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Credibility Thesis is a proposed heterodox theoretical framework for understanding how societal institutions come about and evolve. It purports that institutions emerge from intentional institution-building but never in the originally intended form. Instead, institutional development is endogenous and spontaneously ordered and institutional persistence can be explained by their credibility, which is provided by the function that particular institutions serve rather than their theoretical or ideological form. The Credibility Thesis can be applied to explain, for example, why purported institutional improvements do not take hold as part of structural adjustment programs, while other economies in the developing world deliver growth despite absence of clear and strong market mechanisms such as indisputable private property rights or clearly delineated and registered land tenure. == Postulates of Credibility Thesis == According to the Credibility Thesis, institutional persistence, meaning the survival and change of particular institutions through time is determined by the function of the institution and actors' expectations of the institution to play that function. Changes in institutional arrangements, such as changes from informal land tenure and informal housing to a formalized real estate market or gradually declining prevalence of formal marriage or customary rights, are brought about by rule-making in a multi-actor playing field, where even the strongest actors cannot fully dictate institutional arrangements. An institution that appears stable and unchanging over time can be said to exist in an equilibrium wherein actors’ conflicting interests on what form the institution should take are locked in a frozen conflict. For example, whether land holdings should be registered in a cadastre or if informal exchange of payment for use rights can suffice as confirmation of a land sale, constitute two possible land institution arrangements and either can be beneficial to different actors’ interests. That no actor perceives an immediate opportunity to change the arrangement to their advantage is a sign of the credibility of the assignment and the source of the equilibrium of institutional arrangement. However, disequilibrium characterises institutional arrangements and equilibrium is transitory and rare. In this aspect the Credibility Theory is juxtaposed to Structural functionalism, which is based on presupposed societal equilibrium. A series of underlying postulates for the Credibility Thesis have been proposed: < * Institutions are the resultant of unintentional development. Although actors have intentions, there is no agency that can externally design institutions, as actors’ actions are part of the same endogenous game. Institutions emerge as an unanticipated outcome of actors’ multitudinous interactions, in effect, are the result of an autonomous, ''Unintended Intentionality''. * Institutional change is driven by disequilibrium. Contrary to the notion that institutions settle around equilibrium, actors’ interactions are seen as an ever-changing and conflicting process in which stable status is never reached. One could see it as a “Progressive Disequilibrium” or institutional change as perpetual alteration, yet, with alternating speeds of change; sometimes, imperceptibly slow, sometimes, sudden and with shocks. * Institutional Form is subordinate to Function. In other words, the use and disuse of institutions over time and space is what matters for understanding their role in development, not their appearance.〔 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Credibility thesis」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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