Bernard Paulré

Flexibility in manufacturing systems: A relational and a dynamic approach

Abstract In this paper, we propose that flexibility in a manufacturing system is not independent of the environment with which it interacts. Furthermore, we propose that flexibility is a multidimensional concept relating the degree, effort and time of adaptation. In order to arrive at this approach, a dynamic perspective is adopted in which the flexibility dimensions are related. A number of examples are presented to point out some problems where this approach may be used.

Is the New Economy a Useful Concept

The present paper examines the meaning and usefulness of the concept of a New Economy. This construct, which first began to appear in the media in the mid-1990s, is utilised today with a variety of definitions and intentions. Having identified three possible denotations or orientations relating to its current usage, we suggest that the original meaning, and the language that is associated with it, express an extremely optimistic view of the future of the U.S. economy, and are best classified as being utopian. We also examine the validity and significance of the theses developed by the radical proponents of the New Economy concept by testing them against a certain number of facts and statistical studies concerning the state of the U.S. economy for the past ten years. By studying the substance of these New Economy theses, we discover an inconsistency between one of the concepts basic principles (the advance of technological progress, driven by the information and communications technologies that are allegedly diffusing throughout the whole economic system) and that which we already know about the evolution of two different forms of productivity (the productivity of labour and total factor productivity) - including the way in which they have diverged in the various economic sectors. We mention a few alternative approaches that can be used to analyse the ongoing economic growth in the U.S. Until now, macroeconomic growth models have provided the theoretical underpinnings for most debates on the origins of the particular economic growth and productivity gains that have taken place in the current environment. However, the present study shows that given the nature of the issues that need to be resolved, we should also be taking a look at problems that are more global in nature, i.e., the existence of quantum leaps in technology, and hence the theory of long-term technological change. Our conclusions emphasise the confusion that the New Economy concept can cause, and we evoke Solows Paradox, which we see as still being applicable in todays situation, albeit in a modified form.

Issues and dilemmas in cognitive economics

The cognitive economics, which first made its appearance in the 1960s, now focuses a great deal of economic research resources. It is legitimate to raise questions about the contents and/or timing of the proposal of a cognitive economics research program. In this article, we underline some of the issues at stake in this sort of clarification, focusing specifically on problems pertaining to the speeds at which knowledge or real interactions actually adjust, and to the relevancy of the axioms of the epistemic logic. The dilemmas that we have emphasized here all provide us with an opportunity to highlight a certain number of significant alternatives. Specifically: (i) issues relating to the respective roles of the knowledge economy and of cognitive economics stricto sensu; (ii) the difference between the computable orientation that is involved in standard approaches to economic behaviours, and the connectionist orientation that we illustrate, for example, by the evolutionary conception of the firm; (iii) the problem of the relationship between a cognitive economics research program and one that relates to cognitive sciences. We present an outline of the potential foundations for a cognitive economics research program. This kind of program would manifest itself through potentially divergent schools of thought whose disparities should all be seen as factors of dynamism that could be used to drive research in this area.