Bionomics: The inevitability of capitalism

by Michael L. Rothschild

As with life itself, capitalism does not depend on the faith of its defenders. Bionomics depicts economic history as an ongoing evolutionary process, showing how changes in man's material life stimulates the rise of modern capitalism, and suggesting that technological change is the essential force that drives social change. Charts.

Genres: Economics, Business, Science, Nonfiction, History

423 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1990

Reviews

[Marshall]

It's a good book with interesting ideas. The only caveat is that Rothschild is not an economist and does not back his points with rigor. I recommend reading more Hayek for further study. I think it's a great book for people who do not understand the bottom up nature of social organization. Those who have groked this concept can probably pass.

[Stephanie Petersen]

I re-read parts of this book every year... one of my favorites.

[Brian Beckner]

A truly under appreciated book if you have any interest in Consilience or a unified theory of science by method. Fantastic book.

[Riley Pelisek]

Reading in 2017, I feel some of the awe he would evoke from discussion of genomics in readers during the time it was written would compensate for the poorly developed economic arguments. Unfortunately, now that level of knowledge comes with an 8th grade course, and while there are some interesting anecdotes about ecology, I did not find the book particular insightful as a whole.

[Torsten Sewing]

There's something eery about this. As is with most things to do around Virginia Postrel and "Reason". However, lots of drilled-down, complex thoughts here. As if a right-winger would try to get Ed Freeman's model of "stakeholder capitalism" - if you can accept for arguments' sake the notion of social-darwinism that is hanging in here.

What you get is an indeed "dynamic" (cf Postrel) understanding of economics, something beyond the mechanical mainstream WSJ-stuff, pointing to the ecological dimension of economy. I'd be interested what the guy is doing today... (he wrote that in 1992, so it's interesting to read all the industry stories before anything like CSR hit).

[Nick Woodall]

Interesting parallel and analogies between business and biology.

[Luminous Scratchoff]

Loved it!!! Made me rethink my ideas of what economics are and can be.