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Spontaneous orders are to be distinguished from organizations. Spontaneous orders are distinguished by being scale-free networks, while organizations are hierarchical networks. Further, organizations can be and often are a part of spontaneous social orders, but the reverse is not true. Further, while organizations are created and controlled by humans, spontaneous orders are created, controlled, and controllable by no one.[citation needed] In economics and the social sciences, spontaneous order is defined as "the result of human actions, not of human design".[2]

Spontaneous order is an equilibrium behavior between self-interested individuals, which is most likely to evolve and survive, obeying the natural selection process "survival of the likeliest".[3]








Many economic classical liberals, such as Hayek, have argued that market economies are a spontaneous order, "a more efficient allocation of societal resources than any design could achieve."[7] They claim this spontaneous order (referred to as the extended order in Hayek's The Fatal Conceit) is superior to any order a human mind can design due to the specifics of the information required.[8] Centralized statistical data cannot convey this information because the statistics are created by abstracting away from the particulars of the situation.[9]






Game studiesEdit



Anarchists argue that the state is in fact an artificial creation of the ruling elite, and that true spontaneous order would arise if it was eliminated. Construed by some but not all as the ushering in of organization by anarchist law. In the anarchist view, such spontaneous order would involve the voluntary cooperation of individuals. According to the Oxford Dictionary of Sociology, "the work of many symbolic interactionists is largely compatible with the anarchist vision, since it harbours a view of society as spontaneous order."[11]


The concept of spontaneous order can also be seen in the works of the Russian Slavophile movements and specifically in the works of Fyodor Dostoyevsky. The concept of an organic social manifestation as a concept in Russia expressed under the idea of sobornost. Sobornost was also used by Leo Tolstoy as an underpinning to the ideology of Christian anarchism. The concept was used to describe the uniting force behind the peasant or serf Obshchina in pre-Soviet Russia.[12]

Recent developmentsEdit

Perhaps the most famous theorist of social spontaneous orders is Friedrich Hayek. In addition to arguing the economy is a spontaneous order, which he termed a catallaxy, he argued that common law[13] and the brain[14] are also types of spontaneous orders. In "The Republic of Science,"[15] Michael Polanyi also argued that science is a spontaneous order, a theory further developed by Bill Butos and Thomas McQuade in a variety of papers. Gus DiZerega has argued that democracy is the spontaneous order form of government,[16] David Emmanuel Andersson has argued that religion in places like the United States is a spontaneous order,[17] and Troy Camplin argues that artistic and literary production are spontaneous orders.[18] Paul Krugman too has contributed to spontaneous order theory in his book The Self-Organizing Economy,[19] in which he claims that cities are self-organizing systems. Credibility thesis suggests that the credibility of social institutions is the driving factor behind the endogenous self-organization of institutions and their persistence.[20]

The competitions between huge numbers of self-interested individuals will lead to many possible income distributions. Among all possible income distributions, exponential income distribution will occur with the highest probability. Following the natural selection process "survival of the likeliest", the exponential income distribution is most likely to evolve and survive, and hence is called the "Spontaneous Order" by Tao.[3] By analyzing datasets of household income from 66 countries and Hong Kong SAR, ranging from Europe to Latin America, North America and Asia, Tao et al found that, for all of these countries, the income distribution for the great majority of populations (low and middle income classes) follows an exponential income distribution.[21]

See alsoEdit


  1. ^ a b Barry, Norman (1982). "The Tradition of Spontaneous Order". Literature of Liberty. 5 (2).
  2. ^ Hayek, Friedrich A. (1969). Studies in Philosophy, Politics and Economics. Touchstone. p. 97. ISBN 978-0671202460.
  3. ^ a b Yong Tao, Spontaneous economic order, Journal of Evolutionary Economics (2016) 26 (3): 467-500
  4. ^ Rothbard, Murray. Concepts of the Role of Intellectuals in Social Change Toward Laissez Faire, The Journal of Libertarian Studies, Vol. IX No. 2 (Fall 1990)
  5. ^ Adam Ferguson Archived 2007-05-09 at the Wayback Machine on The History of Economic Thought Website
  6. ^ Ferguson, Adam (1767). An Essay on the History of Civil Society. The Online Library of Liberty: T. Cadell, London. p. 205.
  8. ^ Hayek, F.A. The Fatal Conceit: The Errors of Socialism. The University of Chicago Press. 1991. p. 6.
  10. ^ Stossel, John (2011-02-10) Spontaneous Order, Reason
  11. ^ Marshall, Gordon; et al. (1998) [1994]. Oxford Dictionary of Sociology (2 ed.). Oxford: Oxford University Press. pp. 19–20. ISBN 978-0-19-280081-7.
  12. ^ Faith and Order: The Reconciliation of Law and Religion By Harold Joseph p. 388 Berman Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Religion and law ISBN 0-8028-4852-4
  13. ^ The Constitution of Liberty; Law, Legislation and Liberty
  14. ^ The Sensory Order
  15. ^[permanent dead link]
  16. ^ Persuasion, Power, and Polity
  17. ^ Dizerega, Gus (2001-02-10). Persuasion, Power and Polity: A Theory of Democratic Self-Organization (Advances in Systems Theory, Complexity, and the Human Sciences) (9781572732575): Gus Dizerega, Alfonso Montuori: Books. ISBN 978-1572732575.
  18. ^ "pp.195-211: Troy Earl Camplin". Studies in Emergent Order. 2010-08-20. Retrieved 2018-09-17.
  19. ^ The Self-Organizing Economy
  20. ^ Grabel, Ilene (2000). "The political economy of 'policy credibility': the new-classical macroeconomics and the remaking of emerging economies". Cambridge Journal of Economics. 24 (1): 1–19. CiteSeerX doi:10.1093/cje/24.1.1. Retrieved 20 October 2016.
  21. ^ Yong Tao et al. Exponential structure of income inequality: evidence from 67 countries. Journal of Economic Interaction and Coordination (2017)