Bohanon and Horowitz: Language, markets are organized spontaneously

Eighteenth century Scottish philosopher Adam Ferguson greatly influenced one of our favorite economists, Austrian-school Friedrich Hayek. Ferguson, a contemporary of the more famous Adam Smith, noted that many beneficial patterns of human interaction are “the result of human action, but not the execution of any human design.” Ferguson’s idea of order without design influenced Hayek’s concept of the “spontaneous order,” which Hayek saw as the essence of market processes.

Perhaps the most obvious example of this Enlightenment/Austrian view of human interaction is human language. No one person nor committee “designs” language, even though language results from human activity and serves human ends. Centralized design is not necessary for human language to function or evolve to accommodate new conditions.

Forty years ago, if you said, “Go Google it,” or, “Let’s meet up by Zoom,” the expressions would have been incomprehensible, and your friends might have wondered what was wrong with you. Yet today, they are commonly understood despite the fact they were never authorized by a Congressional Act nor voted on by the public. Editors and curators of dictionaries recognize and record language innovations; they do not formulate or direct them.

Hayek was suspicious of elitist attempts to impose top-down social order on the rest of society. While attempts to control, direct or force language patterns top-down have been quite common, they are usually costly and often quite brutal. Moreover, they typically lead to bitter, long-lasting resentments. The Japanese occupation of Korea from 1910-1945 was accompanied by the forced imposition of the Japanese language.

Few remember that it was not until 1964 that South Korea established full diplomatic relations with Japan. Nor have we North Americans been immune from such linguistic imperialism, as evidenced in the forced suppression of Native American students conversing in their native tongue in government-sponsored boarding schools.

Yet language choice need not be a byproduct of coercion. In a grocery in Hayek’s Vienna, Bohanon noted two non-native English speakers conversing in English. Upon inquiry, the young man was Austrian, and the young lady was from Spain. No one forced them to converse in English, yet it was the best choice for their ends. English has become the international language of commerce and scholarship. Its initial rise was undoubtedly fueled by British Imperialism and American economic dominance, but its prevalence persists well after their decline.

Language and markets show that many essential activities are organized spontaneously with little centralized command and control.•

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Bohanon and Horowitz are professors of economics at Ball State University. Send comments to ibjedit@ibj.com.