This text aims to present a comprehensive survey of methodological individualism in social, political and economic thought from the Enlightenment to the 20th century. Exploring the works of such figures as de Mandeville, Smith, Marx, Spencer, Durkheim, Simmel, Weber, Hayek, Popper and Parsons, the study underlines the contrasts between methodological collectivism and methodological individualism. The analysis offered here also reveals the theoretical presuppositions behind the collectivist and individualist traditions and the practical consequences of their applications. Infantino concludes...

An extensive array of changes and innovations have taken place in and across work organizations and networks of organizations and workers, facilitated by new technologies and technological forms. This has initiated an interest in technological change as one of the conditions for organizational action and researchers have begun to draw inspiration from a wider spectrum of conceptual issues, perspectives and theoretical traditions. This book is interested in both what is occurring at the level of praxis and how this might be understood and theorized. It brings together a comprehensive...

There is a long line, running from antiquity to the present day, which unites all those who believe in an open society. This school of thought bases the demand for liberty on the recognition of human ignorance; we need to be free because we are ignorant and fallible. Free social co-operation permits us to mobilize our knowledge and develop methods of discovery through which we can explore the unknown and continually correct our errors. To assent to free co-operation is to accept critical discussion, democracy and the market, and in this way we are able to increase our rationality and further...

'Ignorance and Liberty' examines how the market is a place which liberates us from this idea of a privileged source of knowledge. The market is not only a place where goods are exchanged but also where different philosophical ideas and religious beliefs must co-habit, opening up new horizons and undermining the sense of an absolute that prevails in a closed world. Those with a belief in open society base the demand for liberty on the recognition of human ignorance; we need to be free because we are ignorant and fallible.

This book is a comprehensive survey of methodological individualism in social, political and economic thought from the Enlightenment to the 20th century. Exploring the works of such figures as de Mandeville, Smith, Marx, Spencer, Durkheim, Simmel, Weber, Hayek, Popper and Parsons, this study underlines the contrasts between methodological collectivism and methodological individualism. The detailed analysis offered here also reveals the theoretical presuppositions behind the collectivist and individualist traditions and the practical consequences of their applications. Infantino concludes in...