Schumpeter’s Gesetz and Gestalt in space: exploring evolutionary economic geographies of money and finance

Abstract

This paper argues that money and finance are not sufficiently integrated into the research agenda of evolutionary economic geography (EEG). I identify two dimensions of Joseph Schumpeter’s vision of the inherent instability of capitalism as promising for the EEG research agenda: First, the ‘law’ (Gesetz) of a disequilibrating role of credit creation and innovations in financial relations reveals the deeply ‘monetary character’ of his theory of development. Second, Schumpeter’s vision of an evolutionary ‘form’ (Gestalt) of capitalism describes a social process that rests on macro-drivers of institutional change. Money and finance thus simultaneously act as both static indicators and dynamic drivers of economic development in space.