Graz Schumpeter Lectures 2026 - Lecture 1

What are the social forces that hold together complex societies encompassing hundreds of millions of people? How did human ultrasociality—extensive cooperation among large numbers of unrelated individuals—evolve? The evolution from small-scale egalitarian groups to large-scale hierarchical societies such as states and empires during the past 10,000 years is an example of a major evolutionary transition (MET). Other METs were the evolution of eukaryotic cells, multicelluar organisms, and social insect colonies. A general evolutionary mechanism that explains such transitions is multilevel selection. In this introductory lecture I will discuss remarkable parallels between evolutionary theories and ideas in economics, most notably that of “creative destruction.”