Creative destruction

Boyes posting on the reaction to fracking is an excellent illustration of the impact and reaction to creative destruction. As the process of innovation and creativity is actualized the prospect of change is unsettling. This sense of discomfort is amplified by the threat that change poses to those who are successful under the existing regime.

That said, the role played by education at any level in confronting creative destruction is significant. One perspective of the role of education is to create independent thinking and provide a framework for examining alternative points of view. In fact, this ideal lies at the heart of the economic way of thinking - trying to understand costs and benefits, the incentive and institutional framework that shapes incentives and costs and an analysis of the consequences of choice.

Another view of education, explicated by Sowell, Hayek and others, is indoctrination. That is, as in the case that Boyes reports, schools can present and advocate for an ideology. The point of view presented by the elementary school teacher is one based on fear of change, distrust of emergent processes and hostility to change.

Boyes and I have explored the moral content of economics and this case is an excellent opportunity to consider the moral framework offered by the economic way of thinking and to juxtapose the economic way of thinking with an ideological view that mobilizes to oppose creative destruction in favor of a static view. Further, the static view favored by those who control or seek to control is a narrow one premised on the false premise of egalitarianism.

I am anxious to explore this juxtaposition in an effort to better understand those who would deny progress or change.