title: Self-organized evolution in a socioeconomic environment.
abstract: We propose a general scenario to analyze technological changes in socio-economic environments. We illustrate the ideas with a model that incorporating the main trends is simple enough to extract analytical results and, at the same time, sufficiently complex to display a rich dynamic behavior. Our study shows that there exists a macroscopic observable that is maximized in a regime where the system is critical, in the sense that the distribution of events follow power laws. Computer simulations show that, in addition, the system always self-organizes to achieve the optimal performance in the stationary state.
authors.affiliation: Departament d'Enginyeria Informàtica, Universitat Rovira i Virgili, Carretera Salou s/n, E-43006 Tarragona, Spain.
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Arenas
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Díaz-Guilera
authors.forename: C J
authors.initials: CJ
authors.lastname: Pérez
authors.forename: F
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Vega-Redondo
mesh_terms: D003198:Computer Simulation; D008962:Models, Theoretical; D010825:Physics / Q000379:methods*; D012959:Socioeconomic Factors