An Exploration of the Nature and Rationale of a Systemic Model

A somewhat abstruse model recently formulated by Alonso is introduced and analyzed. The nature and certain structural properties of the model are examined and its general form is identified. The salient feature of the model is its simultaneous and consistent determination of the totals of the endogenous variables and of their constituent parts. The model can be viewed as an integration of substantive (producing–causal) submodels with a structural–formal (distributive) submodel. The integration is based on the dual roles of two endogenous variables both as normalizing factors and as explanatory factors. The last role is justified by the factors' representation of relative (inverse) mean cost of interaction. A statistical-independence postulation is also identified as an underlying statement of the model.