I have patterned the navigation of this site after what I have termed the organizational architecture. Every organization has four higher level elements:
- Guiding Ideas
- Processes & Methods
- Community
- Infrastructure & Tools
I have provided a brief description of each of these elements and what the sections that I have named after these elements contain.
In addition, I have included links to Site Contents and Lexicon, which I will describe under the tabs above.
Guiding Ideas define the philosophical foundation for The Free Market Center. The principles, theories, and values of free markets provide the context for the ideas and concepts discussed on this website. I have not applied a strict categorization to the topics in the Guiding Ideas section but the topics in this section all fall within those three categories.
On a separate page, I have provided a statement of those elements of the Guiding Ideas that apply exclusively to the development of this website. Those elements include the purpose, vision, mission, and goals for the development of content in this website.
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Processes & Methods describe what The Free Market Center does and how it gets things done.
The primary processes of The Free Market Center consist of providing information and explanations that help people improve their understanding of the nature of free markets. The long term processes of The Free Market Center consist of Exposition, Commentary, Conversation, and Education. In the shorter term we will concentrate on Exposition and Commentary.
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The Free Market Center community consists of a vast number of people—inside and outside the organization; living and dead. It consists of all people and organizations interested in the return to free markets.
The term Community refers to the people (and organizations) that share a symbiotic relationship with The Free Market Center. The term has roots that carry the meaning of sharing and exchange. A community exemplifies a complex adaptive system—much like the markets about which we write.
As a reader you play an important role in our Community.
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Infrastructure & Tools comprise the resources and technologies, and their interrelated patterns, required to perform the processes and methods of this site. When combined with processes & methods, and community, this element fills out what the organization needs in order to accomplish its mission.
A simple example shows the relationship of Infrastructure & Tools to the rest of the Architecture:
If the Guiding Ideas of the organization includes the mission to build houses, it engages in the Processes & Methods of house building. To do this the organization must incorporate a Community of people with an interest in, and the skills to,
build houses. To this mix it must add the Infrastructure & Tools of land, tools, and equipment needed for house building.
This simple example, however, does not give a sense of the complexity of the organizational Infrastructure & Tools. This element includes a number of components that are either overlooked as a part of the organizational structure or are not recognized because of their intangible nature. Infrastructure also includes the mental models of individuals and the paradigms of groups.
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This page provides an annotated Table of Contents for this website.
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Because economics describes the everyday activities of humans, it uses many words from everyday language. In their day-to-day use of language people tend toward imprecise meaning, which can lead to misinterpretation of the precise concepts that economics intends to convey.
The Free Market Center has developed The Free Market Lexicon which provides an important reference to use while reading about and studying economic principles and theories. The Lexicon provides an extensive collection of words and phrases used on this site—and in references to which it refers.
Although a part of the Infrastructure & Tools, I decided that the importance of Lexicon required a separate section.
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