Karl Ludwig von Bertalanffy (September 19, 1901, Atzgersdorf near Vienna – June 12, 1972, Buffalo, New York) was an Austrian-born biologist known as one of the founders of general systems theory (GST). GST is an interdisciplinary practice that describes systems with interacting components, applicable to biology, cybernetics, and other fields. Bertalanffy proposed that the laws of thermodynamics applied to closed systems, but not necessarily to "open systems," such as living things. His mathematical model of an organism's growth over time, published in 1934, is still in use today.

Von Bertalanffy grew up in Austria and subsequently worked in Vienna, London, Canada and the USA.

Biography[link]

Ludwig von Bertalanffy was born and grew up in the little village of Atzgersdorf (now Liesing) near Vienna. The Bertalanffy family had roots in the 16th century nobility of Hungary which included several scholars and court officials.^[1] His grandfather Charles Joseph von Bertalanffy (1833–1912) had settled in Austria and was a state theatre director in Klagenfurt, Graz, and Vienna, which were important positions in imperial Austria. Ludwig's father Gustav von Bertalanffy (1861–1919) was a prominent railway administrator. On his mother's side Ludwig's grandfather Joseph Vogel was an imperial counsellor and a wealthy Vienna publisher. Ludwig's mother Charlotte Vogel was seventeen when she married the thirty-four year old Gustav. They divorced when Ludwig was ten, and both remarried outside the Catholic Church in civil ceremonies.^[2]

Ludwig von Bertalanffy grew up as an only child educated at home by private tutors until he was ten. When he went to the gymnasium/grammar school he was already well trained in self study, and kept studying on his own. His neighbour, the famous biologist Paul Kammerer, became a mentor and an example to the young Ludwig.^[3] In 1918 he started his studies at the university level with the philosophy and art history, first at the University of Innsbruck and then at the University of Vienna. Ultimately, Bertalanffy had to make a choice between studying philosophy of science and biology, and chose the latter because, according to him, one could always become a philosopher later, but not a biologist. In 1926 he finished his PhD thesis (translated title: Fechner and the problem of integration of higher order) on the physicist and philosopher Gustav Theodor Fechner.^[3]

Von Bertalanffy met his future wife Maria in April 1924 in the Austrian Alps, and were almost never apart for the next forty-eight years.^[4] She wanted to finish studying but never did, instead devoting her life to Bertalanffy's career. Later in Canada she would work both for him and with him in his career, and after his death she compiled two of Bertalanffy's last works. They had one child, who would follow in his father's footsteps by making his profession in the field of cancer research.

Von Bertalanffy was a professor at the University of Vienna from 1934–48, University of London (1948–49), Université de Montréal (1949), University of Ottawa (1950–54), University of Southern California (1955–58), the Menninger Foundation (1958–60), University of Alberta (1961–68), and State University of New York at Buffalo (SUNY) (1969–72). In 1972, he died from a sudden heart attack.

Work[link]

Today, Bertalanffy is considered to be a founder and one of the principal authors of the interdisciplinary school of thought known as general systems theory. According to Weckowicz (1989), he "occupies an important position in the intellectual history of the twentieth century. His contributions went beyond biology, and extended into cybernetics, education, history, philosophy, psychiatry, psychology and sociology. Some of his admirers even believe that this theory will one day provide a conceptual framework for all these disciplines".^[1] Spending most of his life in semi-obscurity, Ludwig von Bertalanffy may well be the least known intellectual titan of the twentieth century.^[5]

The individual growth model[link]

The individual growth model published by von Bertalanffy in 1934 is widely used in biological models and exists in a number of permutations.

In its simplest version the so-called von Bertalanffy growth equation is expressed as a differential equation of length (L) over time (t):

Failed to parse (Missing texvc executable; please see math/README to configure.): L'(t) = r_B \left( L_\infty - L(t) \right)

when Failed to parse (Missing texvc executable; please see math/README to configure.): r_B

is the von Bertalanffy growth rate and Failed to parse (Missing texvc executable; please see math/README to configure.): L_\infty
the ultimate length of the individual. This model was proposed earlier by A. Pütter in 1920 (Arch. Gesamte Physiol. Mensch. Tiere, 180: 298-340).

The Dynamic Energy Budget theory provides a mechanistic explanation of this model in the case of isomorphs that experience a constant food availability. The inverse of the von Bertalanffy growth rate appears to depend linearly on the ultimate length, when different food levels are compared. The intercept relates to the maintenance costs, the slope to the rate at which reserve is mobilized for use by metabolism. The ultimate length equals the maximum length at high food availabilities.^[6]

Bertalanffy Module[link]

To honor Bertalanffy, ecological systems engineer and scientist Howard T. Odum named the storage symbol of his General Systems Language as the Bertalanffy module (see image right).^[7]

General System Theory (GST)[link]

The biologist is widely recognized for his contributions to science as a systems theorist; specifically, for the development of a theory known as General System Theory (GST). The theory attempted to provide alternatives to conventional models of organization. GST defined new foundations and developments as a generalized theory of systems with applications to numerous areas of study, emphasizing holism over reductionism, organism over mechanism.

Open systems[link]

Bertalanffy's contribution to systems theory is best known for his theory of open systems. The system theorist argued that traditional closed system models based on classical science and the second law of thermodynamics were untenable. Bertalanffy maintained that “the conventional formulation of physics are, in principle, inapplicable to the living organism being open system having steady state. We may well suspect that many characteristics of living systems which are paradoxical in view of the laws of physics are a consequence of this fact.” ^[8] However, while closed physical systems were questioned, questions equally remained over whether or not open physical systems could justifiably lead to a definitive science for the application of an open systems view to a general theory of systems.

In Bertalanffy’s model, the theorist defined general principles of open systems and the limitations of conventional models. He ascribed applications to biology, information theory and cybernetics. Concerning biology, examples from the open systems view suggested they “may suffice to indicate briefly the large fields of application” that could be the “outlines of a wider generalization;” ^[9] from which, a hypothesis for cybernetics. Although potential applications exist in other areas, the theorist developed only the implications for biology and cybernetics. Bertalanffy also noted unsolved problems, which included continued questions over thermodynamics, thus the unsubstantiated claim that there are physical laws to support generalizations (particularly for information theory), and the need for further research into the problems and potential with the applications of the open system view from physics.

Systems in the social sciences[link]

In the social sciences, Bertalanffy did believe that general systems concepts were applicable, e.g. theories that had been introduced into the field of sociology from a modern systems approach that included “the concept of general system, of feedback, information, communication, etc.” ^[10] The theorist critiqued classical “atomistic” conceptions of social systems and ideation “such as ‘social physics’ as was often attempted in a reductionist spirit.” ^[11] Bertalanffy also recognized difficulties with the application of a new general theory to social science due to the complexity of the intersections between natural sciences and human social systems. However, the theory still encouraged for new developments from sociology, to anthropology, economics, political science, and psychology among other areas. Today, Bertalanffy's GST remains a bridge for interdisciplinary study of systems in the social sciences.

See also[link]

Systems science portal

• Population dynamics
• Systems theory

Publications[link]

By Bertalanffy[link]

• 1928, Kritische Theorie der Formbildung, Borntraeger. In English: Modern Theories of Development: An Introduction to Theoretical Biology, Oxford University Press, New York: Harper, 1933
• 1928, Nikolaus von Kues, G. Müller, München 1928.
• 1930, Lebenswissenschaft und Bildung, Stenger, Erfurt 1930
• 1937, Das Gefüge des Lebens, Leipzig: Teubner.
• 1940, Vom Molekül zur Organismenwelt, Potsdam: Akademische Verlagsgesellschaft Athenaion.
• 1949, Das biologische Weltbild, Bern: Europäische Rundschau. In English: Problems of Life: An Evaluation of Modern Biological and Scientific Thought, New York: Harper, 1952.
• 1953, Biophysik des Fliessgleichgewichts, Braunschweig: Vieweg. 2nd rev. ed. by W. Beier and R. Laue, East Berlin: Akademischer Verlag, 1977
• 1953, "Die Evolution der Organismen", in Schöpfungsglaube und Evolutionstheorie, Stuttgart: Alfred Kröner Verlag, pp 53–66
• 1955, "An Essay on the Relativity of Categories." Philosophy of Science, Vol. 22, No. 4, pp. 243–263.
• 1959, Stammesgeschichte, Umwelt und Menschenbild, Schriften zur wissenschaftlichen Weltorientierung Vol 5. Berlin: Lüttke
• 1962, Modern Theories of Development, New York: Harper
• 1967, Robots, Men and Minds: Psychology in the Modern World, New York: George Braziller, 1969 hardcover: ISBN 0-8076-0428-3, paperback: ISBN 0-8076-0530-1
• 1968, General System theory: Foundations, Development, Applications, New York: George Braziller, revised edition 1976: ISBN 0-8076-0453-4
• 1968, The Organismic Psychology and Systems Theory, Heinz Werner lectures, Worcester: Clark University Press.
• 1975, Perspectives on General Systems Theory. Scientific-Philosophical Studies, E. Taschdjian (eds.), New York: George Braziller, ISBN 0-8076-0797-5
• 1981, A Systems View of Man: Collected Essays, editor Paul A. LaViolette, Boulder: Westview Press, ISBN 0-86531-094-7

The first articles from Bertalanffy on General Systems Theory:

• 1945, Zu einer allgemeinen Systemlehre, Blätter für deutsche Philosophie, 3/4. (Extract in: Biologia Generalis, 19 (1949), 139-164.
• 1950, An Outline of General System Theory, British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 1, p. 139-164
• 1951, General system theory - A new approach to unity of science (Symposium), Human Biology, Dec 1951, Vol. 23, p. 303-361.

About Bertalanffy[link]

• Sabine Brauckmann (1999). Ludwig von Bertalanffy (1901--1972), ISSS Luminaries of the Systemics Movement, January 1999.
• Peter Corning (2001). Fulfilling von Bertalanffy's Vision: The Synergism Hypothesis as a General Theory of Biological and Social Systems, ISCS 2001.
• Mark Davidson (1983). Uncommon Sense: The Life and Thought of Ludwig Von Bertalanffy, Los Angeles: J. P. Tarcher.
• Debora Hammond (2005). Philosophical and Ethical Foundations of Systems Thinking, tripleC 3(2): pp. 20–27. (Dead Link)
• Ervin László eds. (1972). The Relevance of General Systems Theory: Papers Presented to Ludwig Von Bertalanffy on His Seventieth Birthday, New York: George Braziller, 1972.
• David Pouvreau (2006). Une biographie non officielle de Ludwig von Bertalanffy (1901-1972), Vienna
• David Pouvreau & Manfred Drack (2007). On the history of Ludwig von Bertalanffy's "General Systemology", and on its relationship to cybernetics, in: International Journal of General Systems, Volume 36, Issue 3 June 2007, pages 281 - 337.
• Thaddus E. Weckowicz (1989). Ludwig von Bertalanffy (1901-1972): A Pioneer of General Systems Theory, Center for Systems Research Working Paper No. 89-2. Edmonton AB: University of Alberta, February 1989.

References[link]

External links[link]

• International Society for the Systems Sciences' biography of Ludwig von Bertalanffy
• Bertalanffy Center for the Study of Systems Science BCSSS in Vienna.
• Ludwig von Bertalanffy (1901-1972): A Pioneer of General Systems Theory working paper by T.E. Weckowicz, University of Alberta Center for Systems Research.

Ludwig Heinrich Edler von Mises

Austrian School
Born	(1881-09-29)29 September 1881 Lemberg, Galicia, Austria-Hungary (now Lviv, Ukraine)
Died	10 October 1973(1973-10-10) (aged 92) New York City, New York, USA
Institution	University of Vienna (1919-1934) Institut Universitaire des Hautes Études Internationales, Geneva, Switzerland (1934-1940) New York University (1945-1969)
Influences	Kant, Bastiat, Böhm-Bawerk, Brentano, Husserl, Menger, Say, Turgot, Weber, Wieser
Influenced	Allais, Anderson, Bauer, Block, Buchanan, Friedman, Hayek, Hazlitt, Hicks, Hoppe, Huerta de Soto, Hutt, Kirzner, Lachmann, Lange, Paul, Raico, Reisman, Robbins, Rockwell, Rothbard, Salerno, Schiff, Schumpeter, Schutz, Sennholz, Simons, Smith

Ludwig Heinrich Edler von Mises (German pronunciation: [ˈluːtvɪç fɔn ˈmiːzəs]; September 29, 1881 – October 10, 1973) was a philosopher, Austrian School economist, and classical liberal. He became a prominent figure in the Austrian School of economic thought and is best known for his work on praxeology. Fearing a Nazi takeover of Europe, Mises emigrated to the United States in 1940. Mises had a significant influence on the libertarian movement in the United States in the mid-20th century.

Biography[link]

Early life[link]

Coat of arms of Ludwig von Mises' great-grandfather, Mayer Rachmiel Mises, awarded upon his 1881 ennoblement by Franz Joseph I of Austria

Ludwig von Mises was born to wealthy Jewish parents in the city of Lemberg, in Galicia, Austria-Hungary (now Lviv in Ukraine). The family of his father Arthur Edler von Mises had been elevated to the Austrian nobility in the 19th century, and was involved in building and financing railroads. Ludwig's mother, Adele (née Landau), was a niece of Dr. Joachim Landau, a Liberal Party deputy to the Austrian Parliament.^[1] Arthur was stationed there as a construction engineer with Czernowitz railway company. At the age of twelve Ludwig spoke fluent Yiddish, German, Polish, and French, read Latin, and could understand Ukrainian.^[2] Mises was the older brother of the famous applied physicist Richard von Mises, a member of the Vienna Circle. Another brother, Karl von Mises, died as a child from scarlet fever.^{[citation needed]} When Ludwig and Richard were children, his family moved back to their ancestral home of Vienna.

In 1900, he attended the University of Vienna,^[3] becoming influenced by the works of Carl Menger. Mises' father died in 1903, and in 1906 Mises was awarded his doctorate from the school of law.

Professional life[link]

In the years from 1904 to 1914, Mises attended lectures given by the prominent Austrian economist Eugen von Böhm-Bawerk. There, he developed friendships not only with Menger and Böhm-Bawerk, but also prominent sociologist Max Weber.^[4] Mises taught as a Privatdozent at the Vienna University in the years from 1913 to 1934 while formally serving as secretary at the Vienna Chamber of Commerce from 1909 to 1934. In these roles, he became one of the closest economic advisers of Engelbert Dollfuss, the austrofascist but strongly anti-Nazi Austrian Chancellor,^[5] and later to Otto von Habsburg, the Christian democratic politician and claimant to the throne of Austria (which had been legally abolished in 1918).^[6] Friends and students of Mises in Europe included Wilhelm Röpke and Alfred Müller-Armack (influential advisors to German chancellor Ludwig Erhard), Jacques Rueff (monetary advisor to Charles de Gaulle), Lord Lionel Robbins (of the London School of Economics), and President of Italy, Luigi Einaudi.^[7]

Economist and political theorist F. A. Hayek first came to know Mises while working as Mises' subordinate at a government office dealing with Austria's post-World War I debt. Hayek wrote, "there I came to know him mainly as a tremendously efficient executive, the kind of man who, as was said of John Stuart Mill, because he does a normal day's work in two hours, always has a clear desk and time to talk about anything. I came to know him as one of the best educated and informed men I have ever known..."^[8] According to Mises' student Murray Rothbard, Hayek's development of Mises' theoretical work on the business cycle later earned Hayek the 1974 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences (shared with Swedish economist Gunnar Myrdal).^[9]

In 1934, Mises left Austria for Geneva, Switzerland, where he was a professor at the Graduate Institute of International Studies until 1940. Fearing the prospect of Germany taking control over Switzerland, in 1940 along with other Jewish refugees Mises left Europe and emigrated to New York City.^[10] There he became a visiting professor at New York University. He held this position from 1945 until his retirement in 1969, though he was not salaried by the university. Instead, businessmen such as Lawrence Fertig funded him and his work. For part of this period, Mises worked on currency issues for the Pan-Europa movement led by a fellow NYU faculty member and Austrian exile, Richard Coudenhove-Kalergi.^[11] In 1947, Mises became one of the founding members of the Mont Pelerin Society. Despite fleeing Europe, Mises is credited for having an influential role in the economic reconstruction of Europe after World War II through his professional relationships with Ludwig Erhard, Charles de Gaulle and Luigi Einaudi.^[12]

In America, Mises' work first influenced that of economists such as Benjamin Anderson, Leonard Read and Henry Hazlitt, but writers such as former radical Max Eastman, legal scholar Sylvester J. Petro, and novelist Ayn Rand were also among his friends and admirers. His American students included Israel Kirzner, Hans Sennholz, Ralph Raico, Leonard Liggio, George Reisman and Murray Rothbard.^[13] Mises later received an honorary doctorate from Grove City College.

Mises contributed articles to American Opinion, the journal of the John Birch Society, and was a member of its Editorial Advisory Board^{[14] [15]} .

Despite his growing fame, Mises listed himself plainly in the New York phone directory and welcomed students into his home.^[16] He retired from teaching at the age of 87, then the oldest active professor in America.^[17] Mises died at the age of 92 at St. Vincent's hospital in New York. His body is buried at Ferncliff Cemetery, in Hartsdale, New York. Following his death, his entire library (and his personal desk) was donated to Hillsdale College where it is available for student and public use.

Contributions to economics[link]

Mises wrote and lectured extensively on behalf of classical liberalism and is seen as one of the leaders of the Austrian School of economics.^[18] In his treatise on economics, Human Action, Mises introduced praxeology as a more general conceptual foundation of the social sciences and established that economic laws were only arrived at through the means of methodological individualism firmly rejecting positivism and materialism as a foundation for the social sciences. Many of his works, including Human Action, were on two related economic themes:

1. monetary economics and inflation;
2. the differences between government controlled economies and free markets.

Mises in his library

Mises argued that money is demanded for its usefulness in purchasing other goods, rather than for its own sake and that any unsound credit expansion causes business cycles. His other notable contribution was his argument that socialism must fail economically because of the economic calculation problem – the impossibility of a socialist government being able to make the economic calculations required to organize a complex economy. Mises projected that without a market economy there would be no functional price system, which he held essential for achieving rational and efficient allocation of capital goods to their most productive uses. If capital goods are the subject of neither rent nor exchange, as per private ownership of those means of production, then no barter terms or money prices can arise for them. Without the common nominal index of money pricing that allows comparison of costs of production to likely revenues, there can be no rational allocation of diverse capital goods in the production of diverse consumer goods whose production requires some use of scarce capital. In a socialist society, capital is not distributed according to the more efficient—thus profitable—capital structures, but rather to any use a theoretical socialist planner sees fit without the aid of monetary price signals to compare the profitability in a given use of capital.

According to Mises, socialism must fail, as demand cannot be known without prices. Therefore, socialist waste of capital goods is as chronic as the incentives for production and retention of capital are low, while capital goods are coercively monopolised by a dysfunctional State operating with only the data pertaining to interpersonal comparisons of utility, as per democratic production. These data are not sufficient for economic calculation, and therefore are not sufficient for efficient use and allocation of capital. Capital's place in a free market is ordained by the prices set by private owners of the means of production, who keep capital where its production is remunerated best by consumers, and who liquidate it and pass it to other uses if production is bankrupt. In socialism, such means for liquidation of capital goods, and the passage or maintenance of the means of production across extremely diverse applications throughout the divisions of labour according to the expense or cheapness of bidding capital away from vital production, is simply not present.

Mises' criticism of socialist paths of economic development is well-known, such as in his 1922 work Socialism: An Economic and Sociological Analysis:

The only certain fact about Russian affairs under the Soviet regime with regard to which all people agree is: that the standard of living of the Russian masses is much lower than that of the masses in the country which is universally considered as the paragon of capitalism, the United States of America. If we were to regard the Soviet regime as an experiment, we would have to say that the experiment has clearly demonstrated the superiority of capitalism and the inferiority of socialism.^[19]

These arguments were elaborated on by subsequent Austrian economists such as Nobel laureate Friedrich Hayek^[20] and students such as Hans Sennholz.

In Interventionism, An Economic Analysis (1940), Ludwig von Mises wrote:

The usual terminology of political language is stupid. What is 'left' and what is 'right'? Why should Hitler be 'right' and Stalin, his temporary friend, be 'left'? Who is 'reactionary' and who is 'progressive'? Reaction against an unwise policy is not to be condemned. And progress towards chaos is not to be commended. Nothing should find acceptance just because it is new, radical, and fashionable. 'Orthodoxy' is not an evil if the doctrine on which the 'orthodox' stand is sound. Who is anti-labor, those who want to lower labor to the Russian level, or those who want for labor the capitalistic standard of the United States? Who is 'nationalist,' those who want to bring their nation under the heel of the Nazis, or those who want to preserve its independence?

After the fall of the Soviet Union Robert Heilbroner, a lifelong advocate of socialism, said that "It turns out, of course, that Mises was right" about the impossibility of socialism. "Capitalism has been as unmistakable a success as socialism has been a failure. Here is the part that's hard to swallow. It has been the Friedmans, Hayeks, and von Miseses who have maintained that capitalism would flourish and that socialism would develop incurable ailments."^[21]

Mises developed the theory of the 'sovereignty of the consumer' in a free-market economy; in his view, the consumer ultimately dictates everything that happens. This argument was set out in Human Action:

The captain is the consumer…the consumers determine precisely what should be produced, in what quality, and in what quantities…They are merciless egoistic bosses, full of whims and fancies, changeable and unpredictable. For them nothing counts other than their own satisfaction…In their capacity as buyers and consumers they are hard-hearted and callous, without consideration for other people…Capitalists…can only preserve and increase their wealth by filling best the orders of the consumers… In the conduct of their business affairs they must be unfeeling and stony-hearted because the consumers, their bosses, are themselves unfeeling and stony-hearted.^[22]

Criticisms[link]

Milton Friedman considered Mises inflexible in his thinking:

The story I remember best happened at the initial Mont Pelerin meeting when he got up and said, "You're all a bunch of socialists." We were discussing the distribution of income, and whether you should have progressive income taxes. Some of the people there were expressing the view that there could be a justification for it.

Another occasion which is equally telling: Fritz Machlup was a student of Mises's, one of his most faithful disciples. At one of the Mont Pelerin meetings, Machlup gave a talk in which I think he questioned the idea of a gold standard; he came out in favor of floating exchange rates. Mises was so mad he wouldn't speak to Machlup for three years. Some people had to come around and bring them together again. It's hard to understand; you can get some understanding of it by taking into account how people like Mises were persecuted in their lives.^[23]

Within the post-WWII mainstream economics establishment, Mises suffered severe personal rejection: for example, in a 1957 review of his book The Anti-Capitalistic Mentality, The Economist said of von Mises: "Professor von Mises has a splendid analytical mind and an admirable passion for liberty; but as a student of human nature he is worse than null and as a debater he is of Hyde Park standard."^[24] Conservative commentator Whittaker Chambers published a similarly negative review of that book in the National Review, stating that Mises's thesis that anti-capitalist sentiment was rooted in "envy" epitomized "know-nothing conservatism" at its "know-nothingest."^[25] Economic historian Bruce Caldwell described Ludwig von Mises as the mid-20th century's "archetypal 'unscientific' economist."^[26]

In a 1978 interview, Friedrich Hayek said about his book Socialism: "At first we all felt he was frightfully exaggerating and even offensive in tone. You see, he hurt all our deepest feelings, but gradually he won us around, although for a long time I had to – I just learned he was usually right in his conclusions, but I was not completely satisfied with his argument." (Hayek's critique of central planning never incorporated Mises' contention that prices as an indicator of scarcity can only arise in monetary exchanges among responsible owners, a particular case of the universal economic law that value judgements are utterly dependent on property rights constraints.)^[27]

After his death, his wife quoted a passage that Mises had written about Benjamin Anderson, and said that it best described Mises' own personality: "His most eminent qualities were his inflexible honesty, his unhesitating sincerity. He never yielded. He always freely enunciated what he considered to be true. If he had been prepared to suppress or only to soften his criticisms of popular, but irresponsible, policies, the most influential positions and offices would have been offered him. But he never compromised."^[28]

Bibliography[link]

• The Theory of Money and Credit (1912, enlarged US edition 1953)
• Nation, State, and Economy (1919)
  • Nation, State, and Economy
• "Economic Calculation in the Socialist Commonwealth" (1920) (article)
• Socialism: An Economic and Sociological Analysis (1922, 1932, 1951)
• Liberalismus (1927, 1962 – translated into English, with the new title The Free and Prosperous Commonwealth)
• A Critique of Interventionism (1929)
  • A Critique of Interventionism
• Epistemological Problems of Economics (1933, 1960)
  • Epistemological Problems of Economics
• Memoirs (1940)
• Interventionism: An Economic Analysis (1941, 1998)
  • Interventionism: An Economic Analysis
• Omnipotent Government: The Rise of Total State and Total War (1944)
• Bureaucracy (1944, 1962)
• Planned Chaos (1947, added to 1951 edition of Socialism)
  • Planned Chaos
• Human Action: A Treatise on Economics (1949, 1963, 1966, 1996)
• Planning for Freedom (1952, enlarged editions in 1962, 1974, and 1980)
• The Anti-Capitalistic Mentality (1956)
• Theory and History: An Interpretation of Social and Economic Evolution (1957)
  • Theory and History
• The Ultimate Foundation of Economic Science (1962)
  • The Ultimate Foundation of Economic Science
• The Historical Setting of the Austrian School of Economics (1969)
  • The Historical Setting of the Austrian School of Economics
• Notes and Recollections (1978)
• The Clash of Group Interests and Other Essays (1978)
  • The Clash of Group Interests and Other Essays
• On the Manipulation of Money and Credit (1978)
  • The Causes of the Economic Crisis, reissue
• Economic Policy: Thoughts for Today and Tomorrow (1979, lectures given in 1959)
  • Economic Policy: Thoughts for Today and Tomorrow
• Money, Method, and the Market Process (1990)
  • Money, Method, and the Market Process
• Economic Freedom and Interventionism (1990)
• The Free Market and Its Enemies (2004, lectures given in 1951)
  • The Free Market and Its Enemies
• Marxism Unmasked: From Delusion to Destruction (2006, lectures given in 1952)
• Ludwig von Mises on Money and Inflation (2010, lectures given in the 1960s)

See also[link]

• Richard von Mises
• Analytic-synthetic distinction and Ludwig von Mises' response to the Kantian challenge
• Classical liberalism
• Contributions to liberal theory
• Liberalism in Austria
• Libertarianism
• List of Austrian scientists
• Mont Pelerin Society
• Karl Polanyi, whom von Mises debated leading to Polanyi's book The Great Transformation
• F. A. Hayek, important disciple of von Mises
• Wilhelm Röpke, important disciple of Mises
• Henry Hazlitt, important disciple of von Mises
• Max Eastman, important disciple of von Mises
• Israel Kirzner, important disciple of von Mises
• Hans Sennholz, important disciple of von Mises
• Murray Rothbard, important disciple of von Mises
• George Reisman, important disciple of von Mises
• Lew Rockwell, founder of Ludwig von Mises Institute
• Ludwig von Mises Institute
• Gitta Sereny, his stepdaughter

Further reading[link]

• Hülsmann, Jörg Guido. Mises: The Last Knight of Liberalism (Auburn: Ludwig von Mises Institut, 2007) ISBN 978-1-933550-18-3
• Kirzner, Israel M. Ludwig von Mises: the man and his economics (2001)
• Eamonn Butler, Ludwig von Mises – A Primer, Institute of Economic Affairs (2010)
• Brian Doherty, Radicals for Capitalism: A Freewheeling History of the Modern American Libertarian Movement (2007)
• Richard M. Ebeling, Political Economy, Public Policy, and Monetary Economics: Ludwig von Mises and the Austrian Tradition, (London/New York: Routledge, 2010) 354 pages, ISBN 978-0-415-77951-7.
• Richard M. Ebeling, "Ludwig von Mises: The Political Economist of Liberty, Part II", (The Freeman, June 2006)
• Richard M. Ebeling, "Ludwig von Mises: The Political Economist of Liberty, Part I", (The Freeman, May 2006)
• Richard M. Ebeling,"Ludwig von Mises and the Vienna of His Time, Part II", (The Freeman, April 2005)
• Richard M. Ebeling, "Ludwig von Mises and the Vienna of His Time, Part I", (The Freeman, March 2005)
• Richard M. Ebeling, "Austrian Economics and the Political Economy of Freedom", (The Freeman, June 2004)
• Hülsmann, Jörg Guido (2007). Mises: The Last Knight of Liberalism. Auburn: Ludwig von Mises Institute. ISBN 978-1-933550-18-3. http://mises.org/document/3295/Mises-The-Last-Knight-of-Liberalism. Retrieved May 16, 2012. 
• David Gordon (2011-02-23) Mises's Epistemology, Ludwig von Mises Institute
• Margit von Mises, My Years With Ludwig von Mises, Arlington House, 1976, rereleased in 1984 by Libertarian Press. ISBN 0-915513-00-5
• Ron Paul, "Mises and Austrian economics: A personal view" The Ludwig von Mises Institute of Auburn University (1984), 31 pages.
• Murray N. Rothbard, "Mises. Ludwig Edler von," The New Palgrave: A Dictionary of Economics, 1987, v. 3, pp. 479–80.
• "A Tribute to Ludwig Von Mises". A list of works by and on Ludwig Von Mises by the Foundation for Economic Education.

Notes[link]

• Note regarding personal names: 'Edler' (in English: 'noble') is a German title, in rank similar to that of a baronet. It is not a first or middle name. The female form is 'Edle'. Similarly, below, 'Ritter' is German for 'knight' and 'Graf' for 'count'.

External links[link]

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Ludwig von Mises

• Ludwig von Mises Institute Europe
• Mises.org, Ludwig von Mises Institute USA
• Mises.de, Books and Articles in the original German versions by Ludwig von Mises and other Authors of the Austrian School
• Ludwig von Mises at the Open Directory Project
• Audio of von Mises subtitled in Spanish and English "Do wage earners and their employers have interests in conflict?"
• Ludwig von Mises at Find a Grave

Michael Eugene Porter
Born	(1947-05-23) May 23, 1947 (age 65) Ann Arbor, Michigan
Occupation	Author, Management Consultant

Michael Eugene Porter (born May 23, 1947)^[1] is the Bishop William Lawrence University Professor at Harvard Business School. He is a leading authority on company strategy and the competitiveness of nations and regions. Michael Porter’s work is recognized in many governments, corporations and academic circles globally. He chairs Harvard Business School's program dedicated for newly appointed CEOs of very large corporations.

Early life[link]

Michael Eugene Porter received a B.S.E. with high honors in aerospace and mechanical engineering from Princeton University in 1969, where he was elected to Phi Beta Kappa and Tau Beta Pi. He received an M.B.A. with high distinction in 1971 from the Harvard Business School, where he was a George F. Baker Scholar, and a Ph.D. in Business Economics from Harvard University in 1973.

Porter was an outstanding intercollegiate golfer while at Princeton.

Career[link]

Michael Porter is the author of 18 books and numerous articles including Competitive Strategy, Competitive Advantage, Competitive Advantage of Nations, and On Competition. A six-time winner of the McKinsey Award for the best Harvard Business Review article of the year, Professor Porter is the most cited author in business and economics.^[2]

Michael Porter’s core field is competition and company strategy. He is generally recognized as the father of the modern strategy field, and his ideas are taught in virtually every business school in the world. His work has also re-defined thinking about competitiveness, economic development, economically distressed urban communities, environmental policy, and the role of corporations in society.

Recently, Porter has devoted considerable attention to understanding and addressing the pressing problems in health care delivery in the United States and other countries. His book, Redefining Health Care (written with Elizabeth Teisberg), develops a new strategic framework for transforming the value delivered by the health care system, with implications for providers, health plans, employers, and government, among other actors. The book received the James A. Hamilton award of the American College of Healthcare Executives in 2007 for book of the year. His New England Journal of Medicine research article, “A Strategy for Health Care Reform—Toward a Value-Based System” (June 2009), lays out a health reform strategy for the U.S. His work on health care is being extended to address the problems of health care delivery in developing countries, in collaboration with Dr. Jim Yong Kim and the Harvard Medical School and Harvard School of Public Health.

In addition to his research, writing, and teaching, Porter serves as an advisor to business, government, and the social sector. He has served as strategy advisor to numerous leading U.S. and international companies, including Caterpillar, Procter & Gamble, Scotts Miracle-Gro, Royal Dutch Shell, and Taiwan Semiconductor. Professor Porter serves on two public boards of directors, Thermo Fisher Scientific and Parametric Technology Corporation. Professor Porter also plays an active role in U.S. economic policy with the Executive Branch and Congress, and has led national economic strategy programs in numerous countries. He is currently working with the Presidents of Rwanda and South Korea.

Michael Porter has founded three major non-profit organizations: Initiative for a Competitive Inner City - ICIC^[3] in 1994, which addresses economic development in distressed urban communities; the Center for Effective Philanthropy, which creates rigorous tools for measuring foundation effectiveness; and FSG-Social Impact Advisors, a leading non-profit strategy firm serving NGOs, corporations, and foundations in the area of creating social value. He also currently serves on the Board of Trustees of Princeton University.

In 2000, Michael Porter was appointed a Harvard University Professor, the highest professional recognition that can be awarded to a Harvard faculty member.

Michael Porter is one of the founders of The Monitor Group, a strategy consulting firm that came under scrutiny in 2011 for its past contracts with the Muammar Gaddafi-led regime in Libya and alleged failure to register its activities under the Foreign Agents Registration Act.^[4] He is a Senior Partner and Academic Director.

In 2009, he was awarded an honorary degree from McGill University.

His main academic objectives focus on how a firm or a region can build a competitive advantage and develop competitive strategy. He is also a Fellow Member of the Strategic Management Society. One of his most significant contributions is the five forces. Porter's strategic system consists primarily of:

• Competitive advantage
• Porter five forces analysis
• strategic groups (also called strategic sets)
• the value chain
• the generic strategies of cost leadership, product differentiation, and focus
• the market positioning strategies of variety based, needs based, and access based market positions
• global strategy
• Porter's clusters of competence for regional economic development
• Diamond model
• Porter's four corners model

Works[link]

Competitive Strategy

• Porter, M.E. (1979) "How Competitive Forces Shape Strategy", Harvard Business Review, March/April 1979.
• Porter, M.E. (1980) Competitive Strategy, Free Press, New York, 1980. The book was voted the ninth most influential management book of the 20th century in a poll of the Fellows of the Academy of Management.^[5]
• Porter, M.E. (1985) Competitive Advantage, Free Press, New York, 1985.
• Porter, M.E. (ed.) (1986) Competition in Global Industries, Harvard Business School Press, Boston, 1986.
• Porter, M.E. (1987) "From Competitive Advantage to Corporate Strategy", Harvard Business Review, May/June 1987, pp 43–59.
• Porter, M.E. (1996) "What is Strategy", Harvard Business Review, Nov/Dec 1996.
• Porter, M.E. (1998) On Competition, Boston: Harvard Business School, 1998.
• Porter, M.E. (1990, 1998) "The Competitive Advantage of Nations", Free Press, New York, 1990.
• Porter, M.E. (1991) "Towards a Dynamic Theory of Strategy", Strategic Management Journal, 12 (Winter Special Issue), pp. 95–117.
• McGahan, A.M. & Porter, M.E. Porter. (1997) "How Much Does Industry Matter, Really?" Strategic Management Journal, 18 (Summer Special Issue), pp. 15–30.
• Porter, M.E. (2001) "Strategy and the Internet", Harvard Business Review, March 2001, pp. 62–78.
• Porter, M.E. & Kramer, M.R. (2006) "Strategy and Society: The Link Between Competitive Advantage and Corporate Social Responsibility", Harvard Business Review, December 2006, pp. 78–92.
• Porter, M.E. (2008) "The Five Competitive Forces That Shape Strategy", Harvard Business Review, January 2008, pp. 79–93.

Domestic Health Care

• Porter, M.E. & Teisberg, E.O. (2006) "Redefining Health Care: Creating Value-Based Competition On Results", Harvard Business School Press, 2006.
• Berwick, DM, Jain SH, and Porter ME. "Clinical Registries: The Opportunity For The Nation." Health Affairs Blogs, May 2011.

Global Health Care

• Jain SH, Weintraub R, Rhatigan J, Porter ME, Kim JY. "Delivering Global Health". Student British Medical Journal 2008; 16:27.[1]
• Kim JY, Rhatigan J, Jain SH, Weintraub R, Porter ME. "From a declaration of values to the creation of value in global health: a report from Harvard University's Global Health Delivery Project". Global Public Health. 2010 Mar; 5(2):181-8.
• Rhatigan, Joseph, Sachin H Jain, Joia S. Mukherjee, and Michael E. Porter. "Applying the Care Delivery Value Chain: HIV/AIDS Care in Resource Poor Settings." Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 09-093, February 2009.

Criticisms[link]

Porter has been criticized by some academics for inconsistent logical argument in his assertions.^[6] Critics have also labeled Porter's conclusions as lacking in empirical support and as justified with selective case studies.^{[7][8][9][10]}

See also[link]

• Cluster development
• Competitive advantage
• Marketing strategies
• National Diamond
• Porter 5 forces analysis
• Strategic planning
• Strategic management
• Techno cluster

References[link]

External links[link]

• Michael Porter currently leads the Institute for Strategy and Competitiveness at Harvard Business School
• Porter proposals for reforming the delivery of health care
• Summary Biography from Global Leaders
• Biography at Harvard Business School Faculty Pages
• Porter Prize
• Michael Porter's Author profile and bibliography from Shelfari
• Michael Porter's Thought Leader profile and bibliography from Monitor China
• Michael Porter's Talent profile from Monitor Talent