Conclusion: Economic Theory and the General Theory of Social Systems

The purpose of this brief concluding chapter is to summarize our analysis by stages and to point up some implications for economic and sociological theory, respectively, and for the relations between them. Our central proposition is that economic theory is a special case of the general theory of social systems, which is in turn one of the main branches of the developing general theory of action. We have applied this proposition to the following fields of economic inquiry: the general frame of reference of economic theory; the conception of the economy as a special type of social system differentiated from other societal subsystems ; the place of the economic subsystem in the society and its relations to cognate subsystems ; the institutional structure of the economy; processes within the economy and across its external boundaries, and the problem of growth and institutional change in the economy. By way of preliminary analysis, we tried to show that economic theory conceives economic processes as processes of action (in our technical sense) oriented to a goal of production as available means. In so far as this involves interaction, the supply-demand schema is a special case of the more general performance-sanction schema which underlies all social interaction. Furthermore, the classification of commodities as goods and services corresponds to the general distinction between physical and social objects on the one hand and between qualities and performances on the other. 295