Evolutionary dynamics and sustainable development

The strategic management of socio-economic systems is becoming increasingly difficult to manage with traditional economic models which are unable to handle environmental and technological factors. In Evolutionary Dynamics and Sustainable Development Norman Clark, Francisco Perez-Trejo and Peter Allen offer a new approach which emphasises the evolutionary nature of socio-economic systems. Their discussion includes the use of decision tools which can simultaneously handle spatial and temporal evolution. This major book begins with a critical evaluation of conventional economic approaches to development planning and then explores how modern general systems theory can show economic development as a process of structural change. The authors then develop a model which they explore through case studies of both Senegal and Crete. The model is combined with risk analysis to show how it can be used in computer-based scenarios, before its properties as an aid to decision making are summarised in the last chapter. Defining development as a process of structural change in economic systems rather than in terms of economic output, this volume will be welcomed for its advocacy of non-linear models as decision tools and for its special reference to issues of economic development and environmental stability in Third World countries.