This book has two components: stochastic dynamics and stochastic random combinatorial analysis. The first discusses evolving patterns of interactions of a large but finite number of agents of several types. Changes of agent types or their choices or decisions over time are formulated as jump Markov processes with suitably specified transition rates: optimizations by agents make these rates generally endogenous. Probabilistic equilibrium selection rules are also discussed, together with the distributions of relative sizes of the bases of attraction. As the number of agents approaches infinity, we recover deterministic macroeconomic relations of more conventional economic models. The second component analyzes how agents form clusters of various sizes. This has applications for discussing sizes or shares of markets by various agents which involve some combinatorial analysis patterned after the population genetics literature. These are shown to be relevant to distributions of returns to assets, volatility of returns, and power laws.

Author Biography

Masanao Aoki is Professor Emeritus in the Department of Economics at the University of California, Los Angeles. He also held professorial appointments at the Institute for Social and Economic Research at Osaka University, Tokyo Institute of Technology, and the University of Illinois. Professor Aoki is a past President of the Society for Economic Dynamics and Control, a Fellow of the Econometric Society, and a Fellow of the IEEE Control Systems Society. Currently Associate Editor of the journal Macroeconomic Dynamics published by Cambridge University Press, he also served as Editor of the Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control and the International Economic Review, and Associate Editor of the IEEE’s Transaction of Automatic Control, Information Sciences, and the Journal of Mathematical Analysis and Application. Professor Aoki is the author or editor of ten books, including New Approaches to Macroeconomic Modeling: Evolutionary Stochastic Dynamics, Multiple Equilibria, and Externalities as Field Effects (Cambridge University Press, 1996).

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