Tensions and ambiguities in Hayek's social theory: on ontology; methodology; substantive claims; and self-description
This paper considers some tensions that arise in Hayek’s work as a result of his adoption of a complexity perspective. More specifically, the focus is on tensions arising as a result of Hayek’s gradual embrace, from the early 1950s onwards, of the notion of ‘emergence’. Those tensions include that between Hayek’s account of the mind as an emergent property of neural interaction, which was influenced by his reading of organismic biologists such as Ludwig von Bertalanffy, and the more mechanistic account of the mind implied by Hayek’s use of cybernetics. A second tension arises from the fact that from the late 1950s onwards Hayek embraces the notion of emergence in his social theory, most notably in his account of cultural evolution via group selection. Such an account, which accords significant causal and explanatory weight to emergent social properties that are irreducible to the properties of individual people, is not obviously consistent with Hayek’s methodological individualism. Third, it will be argued that Hayek’s view of the coordinative power of the market as an emergent social property of the social whole formed when people’s interactions are structured by certain kinds of rules has important implications for his account of the market process. In particular, since the emergent property in question operates only in and through human agency, there arises the possibility that the capacity of the market to bring people’s plans into conformity with one another might be offset by the capacity of human agents to respond so autonomously, so creatively—and, therefore, so unexpectedly—to their circumstances that they surprise one another and so develop plans that are less, not more, compatible. That is to say, ththe creative powers of human agents may be such that dis-coordinating forces are generated endogenously, as part of the market process, so that the operation of the latter can lead to less, not more, plan coordination, even in the absence of external shocks.
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Keywords: Hayek, compelxity emergence, ontology
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