Applications of Small-World Networks to some Socio-economic Systems

TL;DR

This paper explores how small-world networks better represent social systems and applies models like the Sznajd opinion formation to these networks, incorporating leadership to explain socio-economic phenomena.

Contribution

It generalizes economic evolution models and applies opinion dynamics models to small-world networks, including leadership roles, to better understand socio-economic behaviors.

Findings

SWN models better match real social systems

Opinion formation dynamics are effectively modeled on SWN

Leadership influences are incorporated into socio-economic models

Abstract

Small-world networks (SWN) are found to be closer to the real social systems than both regular and random lattices. Then, a model for the evolution of economic systems is generalized to SWN. The Sznajd model for the two-state opinion formation problem is applied to SWN. Then a simple definition of leaders is included. These models explain some socio-economic aspects.