Contemporary Capitalism: The Variety and Unequal Performance of Really Existing Markets: Farewell to Doctor Pangloss?
01 Mar 1997-pp 55-93
TL;DR: A return to free market concepts has been discussed by as mentioned in this paper, who argue that market mechanisms had to be tamed by a series of legislation, regulation, and collective agreements, as well as built-in stabilizers in the tax system and/or in the reaction functions of central banks.
Abstract: A RETURN TO FREE MARKET CONCEPTIONS: WHY? The conceptions about the self-regulating mechanisms associated with markets have undergone the equivalent of a long wave. During the Great Depression of the 1930s, a majority of economists were critical of the institutional impediments to the free functioning of markets. Only a minority argued that it was in the very nature of free markets to trigger large instabilities and/or stagnation (Weir and Skocpol, 1985). After World War II, the Keynesian heterodoxy became the core of significant revolution concerning the respective roles that the state and market should play in the long run social and economic reproduction of capitalism: Adequate public regulation and fine tuning of monetary and fiscal policies could promote quasifull employment, along a steady growth path. Basically market mechanisms had to be tamed by a series of legislation, regulation, and collective agreements, as well as built-in stabilizers in the tax system and/or in the reaction functions of central banks. As Joan Robinson recurrently pointed out, markets were efficient for allocating scarce resources between alternative goals via the formation of relative prices. But one major drawback resulted from the fact that pure market mechanisms were generally unable to provide full employment and macroeconomic stability. In fact during the fifties and sixties this view was widely shared by almost all governments, including the most conservative ones. Did not Richard Nixon declare, “Now we are all Keynesians”?
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TL;DR: In this article, a global commodity chain analysis approach is combined with insights from economic sociology embeddedness theory to explore the social, cultural and organizational factors shaping the Fair Trade coffee and Forest Stewardship Council certification.
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Cites background from "Contemporary Capitalism: The Variet..."
...The apparently objective organizational imperatives of production and trade in today s globalizing markets are shaped by particular constellations of social and political relations (see Boyer, 1997; Randles, 2003)....
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TL;DR: In this paper, the authors propose an institutional analysis of modern capitalist economies and argue that the institutional dimension is crucial if one wants to account for the coexistence of different types of modern developed economies, characterized by substantially different institutional structures.
Abstract: This article proposes an institutional analysis of modern capitalist economies. It argues that the institutional dimension is crucial if one wants to account for the coexistence of different types of modern developed economies, characterized by substantially different institutional structures. It explains why no generalized pattern of convergence towards the same economic model should be expected, in spite of 'globalization'. An institutional analysis of modern economies, or social systems of innovation and production, can be made using the concepts of complementarity and hierarchy of institutions. Institutional arrangements are complementary to each other and thus define the coherence as well as the potential for evolution of the various economies. The hierarchy of institution expresses which part of the institution drives the others, and is helpful for understanding historical evolutions. The article proposes a classification of developed economies and draws some conclusions regarding the usefulness of ...
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TL;DR: In this article, the authors consider the impact of institutional makeup of a society on its particular style of innovativeness and propose a framework to understand the appropriate boundaries and content of institutional analysis.
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TL;DR: In this article, the authors make intensive use of international comparisons, challenge the role of market as the exclusive coordinating mechanism, and raise doubts about the existence of a 'one best way' for capitalism.
Abstract: The variety of capitalism school (VOC) and regulation theory (TR) are both analyses of the diversity of contemporary national economies. If VOC challenges the primacy of liberal market economies (LME) and stresses the existence of an alternative form, i.e. coordinated market economies (CME), TR starts from a long-term analysis of the transformation of capitalism in order to search for alternatives to the Fordist regime that emerged after the post-Second World War era. Both approaches make intensive use of international comparisons, challenge the role of market as the exclusive coordinating mechanism, and raise doubts about the existence of a 'one best way' for capitalism. Finally, they stress that globalization does deepen the competitive advantage associated with each institutional architecture. Nevertheless, their methodology differs: VOC stresses private firm governance, whereas TR considers the primacy of systemic and macroeconomic coherence. Whereas for VOC there exist only LME and CME, TR recurrently finds at least four brands of capitalism: market-led, meso-corporatist, social democrat and State-led. VOC seems to consider that the long-term stability of each capitalism can be challenged only by external shocks, but TR stresses the fact that the very success of a regulation mode ends up in a structural crisis, largely endogenous.
279 citations
Cites background from "Contemporary Capitalism: The Variet..."
...On the other hand, a review of the literature on the bases of institutional economic theories (Hollingsworth/Boyer 1997) shows that it is no longer possible to see the market as the sole process of coordination, no more than it is to view the market and the state as being diametrically opposed to…...
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...Both are activated but in varying order, depending on the context (Hollingsworth/Boyer 1997: 15–18)....
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...…real economies feature asymmetrical and imperfect information, strategic behaviours usually on the part of large actors, and significant public goods and externalities that can be either positive (education, innovation, healthcare) or negative (pollution, congestion, systemic risks) (Boyer 1997)....
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TL;DR: In this paper, the authors make intensive use of international comparisons, challenge the role of market as the exclusive coordinating mechanism, and raise doubts about the existence of a 'one best way' for capitalism.
Abstract: The variety of capitalism school (VOC) and regulation theory (TR) are both analyses of the diversity of contemporary national economies. If VOC challenges the primacy of liberal market economies (LME) and stresses the existence of an alternative form, i.e. coordinated market economies (CME), TR starts from a long-term analysis of the transformation of capitalism in order to search for alternatives to the Fordist regime that emerged after the post-Second World War era. Both approaches make intensive use of international comparisons, challenge the role of market as the exclusive coordinating mechanism, and raise doubts about the existence of a 'one best way' for capitalism. Finally, they stress that globalization does deepen the competitive advantage associated with each institutional architecture. Nevertheless, their methodology differs: VOC stresses private firm governance, whereas TR considers the primacy of systemic and macroeconomic coherence. Whereas for VOC there exist only LME and CME, TR recurrently finds at least four brands of capitalism: market-led, meso-corporatist, social democrat and State-led. VOC seems to consider that the long-term stability of each capitalism can be challenged only by external shocks, but TR stresses the fact that the very success of a regulation mode ends up in a structural crisis, largely endogenous.
270 citations