Economics and Information

1. Front Matter

   Pages 1-9

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2. Introduction

   1. Introduction

      • Pascal Petit

      Pages 11-16

3. Information theories

   1. Economics of Information or Economics of Information Systems ?

      • Pascal Petit

      Pages 17-31

   2. What Economics Borrows from the Statistical Theory of Information?

      • Pascal Petit

      Pages 33-48

   3. Structure and Role of Information and Beliefs in Game Theory

      • Pascal Petit

      Pages 49-59

4. Information and market

   1. Information and Prices

      • Pascal Petit

      Pages 61-81

   2. The Self Centred Logic of Financial Markets

      • Pascal Petit

      Pages 83-92

   3. Theory of Information: From Bounded Rationality to Interpretive Reason

      • Pascal Petit

      Pages 93-120

5. Information and organisations

   1. Information, Knowledge and the Evolutionary Theory of the Firm

      • Pascal Petit

      Pages 121-137

   2. Information in the Theory of Organizations

      • Pascal Petit

      Pages 139-153

   3. On the Codifiability of Knowledge: Technical Change and the Structure of Cognitive Activities

      • Pascal Petit

      Pages 155-165

6. Perspectives and conclusions

   1. The European Policy of Promotion of the Information Society

      • Pascal Petit

      Pages 167-187

   2. Screening the Information Economy through Theories of Information

      • Pascal Petit

      Pages 189-216

7. Back Matter

   Pages 217-220

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The notion of information is multifaceted. According to the case, it is a simple signal or already knowledge. lt responds to codes and is inscribed into a social relationship. There are clearly many perspectives which the social sciences can take to analyse the notion of information. The economy cannot account for the majority of situations where, in the activities of production, consumption or exchange, the notion of information finds itself implied, although each school of thought has its own understanding of the notion of information. This book takes this observation as a starting point and goes on to clarify a contemporary debate on the economy of information which remains quite vague, making use of the ways in which different theoretical approaches deal with information. To seize the nature and scope of the transformations in our societies, a consequence of our new ways of handling, stocking and circulating information in the workings of the markets like Organisations, such a theoretical exercise seems useful. The organisation of the book results from this choice. The contributions gathered in one part deal with the role of information in the functioning of the markets, those featuring in another are more interested in the organisations. To favour an enriching cross-reading of approaches developed in the two sections already referred to, we have preceded these with a section gathering approaches (which are more transversal) developing different theories of information (according to perspectives which are, respectively, systematic, statistical or strategic).

• Know-how
• game theory
• information
• information system
• organization
• service-oriented computing

• Paris, France

  Pascal Petit

Pascal Petit is a CNRS director of research , working at CEPREMAP, a research centre in Paris sponsored by the CNRS and the Commissariat General du Plan. He teaches economics at the University of Paris 13 and has produced a number of books and a great many articles on economic growth, productivity, technological change and employment in developed economies.

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