Abstract

Convergence of Ecomic Systems - A Way to an Optimal Economic System?

The author analyzes Tinbergen’s hypothesis that capitalist and socialist systems are showing a converging pattern and thus are approaching an “optimal economic system”. He refutes the idea of an optimal system by showing that the character of economic systems is not only instrumental but dependent on the goals of a society and that an optimal system can only be defined for a specific historical situation and hierarchy of goals and values. He admits the convergence of certain elements of these systems and welcomes the fact that the discussion of these elements is losing some of its ideological bias. However, he warns that the old ideologies of the self-destruction of systems and of the incompatibility of their elements might be replaced by a new ideology, namely that of convergence. This would prevent research from directing itself towards improving existing systems and communication between systems as well as from developping new concepts of systems