation. In fact, with such a constructivist understanding, only what was previously put into the terms can be achieved. Above all, the step theory was rejected because of its one-sidedness and arbitrariness. Fundamental criticism comes in the assumed legal history, similar to the incorrect Marx stands''s theory of the modes of production contradicts the openness and variability of the development process. In particular, the transition to the next stage of development is criticized, which remains unclear, especially with regard to its causes. Therefore, the hierarchy is at best viewed as a periodization and rejected as a theory of evolution. Müller-Armack criticized the doctrine of economic levels because of the emphasis on only one aspect of life and the arbitrary separation of levels; the latter underestimated all early epochs as too primitive and monotonous. Nevertheless, he took the view with regard to the concept of business style: "Even if the style phenomenon is difficult to make visible, its existence cannot be denied."
Topicality
Today, the concept of style only leads a shadowy existence. As a result of the East-West system conflict, it was almost completely displaced by the term economic system. After its end, interest revived occasionally. One of the reasons for this is that today a large number of culturally shaped economic systems and economic orders are in competition around the world. This competition can be understood as a competition between different economic cultures or economic styles, such as the continental European variants of a “social market economy” and the British market economy. For example, Klaus Schwab , founder and president of the Davos World Economic Forum , predicts that the German economic style of social market economy will prove to be inferior to the Anglo-American model of capitalism worldwide due to the problems of efficiency and justice in the welfare state. But the success of the East Asian model has also shaken the dominance of the Western model of the market economy. Islamic economic styles are proving to be an obstacle in the transition to modernity. Ultimately, the so far limited interest is directed towards the concept of economic style, as the dehistoricization and formalization of economics with its associated cultural indifference has been recognized as problematic and solutions are being sought. Points of contact with the New Institutional Economics , New Growth Theory and approaches to cultural economics could lead to a further development of the concept.
literature
- Rainer Klump (ed.): Economic culture, economic style and economic order . Metropolis Verlag, Marburg 1996, ISBN 3895181226
- Jürgen Löwe: Contextual Theory of Economics. Karl Knies' approach as the basis for future economic policy . Faculty Amsterdam 1998, ISBN 3895189502
- Alfred Schüller: Economic styles and economic levels in: ders. And Hans-Günter Krüsselberg (ed.): Basic concepts for order theory and political economy . 6th revised and supplemented edition. Verlag der Gesellschaft für Ordnungsfragen der Wirtschaft, Marburg 2004, ISBN 3930834081 , pp. 73–76.
- Bertram Schefold: Wirtschaftsstile , 2 volumes (Volume 1: Studies on the relationship between economy and culture , Volume 2: Studies on economic theory and the future of technology ), Fischer Taschenbuch Verlag Frankfurt am Main 1994/1995. ISBN 3596122430
- Review by Bertram Schefold (ed.): Economic systems in historical comparison, Stuttgart 2004 - http://hsozkult.geschichte.hu-berlin.de/rezensions/type=rezbuecher&id=4904&verlage=11
- Daniel Dietzfelbinger: "Social market economy as an economic style. Alfred Müller-Armack's life's work", Gütersloh 1998
- Daniel Dietzfelbinger: "The concept of style as a paradigm of business ethics", in: Zeitschrift für Evangelische Ethik (ZEE) No. 3, 1998, Gütersloh 1998, pp. 190–206