What is it about?
Today there is much discussion of “spontaneous” social phenomena (emergent, unintended, etc.), also as a consequence of Friedrich von Hayek’s strong influence on the debate. However, starting from a critical reading of Hayek, it would be better to more clearly distinguish between (i) “theories of spontaneous evolution of institutions” (i.e., theories about how certain rules emerged spontaneously over long historical periods through countless trials and errors) and (ii) “theories of spontaneous orders of actions” (i.e., theories about how certain forms of coordination among the actions of different individuals who are not intentionally cooperating can nonetheless arise in an unintended way). The chapter develops this distinction and shows its main implications.
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Why is it important?
it is possible and necessary to establish a clear distinction between two of Hayek’s theories on two separate phenomena: first, his theory regarding the spontaneous evolution of social institutions (developed mainly in Hayek, 1982 and 1988); and second, his theory of the spontaneous order of actions (already clear in his early work, e.g. Hayek, 1948). The two theories must be kept distinct because they pivot on: (i) different “unintended (ordered) phenomena” that are “unplanned” in a different sense; (ii) different kinds of “emergence”; (iii) different kinds of “knowledge” (available in society); (iv) different kinds of “invisible-hand explanations”.
Perspectives
The importance of considering the theory of spontaneous order of actions and the theory of spontaneous evolution of institutions as separate theories should be higlighted. Many commentators and followers of Hayek still fail to appreciate this important distinction, a failure which can generate some undesirable overlaps among explanatory levels and concepts. It is an interesting challenge to assess whether and how it is possible to devise a more general theory of spontaneous phenomena that covers a variety of different types of unintended patterns. To my mind, this challenge is still ongoing, and I hope that the discussion of Hayek’s work conducted in this chapter will shed some light on the intricacies, opportunities, and difficulties of this enterprise.
prof. Stefano Moroni
Politecnico di Milano
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This page is a summary of: Evolution of institutions and orders of actions in Hayek: two different theories of two distinct spontaneous phenomena, April 2026, Edward Elgar Publishing,
DOI: 10.4337/9781035394227.00009.
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