Tag: networks

Networks and Contagion in Financial Markets

(This article follows on from a more general post on the study of networks in economics)

In this model, as well as those concepts Jackson discussed in the broader discussion on networks, we have the concepts of diversification and integration to separate the breadth and depth of connectivity of one organisation to others. A company/organisation/ country with many connections to others would be highly diversified; where those interests represented a higher proportion of their overall connectivity, they would be highly integrated. Continue reading “Networks and Contagion in Financial Markets”

It’s a Small World, After All

We all know we’re only 7 steps away from Jonny Depp. Or Obama. Or Lionel Messi (maybe, quite literally if you’re here at the GSE.) However, the world is not only small; it is shrinking. We are becoming more interconnected through new forms of communication. We find out information through these networks, which then influences our decisions. What we do, therefore, is influenced by whom we know.

Matt Jackson at Stanford University has been analysing the increasing connectedness of the world and its implications on spreading information, and came to Barcelona to explain his findings at the UPF opening ceremony. (And there we were thinking we’d been here so long, you could look us up on the book directory at the library and know where to find us.)

So what is a network and how can we think about connectivity within one?

Continue reading “It’s a Small World, After All”