Introduction to the Minitrack on Strategy, Information, Technology, Economics, and Society (SITES)

Much of the economic insight gained over the past several hundred years was derived under the basic premise that individuals (also referred to as economic agents) are self-interested and take actions, which—at least subjectively—maximize utility, subject to the constraints implied by any agent’s limited means and/or bounded rationality, as well as by the environment he (or she) lives in. Indeed, even today, in a substantially more complex society and economy, constrained maximization of goal achievement under uncertainty remains a strong predictor and explanatory force for the actual behavior of economic agents. Yet agents’ choices are quite sensitive to the information available to them, unless they “choose” to be selectively ignorant. The contributions contained in the 2021 edition of our longstanding SITES mini-track illustrate insights derived under the classical premise of self-interest, in the context of a “new economy,” where information—its generation, control, and strategic use—presents a key asset. The selection of research papers cluster within four main themes: rentseeking, collective perception and action, incomplete information, and communication. Each of the four topics features three papers dedicated to one of these themes, now examined in turn.