The Competitiveness of Nations

in a Global Knowledge-Based Economy

Harry Hillman Chartrand

April 2002

Jean Piaget                                                        

MAIN TRENDS IN INTER-DISCIPLINARY RESEARCH.  

This essay was originally published as Chapter 7 in Main Trends of Research in the Social and Human Sciences, Part 1, Mouton/Unesco 1970.  This book was also published in Great Britain in 1973 by George Allen & Unwin Ltd., Copyright © 1970 by Unesco. Harper Torchbooks, New York, N.Y., 1973.

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Table of Contents

                                                                                                                                                   Page

        Introduction                                                                      7

I - POSITION OF THE PROBLEMS                                            9

1. Interdisciplinary collaboration in the                                       9

          natural sciences                             

2. Convergence of problems within the human sciences          12

      and their relative affinity with those of the life sciences

3. From problems to general processes: structures,                  14

          functions and meanings

4. Logic, law and signs                                                             18

II - STRUCTURES AND RULES (OR NORMS)                            21

5. Concepts of structures                                                           21

6. Systems of Rules                                                                   26

7. Examples of interferences in the field of                                 28

        logical structures 

8. Systems of non-deducible norms: sociology of law,                 31

      etc.; customs and habit patterns

9. Diachronic and synchronic problems in the

         field of norms                                                                       33

III - FUNCTIONING AND VALUES                                                  35

10. Functioning and functions. Affectivity and praxeology              36

11. Classification of Values                                                             40

12. Regulations and operations relative to valorizations

       of finality                                                                                    43

13. Cybernetic circuits and economic adjustments                            46

14. Synchronic and diachronic problems in the sphere of

       function and value                                                                     49

IV - MEANINGS AND THEIR SYSTEMS                                             52

V - CONCLUSION: THE SUBJECT OF KNOWLEDGE                         63

      AND THE HUMAN SCIENCES                                    

Notes (bottom of each web page)                                            68

 

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