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- Title
Our Obsolete Technology Mentality.
- Authors
Swaney, James A.
- Abstract
Karl Polanyi, in his essay "Our Obsolete Market Mentality," argues that the common view self-regulating markets are the primary agent of progress was preventing the necessary coordination of social intervention and inhibiting democratization of the economy. In short, this essay argues that some institutionalists hold a common view that technology defines progress, technology is the sole agent of progress, a universal process, and always progressive. Many who do not suffer from this obsolete technology mentality unfortunately continue to use "technology," "technological," and "instrumental" interchangeably. In the institutionalist literature, technology is usually defined as the package containing not just up-to-date tools, but the skills necessary to put those tools to use. The technological process necessarily operates within the institutional structure of the extant culture. Since people everywhere tend on occasion to figure out new and better ways to get things done, the instrumental process is universal, even though technology that is current in one culture may or may not be appropriate for another culture.
- Subjects
SOCIOECONOMICS; TECHNOLOGY &; economics; POLANYI, Karl, 1886-1964; PROGRESS; ECONOMICS; TECHNOLOGY; TECHNOLOGICAL obsolescence; TECHNOLOGY transfer; INSTITUTIONAL economics; SELF-regulation of industries
- Publication
Journal of Economic Issues (Association for Evolutionary Economics), 1989, Vol 23, Issue 2, p569
- ISSN
0021-3624
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.1080/00213624.1989.11504923