The nature of economic change and management in a new knowledge based information economy

The development of management theory and practice and their informational assumptions are followed over three phases of economic development; (1) the pre-oil crisis experience 1969–1975, (2) the post oil crisis sobering up through most of the 1990s and (3) the emergence of globally distributed production organizations, blurring the notion of the firm to be managed. The change from a belief in a predictable environment and only marginally uninformed actors to an increasing recognition of the fundamental ignorance that enters all business decisions, the consequent business mistakes and that learning between the periods has been of limited value and often misleading is found to be reflected in business information systems.The increased rate of failure among large firms in recent decades appears to be related to the increasing complexity of business decisions, the decreased reliability of learning and the difficulties of controlling the value chain in globally distributed production.