Description
Book SynopsisThe strategic management of socio-economic systems is becoming increasingly difficult 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 emphasizes the evolutionary nature of socio-economic systems. 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 discussion includes the use of decision tools which can simultaneously handle spatial and temporal evolution. The authors 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 summarized 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.
Trade Review’The discussions in the book do an excellent job of explaining the type of interactive model that will be needed for sustainable development policy.’ -- R.V. O’Neill, Ecological Economics’This book provides a clear and insightful discussion of these issues and is important reading to those concerned with the complexity of cities.’– M. Batty, Environment and Planning
Table of ContentsContents: Preface 1. Modelling Sustainable Development 2. The Nature of Systems 3. Economic Systems 4. Spatial Modelling 5. The Model as a Decision Tool (A Crete Case Study) 6. An Agenda for the Future Appendix References Index
