Crisis as a Mechanism for Restoring System Equilibrium
According to Professor Elżbieta Mączyńska’s diagnosis, the modern economy exists in a state of "disturbed equilibrium," where instability paradoxically drives progress. In this view, financial crises are not episodic errors but mechanisms for restoring systemic coherence. This article analyzes Hyman Minsky’s hypothesis, which explains how the system "uses" collapses to purge itself of excesses. Readers will learn why the prosperity phase is a preparatory stage for a crash and how modern technology and politics are shaping a new economics of crisis.
The Minsky Model: From Hedge to Ponzi Finance
The financial instability hypothesis assumes that the capitalist system is structurally fragile. The key lies in a three-part typology of financing. In the hedge (secured) variant, income covers both principal and interest payments. In speculative financing, profits only cover interest, and debt must be rolled over. The most dangerous is Ponzi financing, where the debtor maintains liquidity only by spiraling their debt levels.
Minsky argues that the longer a period of stability lasts, the more the system shifts toward risky structures. This evolution fuels speculative bubbles, which cannot exist without rapid credit expansion. Only when banks begin to mass-produce "money substitutes" do asset prices decouple from real income, building the foundation for a future catastrophe.
Kindleberger: From Mania to Panic in the Crisis Sequence
Charles Kindleberger describes the speculative drama in five acts: displacement, mania, overtrading, distress, and panic. In the mania phase, driven by the fear of missing out (FOMO), creative accounting and fraud become systemic elements. Cheap credit masks pathologies that only come to light during a sudden demand for liquidity.
This instability spreads through the mechanism of contagion. On a national scale, this manifests as "twin peaks" in the stock and real estate markets. Internationally, the crisis is transmitted through psychological, trade, and financial channels—primarily through global dollar capital flows that link distant markets into a single, vulnerable organism.
The Lender of Last Resort Promotes Moral Hazard
The existence of bailout institutions gives rise to moral hazard. The belief that the state "will not let giants fail" encourages management to use excessive leverage. Governments face an aporia: a lack of intervention risks destroying the real economy, but a rescue reinforces destructive habits. These models vary regionally—from Islamic finance and the American Dodd-Frank Act to the European banking union.
A modern challenge is AI algorithms. While artificial intelligence helps in risk modeling, it can also amplify algorithmic herd behavior. When multiple institutions use similar models, their reactions to market stress synchronize, drastically accelerating the transition to the panic phase and deepening systemic instability.
Crisis Management: Strategies for Building Resilience
Modern economics criticizes Minsky’s hypothesis for a certain fatalism and for ignoring external shocks, such as wars or pandemics. Nevertheless, it is the debt architecture that determines whether a shock causes a mere tremor or a full implosion. In a world of permanent crisis, management must implement resilience-building strategies based on prudence and limiting leverage during times of euphoria.
True innovation does not lie in creating more financial instruments, but in seeking the ethical foundations of the economy. Are we doomed to repeat the same mistakes, or can we learn the art of surviving a fall? Responsible leadership requires the courage to refuse to participate in the race to the bottom, even when the entire market succumbs to mania.
📄 Full analysis available in PDF