Leo Tolstoy's novel "Anna Karenina" begins with the phrase: "All happy families are alike, each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way." Based on this aphorism, the so-called Anna Karenina principle is derived, which is used to describe systems in various sciences. For example, Jared Diamond explains with his help why so few animals have been domesticated by man - for successful domestication, several factors must coincide, and the absence of one of them makes domestication impossible. Economists use the principle of Anna Karenina, speaking about the adaptation of systems to the external environment and their behavior during a crisis: all well-adapted systems have the same features, and all unadapted systems do not cope with adaptation in their own way.

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By the way, the so-called Anna Karenina principle often works in economics. American scientist Jared Diamond formulated it on the basis of the famous phrase from Leo Tolstoy's novel that "All happy families are alike, each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way." For economic systems this means that all efficient markets and companies have similar features, while problematic ones fail for different reasons. At the same time, the success of an enterprise depends on the simultaneous combination of many factors, while one mistake is enough for failure. This pattern has been known since the time of Aristotle. The ancient philosopher wrote that "it is possible to do the right thing in only one and only way," since "good is certain, and evil is limitless."

“The task is not to catch up, but to keep the best”

EVGENY SATANOVSKY: “Sometimes it's enough not to worsen the situation - if you are stuck at your level, and your competitors have failed, this is also normal. Your task is not to catch up, your task is to save all the best that you have, to gradually gain all the best that you can. But the most important thing is not to fail, chasing fashion, the best. This is exactly what we have been developing since the late 80s.”

22.01.2020, 07:08

“We are moving to a policy of national selfishness”

MIKHAIL KHAZIN: “What are the tasks facing Vladimir Putin today? The tasks are simple - he must fit Russia into the new world order. We must pay tribute to Vladimir Vladimirovich, he almost always talks about his plans, but, however, putting it into context in such a way that it is almost impossible to see.

The Anna Karenina principle describes situations where the success of any project, idea or business is possible only if a number of factors are simultaneously present and, therefore, the absence of one of these factors dooms the business to failure. The principle was popularized in Jared Diamond's Guns, Germs, and Steel, in which he explored the geographic, cultural, environmental, and technological factors that led to the dominance of Western civilization throughout the world. Diamond uses this principle to illustrate why there are so few instances of domestication of wild animals in human history: it only takes one necessary factor to be absent for an animal to resist domestication. The simultaneous combination of all necessary factors is rather an exception.

Alexander Gorban uses the principle of Anna Karenina when analyzing the widest range of crisis phenomena - in physiology from adaptation crises with changing climatic conditions to the dynamics of postoperative mortality of cancer patients, in the economy from bank failures to changes in recessions and upswings in financial markets. In their work, Gorban and his colleagues explore the adaptation various systems to the external environment. Based on the analysis of correlations between factors and their variations, the authors note that during prosperous periods, the systems behave in the same way, while at times of crisis, the behavior begins to differ. In other words, the authors paraphrase Tolstoy's aphorism in the following way: "All well-adapted systems are similar, all maladjusted systems fail to adapt each in its own way," and add: "It seems paradoxical, but as the difference between systems increases, they simultaneously become more correlated."

Thus, “in the chaos of disadaptation, order arises”: during periods of crisis, both the spread (systems become more “dissimilar”, the size of the data cloud grows) and correlations increase simultaneously (the dimension of the data cloud decreases). The effect theory is based on the concept of adaptive energy introduced by G. Selye in the 1930s. On the basis of this supplemented principle of Anna Karenina, a method of correlation adaptometry was created.

In economics, it is used to analyze various objects: from individual enterprises to national banking systems.

In physiology, Gorban's approach has been successfully used by various authors in comparative analysis adaptation in various situations, in health and disease, and from human physiology to plant adaptation.

Supporters of socionics cite a quote from Anna Karenina as an illustration of the main socionic hypothesis: compatibility in a family is much more likely to arise between dual types than between any other.

Vladimir Arnold in his book "Theory of Catastrophes" describes the so-called. “Principle of the fragility of good”, which, in a sense, complements the Principle of Anna Karenina. "Good" systems must simultaneously possess a number of properties, and therefore are more fragile than bad ones:

... for a system belonging to a special part of the stability boundary, with a small change in parameters, it is more likely to fall into the instability region than into the stability region. It's a manifestation general principle, according to which everything good (for example, sustainability) is more fragile than bad. Apparently, all good objects satisfy several requirements at the same time, while an object that has at least one of a number of shortcomings is considered bad.

What is its essence?
Yes, in the fact that if you have conceived a business, conceived a project, then it can be fully realized, but on one condition - that all favorable factors are available.
As soon as one factor is missing, your whole business can go downhill. The simultaneous combination of all the necessary factors - this can be called an exception.

For the first time in his book, the biologist Jared Diamond used this principle, he explained why not all animals can be domesticated and what conditions are needed for this.

An animal must grow rapidly in order to be profitable and economical.
Breed in captivity. Not every animal is ready to do it locked up - this is the problem of many zoos.
Unpretentiousness in food.
Friendliness - is it possible to tame his obstinate temper?
Reaction to danger - animals react differently to danger, there are those that run away with all their might and are unlikely to be able to collect them later.
Independence - Individualists and loners are inherently poor candidates for domestication.

The combination of all these factors led to the domestication of many animal species.

Krasnoyarsk professor Alexander Gorban uses this principle to explain the range of economic phenomena. He also brought it into circulation. On its basis, he investigated the adaptation of various systems and organisms to external conditions. He studied why the banking system crashes, booms and busts in the markets, mortality after operations in the field of oncology, etc.

The bottom line is that by observing the statistical relationship of some quantities financial systems how they behave under the influence external factors, it is possible to calculate the crisis, even before it begins, to find hidden tension. If anything, predict the future.
Paraphrasing Tolstoy's statement, he concluded that

"All well-adapted systems are alike; all maladjusted systems experience problems with adaptation - each in its own way"

If the pressure of external factors becomes stronger, then this leads to economic suicide - the full principle of "Anna Karenina".

I bring to your attention;

What does the expression "black swan" mean?
What does the term shock therapy mean? What does it include?

Anna Karenina principle describes situations where the success of a project, idea or business is possible only if a number of factors are simultaneously present and, therefore, the absence of at least one of these factors dooms the entire enterprise to failure. The principle was popularized in Guns, Germs and Steel by Jared Diamond, in which he explored the geographic, cultural, environmental, and technological factors that led to the dominance of Western civilization throughout the world.

The name of the principle is based on the famous aphorism of Leo Tolstoy that opens the novel Anna Karenina:

All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.

Application and examples[ | ]

Story [ | ]

Diamond, in Guns, Germs, and Steel, uses this principle to illustrate why there are so few instances of domestication of wild animals in human history: it only takes one necessary factor to be absent to prevent an animal from being domesticated. The simultaneous combination of all necessary factors is rather an exception.

He lists six essential ingredients without which domestication would be impossible:

diet- A candidate for domestication must be unpretentious in food. Too picky animals are obviously unsuitable: too much fuss is required by a creature that feeds, for example, exclusively on dates.
growth rate- The animal must grow fast enough to make it economically viable to breed. For example, a person who intended to breed elephants would have to wait 12 years for the elephant to reach maturity.
Problems with breeding in captivity- Some animals do not want to breed in artificial conditions. So the male cheetah in his natural environment has to chase the female for several days to provoke her ovulation. In this regard, cheetahs, which are noticeably superior to dogs as hunting animals, are very difficult to breed.
viciousness- Some species are too hostile to be a good candidate for domestication. In particular, the zebra would be an excellent candidate if not for its obstinate disposition.
tendency to panic - Different types react differently to danger. Animals that immediately take flight at the first threat are hardly suitable for keeping on the farm.
social structure- Independent mavericks are also bad candidates. Animals with a well-defined social hierarchy and the ability to mistake a person for a leader are best suited for breeding.

From physiology to economics[ | ]

In this way, "in the chaos of maladaptation, order arises": during periods of crisis, both the spread (systems become more “dissimilar”, the size of the data cloud grows) and correlations (the dimension of the data cloud decreases) increase simultaneously. The effect theory is based on the concept of adaptive energy, introduced by G. Selye in the 1930s. Based on this supplemented principle of Anna Karenina, a method of correlation adaptometry was created. In economics, it is used to analyze various objects: from individual enterprises to national banking systems. In physiology, Gorban's approach has been successfully used by various authors in the comparative analysis of adaptation in various situations, in normal and pathological conditions, and from human physiology to plant adaptation.

Vladimir Arnold in his book "" describes the so-called. “Principle of the fragility of good”, which, in a sense, complements the Principle of Anna Karenina. "Good" systems must simultaneously possess a number of properties, and therefore are more fragile than bad ones:

... for a system belonging to a special part of the stability boundary, with a small change in parameters, it is more likely to fall into the instability region than into the stability region. This is a manifestation of the general principle that all good things (such as sustainability) are more fragile than bad things. Apparently, all good objects satisfy several requirements at the same time, while an object that has at least one of a number of shortcomings is considered bad.

Duane Moore describes the application of the Anna Karenina principle in the field of ecology: successful environmental risk assessments are all the same, each unsuccessful environmental risk assessment fails in its own way. The Anna Karenina principle also applies to environmental risk assessment with multiple stressors.

Notes [ | ]

A.N. Gorban, E.V. Smirnova, T.A. Tyukina, Correlations, Risk and Crisis: From Physiology to Finance , Physica A, Vol. 389, Issue 16, 2010, pp 3193-3217.
"In the chaos of maladaptation, there is an order. It seems, paradoxically, that as systems become more different they actually become more correlated within limits." Anna Karenina principle explains bodily stress and stockmarket crashes, University of Leicester, 2010.
Group Stress Effect and Correlation Adaptometry
S. N. Masaev, M. G. Dorrer, Evaluation of the company management system based on the method of adaptive correlation to the external environment // Problems of Management, No. 3, 2010, 45-50.
E. V. Pokidysheva, Assessing the contingency of monetary and banking policies during the crisis , Finance and Credit 42(426), 2010 (November), 72-78.
Gorban A. N., Manchuk V. T., Petushkova E. V. Dynamics of correlations between physiological parameters during adaptation and the ecological-evolutionary principle of polyfactoriality // Problems of ecological monitoring and modeling of ecosystems. - L .: Gidrometeoizdat, 1987. - T.10. - P.187-198.
Svetlichnaya G. N., Smirnova E. V., Pokidysheva L. I. Correlation adaptometry as a method for assessing cardiovascular and respiratory interaction // Human Physiology. - 1997. - V.23, No. 3. - S.58-62.
Pokidysheva L. I., Polyntsev L. A., Lazarenko V. I. On the relationship of rheographic parameters of the eye in normal and pathological conditions during adaptation to hypothermic exposure. Journal of Ophthalmology. - Odessa, 1996. - No. 3. - P. 153-155.