The Research On Hayek’s Thought Of Spontaneous Order

Hayek (F.A.Hayek) is an important masters in economics and political philosophyin20th century. In the field of Western liberalism, Hayek is undoubtedly an importantfigure, he wrote many masterpieces, covering areas such as politics, economics and law,Hayek focused on spontaneous order of human beings all his life. Spontaneous order isthe core through which people can understand the relationship between the individualand society.The philosophical basis of the formation of Hayek’s spontaneous order, is"inevitable ignorance" view and the concept of "bounded rationality". Especially theview of "inevitably ignorance" is the core of Hayek’s whole theory system and theconcept of bounded rationality is marked out from his knowledge, the limitation ofhuman knowledge makes the reason limit. Hayek thought that social order was thenecessary premise that human society exists. Human innocence and rationalitycontributed to the social order that is a spontaneous order necessarily. This order is notfrom human’s intentional design, but is rooted in tradition and experience. Spontaneousorder is formed by individual behavior in the process of the pursuit of their goals orunconsciously following a "general rule", it is not designed or created. According toAdam Ferguson, it is "the result of human behavior, rather than the results of humandesign".Hayek made a difference between two kinds of rational concepts, and heagreed with evolutionary rationalism and disagreed with constructivist rationalism. Heclaimed that gradual accumulation was the way leading to the advancement of humansociety and the overall design by human rationality could not help to elevate the living conditions of human race.Based on the thought of spontaneous order, Hayek put forward a lot of meaningfulpoints. He pointed out that people should distinguish the relationship between law andlegislation, the law will not definitely lead to the rule of law，tradition and conventionshould be treasured in the way to rule of law, because the law originated from thetradition and convention, it was not being worked out through human rationality, butwas found. His distinction between the internal and external regulations was significant,and we should attached importance to internal rules or general rules which passedthrough a long historical evolution. In the process of respecting the rules, eachindividual should take his due responsibilities and moral self-discipline, and thegovernment’s action must be limited to a certain range of competence.