Conventional Macroeconomics Is Choice-Theoretic But Austrian Cycle Theory Has a Coordinationist Style of Macroeconomics

What is of continuing value in Austrian cycle theory is its foundational orientation toward a coordinationist style of macroeconomics. In sharp contrast, conventional macroeconomics is choice-theoretic and not coordinationist. Macro variables are treated as direct objects of choice, whereas within a coordinationist perspective macro variables are simply phenomena that emerge through interaction among people, but which are not chosen directly by anyone. Central to the entire corpus of Austrian economics is the claim that macro variables are not direct objects of choice but are built up through the interactions among participants within the economic process.

--Richard E. Wagner, "Austrian Cycle Theory and the Prospect of a Coordinationist Macroeconomics," in Modern Applications of Austrian Thought, ed. Jürgen G. Backhaus, Routledge Frontiers of Political Economy (London: Routledge, 2005), 82.