A book chapter, “Evolutionary Political Economy,” in the Handbook of Alternative Theories of Political Economy, edited by F. Stilwell, D. Primrose, and T. Thornton, pp. 140-155. Cheltenham, UK: Edward Elgar, published in May 2022.
This chapter explores evolutionary political economy, the study of social evolution as an open-ended unfolding process pertaining to the organization and reproduction of the economic system and its constituents in historical context. Evolutionary political economy, in the tradition of classical political economy and Veblen’s evolutionary economics, is one of building blocks of present heterodox economics. It is an alternative to mainstream evolutionary economics typified by Nelson and Winter’s approach largely influenced by Herbert Spencer’s evolutionism and Alfred Marshall’s quasi-evolutionary economics. It is evolutionary political economy that is suitable for analysing the underlying structural causes and effects of anomalies in society.
Dr. Tae-Hee Jo 