Simon, Herbert Alexander (1916–2001)

Abstract

Which discipline can claim the work of Herbert Simon as its own? Computer scientists, cognitive scientists, political scientists, public administration scholars, statisticians, and artificial intelligence specialists all claim a portion of the vast intellectual corpus of Herbert Simon as their own. Of all of the disciplines that claim Simon as an intellectual progenitor, it is unusual for political theorists to claim Simon as their own. This is an unfortunate error in the bibliography of the field. Herbert Simon is one of the twentieth century's foremost theorists of reason, organization, and decision-making. From Herbert Simon, the fields of politics and political theory gained the concepts bounded rationality, satisficing, and a theory of adaptive organization.