Spontaneous Order and the Evolution of Behaviors

Spontaneous Order and The Evolution of Behaviors

Hayek on Spontaneous Order Hayek argues that people interpret the events they experience through the light of a preexisting system of classification, which is built through a process of cultural evolution and individual learning. The experiences people pass through have a crucial influence in them building a “growth of knowledge” process, which will define their future responses to various situations they will be facing. It is thus misleading to believe that humans can simply design a set of rules and impose it upon their environment, as is it the environment in which they live that shapes their behavior. Hayek considers that humans did not adopt laws and institutions because they were able to foresee the benefits these would bring. Rather, their adoption was due to spontaneous order, as they evolved through a process of the logic of choice. People’s behavior follows patterns that have previously been accepted by their society; this allows them to not only pursue their own means but the means of others as well.

Hayek considers that the market is not simply a guide or a communication mechanism, but a complex mechanism which allows participants to spontaneously adopt their actions to circumstances and events they previously had no knowledge of. The market is not a social institution but a “value-free result of the Logic of Choice”, which not only makes use of the existing knowledge market participants have but continuously generates new knowledge. The market operates as a mode of coordination and information is being transmitted through a series of general mechanisms (i.e. the price mechanism).