„…(biological reality check: dogs don’t eat other dogs)…”

Economists and public policy experts can be forgiven for being wary of evolution as a theoretical framework, given its sorry history during the 19th and early 20th centuries. Even today, most people associate the term ‘social Darwinism’ with a cruel dog-eat-dog view of the marketplace (biological reality check: dogs don’t eat other dogs). But, today, a new kind of social Darwinism is emerging, and it actually favours co-operation.

When Elinor Ostrom was announced as one of the recipients of the Nobel Prize in Economics in 2009, many members of the economic establishment were dumbfounded. Steve Levitt wrote on his New York Times Freakonomics blog that most economists had never heard of her or her work – he was chagrinned to count himself among them…

„A good social Darwinism”
David Sloan Wilson