ABSTRACT
A system may evolve following a range of potential paths. A path may be selected by collective agency. Such a selection is shaped by the institutional framework, which influences how existing capacities are used and where changes can be and are sought and introduced. Different institutional environments can lead agents to emphasize different objectives and different ways for reaching these. Their emphases, in turn, have an impact on the technological foundations of activities and, thereby, on the possibilities for further changes. Consequently, trajectories of change can differ noticeably between groups. Additionally, it is not only technological capacities that expand or contract along the paths that can serve to describe the changes observed. The institutional framework itself can also change, with possible repercussions on the effectiveness and use of technology. The connection of economic activity, such as production, distribution, and consumption, and the related exchanges and transactions, to other social activities and influences has repeatedly been pointed out (e.g., Polanyi 1968; Lee and Jo 2011; Todorova 2013). It is a part of the overall social environment. Economic activity is structured and shaped not solely by economic factors and constraints, but by a broader set of political, social, and cultural influences as well, which are themselves overlapping. For example, people are citizens, not only consumers and taxpayers. The direction and nature of individuals’ activities respond to social structures (Archer 1995; Lawson 1997; Lee 2011). The socio-technological environment of agents shapes a gamut of possibilities from which production processes can be selected. It lies behind rules of exchange, patterns of distribution, possibilities for the logistics of distributing products, and the consumption space that agents can explore, amongst others. Patterns of production, distribution, and consumption, as well as exchanges, emerge from technological potential. The specific institutional environment in which these activities are undertaken directs agents’ focus and awards them meaning. Economic activities are occurring in a social context. They are part of on-going processes. Consequently, economic activities are understood as a ‘social provisioning process,’ as the historical process that provides agents with the means for satisfying needs that are amenable to economic exchanges (e.g., Gruchy 1987; Dugger 1996; Jo 2011; Lee 2011, 2012; Lee and Jo 2011). The integration of economic activity and its technological foundation as a part of the overall social environment are proposed in order to offer the foundation for an understanding of endogenous dynamics in the system and open-ended, nonteleological processes of change (see, e.g., Veblen 1898; Ayres [1944] 1996; Lee 2011; Elsner 2012).
