Showing papers on "Capitalism published in 1992"

Capitalist development and democracy

Abstract: It is a commonplace claim of Western political discourse that capitalist development and democracy go hand in hand. Crossnational statistical research on political democracy supports this claim. By contrast, comparative historical studies carried out within a political economy approach argue that economic development was and is compatible with multiple political forms. The authors offer a fresh and persuasive resolution to the controversy arising out of these contrasting traditions. Focusing on advanced industrial countries, Latin America, and the Caribbean, they find that the rise and persistence of democracy cannot be explained either by an overall structural correspondence between capitalism and democracy or by the role of the bourgeoisie as the agent of democratic reform. Rather, capitalist development is associated with democracy because it transforms the class structure, enlarging the working and middle classes, facilitating their self-organization, and thus making it more difficult for elites to exclude them. Simultaneously, development weakens the landed upper class, democracy's most consistent opponent. The relationship of capitalist development to democracy, however, is not mechanical. As the authors show, it depends on a complex interplay of three clusters of power: the balance of power among social classes, power relations between the state and society, and transnational structures of economic and political power. Looking to the future, the book concludes with some reflections on current prospects for the development of stable democracy in Latin America and Eastern Europe.

Alliance capitalism : the social organization of Japanese business

Abstract: Business practices in Japan inspire fierce and even acrimonious debate, especially when they are compared to American practices. This book attempts to explain the remarkable economic success of Japan in the post-war period - a success it is useful to understand in a time marked by controversial trade imbalances and concerns over competitive industrial performance. Gerlach focuses on what he calls the intercorporate alliance, the innovative and increasingly pervasive practice of bringing together a cluster of affiliated companies that extends across a broad range of markets. The best known of these alliances are the "keiretsu", or enterprise groups, which include both diversified families of firms located around major banks and trading companies and vertical families of suppliers and distributors linked to prominent manufacturers in the automobile, electronics and other industries. In providing a key link between isolated local firms and extended international markets, the intercorporate alliance has had profound effects on the industrial and social organization of Japanese businesses. Gerlach casts his net widely. He not only provides a rigorous analysis of intercorporate capitalism in Japan, making useful distinctions between Japanese and American practices, but he also develops a broad theoretical context for understanding Japan's business networks. Addressing economists, sociologists and other social scientists, he argues that the intercorporate alliance is as much a result of overlapping political, economic and social forces as traditional Western economic institutions such as the public corporation and the stock market. Most compellingly, "Alliance Capitalism" raises important questions about the best method of exchange in any economy. It identifies situations where cooperation among companies is an effective way of channelling corporate activities in a world marked by complexity and rapid change, and considers in detail alternatives to hostile takeovers and other characteristic features of American capitalism. The book also points to the broader challenges facing Japan and its trading partners as they seek to coordinate their distinctive forms of economic organization.

Business Organization and the Myth of the Market Economy

Abstract: Acknowledgments Introduction: the wealth of three nations Part I. Economic Institutions and Economic Performance: 1. Business organization and competitive advantage 2. Institutional foundations of industrial dominance and decline 3. Organizations and markets in capitalist development Part II. Intellectual Foundations and Intellectual Constraints: 4. The theory and history of capitalist development 5. The making of the market mentality Part III. 'The Marvels of the Market' Versus 'The Visible Hand': 6. The innovative business organization and transaction cost theory 7. Lending the economic institutions of capitalism a visible hand Part IV. Overcoming Intellectual Constraints: 8. Business organization and economic theory 9. Rigor and relevance in economics.

Corporate Roles, Personal Virtues: An Aristotelean Approach to Business Ethics

Abstract: Each of us is ultimately lonely, In the end, it's up to each of us and each of us alone to figure out who we are and who we are not, and to act more or less consistently on those conclusions.–Tom Peters, “The Ethical Debate” Ethics Digest Dec 1989, p. 2.We are gratefully past that embarrassing period when the very title of a lecture on “business ethics” invited—no, required—those malapert responses, “sounds like an oxymoron” or “must be a very short lecture.” Today, business ethics is well-established not only in the standard curriculum in philosophy in most departments but, more impressively, it is recommended or required in most of the leading business schools in North America, and it is even catching on in Europe (one of the too rare instances of intellectual commerce in that direction). Studies in business ethics have now reached what Tom Donaldson has called “the third wave,” beyond the hurried-together and overly-philosophical introductory textbooks and collections of too-obvious concrete case studies, too serious engagement in the business world. Conferences filled half-and-half with business executives and academics are common, and in-depth studies based on immersion in the corporate world, e.g. Robert Jackall’s powerful Moral Mazes, have replaced more simple-minded and detached glosses on “capitalism” and “social responsibility.” Business ethics has moved beyond vulgar “business as poker” arguments to an arena where serious ethical theory is no longer out-of-place but seriously sought out and much in demand.

Head to Head: The Economic Battle Among Japan, Europe, and America

Abstract: With the dismantling of the Berlin Wall in 1989 and the implosion of the USSR in 1991, the Cold War era has ended. Immediately, a new economic struggle begins. Three economic superpowers emerge, each playing the game of capitalism in a strikingly different manner. And, for the first time, the United States is the second largest economy in the world. As the domestic economy stagnates and the deficit financing of the federal government escalates, many Americans see themselves at a turning point. And well they might. In "Head to Head", Lester Thurow provides an assessment of the emerging economic landscape, the rules of this new three-way competition; the strengths and weaknesses of the players; and the information needed to win. "Head to Head" contains several surprises; one attribute of the new competition is that radical new skills and radical new ways of thinking are vital to success. For example: competition and cooperation - in the 1990s, there will be no clear winners, but losers might be destroyed, the ability to co-operate effectively with one's direct adversary will be a requisite for survival; resources - those who want to thrive in this new environment must overhaul their whole notion of essential resources before the year 2000; key industries - there are seven key industries vital to the maintenance of a high standard of living, how can the competitiveness of those industries be maintained over the coming decade and beyond?; education - education is the most potent weapon of the new warfare, how can the education gap be closed?; and teams - how can we learn to become players in new and unfamiliar ways?

Familiar Exploitation: A New Analysis of Marriage in Contemporary Western Societies

Abstract: Introduction. 1. Feminism and the Family. Part I: Critical Perspectives. 2. Part of Capitalism: Accounts of Womens' Oppression in the Family by Traditional Marxists. 3. Still Part of Capitalism? Marxist Feminist Accounts of the Family. Part II: A New Theoretical Approach to the Western Family. 4. Housework, Household Work and Family Work. 5. The Family as an Economic System: Introduction and Common Misconceptions. 6. The Family as an Economic System: Theoretical Outline. Part III: Empirical Studies. 7. Factory Workers' Families in England. 8. Farm Families in France. 9. The Variety of Work Done by Wives. 10. Conclusion. Bibliography.

The soviet transition from socialism to capitalism: worker control and economic bargaining in the wood industry*

Abstract: Analyses oftlze transition from state socialisnz to capitalism @pically focus on political impedimerlrs and underesritnate tlle economic obsracles to economic rransformatior1. Based or1 a c,ase srudy c?f'the Soviet ~ ' o o d indusrr-y, we argue tlzur there Hill he no economic tr.ansition so long as enterprises rerain two hisroric features, nanzely anarchy in pr.oduction and barqainit~g in exrernal r.elarions. Far. jtom consrituting a re~~olution, tlze witllerirlg away of the party srate has esaggerared rlle parhologies of'rhe old econotnic order. Barrer has hecome nzo1.e inzpor.tant, conglonzerates ha1.e strengrhened their monopoly and ~wrkers 1la1.e greater conrr.ol of tlze shop floor. If there is a nzolbemenr to~sar.d a nzar.ket economy at all, it is to~sar.da jb1.m ofmerchant capitalisnz rlzut deepens economic under.de~>elol~nzet~t and lz~~arts tlze rise of nzodern bourgeois capiralism.

The Golden Age of Capitalism: Reinterpreting the Postwar Experience

Abstract: For some twenty years after the Second World War, Keynesian economic policies in countries of the capitalist West were successful in generating rapid growth with high employment. This `golden age of capitalism' did not survive the economic traumas of the 1970s; nor has the more recent emphasis on monetarist policies and supply-side performance succeeded in regenerating comparable growth rates. Blending historical analysis with economic theory, this book seeks to understand the making and unmaking of this `golden age', questions the basis of much present policy-making, and suggests alternative directions for policy.

Labor Surplus and Punishment: A Review and Assessment of Theory and Evidence

Abstract: Since the pioneering work ofRusche and Kirchheimer (1939), the theoretical links between labor surplus and punishment have seen extensive development. Eleven of those links described here are mediated by economic, political, and ideological factors such as the value of labor, the systemic needs of capitalism, and the ideology of judges and their communities. The sophistication of theorizing about labor surplus and punishment is matched with skepticism about the corresponding empirical evidence which has been termed “elusive”and “contradictory” at best. The results from 44 empirical studies are systematically assessed. The evidence suggests that independent of the effects of crime, labor surplus is consistently and significantly related to prison population, and to prison admissions when time-series and individual level data are used. The relationship of labor surplus and punishment appears slightly stronger when age, race, and gender specific measures are employed. The limitations of existing research, in light of theoretical developments, are discussed.

Thinking For A Living: Education And The Wealth Of Nations

Abstract: Introduction: The American Economy: Point of Decision America Pre-eminent: Riding the Second Industrial Revolution to Success The Mass-Production Economy: the American Way Mass-Producing Education The Forces Changing the World Economy: Our Competitors Respond Technology, Competitiveness, and the New International Economy Our Competitors Take the Lead: The Path to Human-Resource Capitalism The Challenge America on the Precipice: Will We Boil the Frog? Facing the ChallengeAt Last The New American System: Strategies for High Performance The Demand for Excellence: CanAnd WillEmployers and Labor Lead the Way? Restructuring the Schools for High Performance: Tough Road to Excellence Incentives: The Great Debate Building a System Driven by Standards The Family Rebuilding a System Driven by Standards Technical and Professional Education A Labor-Market System for America Two Futures: Which Will We Choose? Investing in Our People.

Ecology and discursive democracy: Beyond liberal capitalism and the administrative state∗

Abstract: (1992). Ecology and discursive democracy: Beyond liberal capitalism and the administrative state. Capitalism Nature Socialism: Vol. 3, No. 2, pp. 18-42.

Reworking Modernity: Capitalisms and Symbolic Discontent

Abstract: Using both grand conceptualizations and grounded case studies, Allan Pred and Michael Watts look at how people cope with and give meaning to capitalism and modernity in different times and places. As capital accumulation has grown and taken new forms, it has affected technology and labor relations which in turn have affected people's daily lives. These changes have not always been either welcome or easy. Pred and Watts focus on the symbolic discontent and cultural confrontations that accompany capitalism. They depict people struggling over the meaning of change in their lives and over new relations of power.Modernity is experienced differently in different times and places. To illustrate this point, Pred and Watts offer four case studies that range across time and space. These studies remind us that there are multiple capitalisms and mutiple reactions to capitalisms. Watts begins with a study of a Muslim millenarian movement that arose alongside the Nigerian oil boom of the 1970s. When a Muslim prophet and disenfranchised followers tried to create a distinctive community and identity, they came into brutal conflict with state authorities. Thousands died in the resulting oppression. Watts's next case is less bloody, at least in the short run. He tell us what happened when technological change was introduced in rice production in West African peasant society. Peasants were drawn into the world economy as contract farmers. This changed work relations and affected everyday life in peasant households. Families began to fight over who would work and under what conditions. They struggled over gender indentity and property rights. We move back in time and across space for ther third case study. Pred discusses changes in the daily life of the Stockholm working class at the end of the nineteenth century. He writes of the various forms their discontent took as they struggled with economic restructuring. Even conflict over street names took on special meaning. For the last case Pred takes us to a steel mill in California. When a South Korean company became half owner of the mill, there was money for modernization and the threat of layoffs was reduced. But the workers remained unhappy. They protested low wages, unsafe conditions, and unfair recruitment practices. Their labor issues turned into issues of nationalism, morality and identity. All four case studies demonstrate the shock of modernity and how the resulting struggles affect daily life.

Marxism and the city

Abstract: Marxism and the city? themes in Marxist social theory towards a respatialized Marxism: Lefebvre, Harvey, and Castells capitalism, city space, and class formation: a journey organized by Friedrich Engels from feudalism to capitalism: the place of the city working classes map the city remapping the city.

From System Identity to Organizational Diversity: Analyzing Social Change in Eastern Europe

Abstract: Across the ruins of communism, a clear breeze blows from the West. Like the "fresh winds" that had been hailed from the East across the ruins of war more than four decades earlier, it promises prosperity through sacrifice. And, like the old vision, with its road maps to the promised land, this new vision comes with packaged formulas for applying economic science to the grand project of institutional reconstruction. In 1992, no less than in 1948, devastation is seen as mandating boldness of action: the collapse of the old order issues the imperative for ambitious experiments while offering the occasion to build anew, this time, with a fresh start to create capitalism by design. Free to choose, the societies of Russia and Eastern Europe are free at last to be guided by the science of choice (e.g., Sachs 1989; Peck and Richardson 1992). For political science the metaphor of collapse is similarly all-pervasive. Whether the edifice crumbled from structural fatigue, was toppled from within, or was battered from without, there is widespread agreement that the central problem is how to build a new economy and a new polity on a society in ruins. But whereas mainstream economists see institutional collapse as the setting for the bold initiatives of designer capitalism, many political scientists perceive institutional vacuum as leading to paralysis or even chaos. For the latter, the collapse of the party-state leaves these societies "without institutions and without a system. . . . What we find in Eastern Europe today is an institutional vacuum. The logic of state socialism was to render the party the central nervous system. It was the institution, giving life, logic and functions to all other subsidiary institutions. When communist party hegemony died, institutions died and, with that, roles and rules" (Bunce and Csanadi 1992, p. 14). To be sure, fragments of the old socialist order survive alongside new elements obeying another logic. But because the elements taken from two stable systems are mutually contradictory, postcommunism is a "nonsystem." In an irrational environment "without patterns" the category of interests becomes meaningless. Similarly, Ken Jowitt, another political scientist who has been a long-time observer of the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, foresees in the aftermath of the collapse of Leninism a "new world disorder" (Jowitt 1991). Although they are not exactly "without form, and void," Jowitt labels the geopolitical setting and the post-Leninist societies as "Genesis environments," whose characteristics are dislocation, trauma, and uncertainty; old rigid boundaries give way and new political vocabularies "name" new entities and delineate "new ways of life" (Jowitt 1991; and see Michael Kennedy's review of Chirot in this issue). "In this new world," writes Jowitt, "leaders will matter more than institutions, charisma more than political economy." Liberal outcomes are not excluded and apocalypse is not inevitable, but we should be alert to the obstacles to democratic consolidations and the likelihood of wars and "movements of rage." For Jowitt, the exodus from Leninism leads not to the promised land but to much wandering in the wilderness.

Capitalism and Underdevelopment

Abstract: The analysis considered in Part II focused upon the functioning and transformation of advanced capitalism. Each theory sought to provide an explanation of the ‘long boom’, understand the contradictions which would ultimately undermine it, and thereby account for the passivity of the working classes in the West, as well as locating the basis for any future radicalisation. In all cases the economic structures of backward areas and their relationship to those of developed countries figured hardly at all. Only Baran and Sweezy thought them to be significant, and even in Monopoly Capital they were of secondary importance. The forces of stability and change in the heartlands of capitalism were seen to operate primarily through the reproduction and growth of the major capitalist economies.

Poverty and development in the 1990s

Abstract: Alan Thomas and Tim Allen: Introduction Section 1: A World of Problems?: Ben Crow: Hunger and Famine Gordon Wilson: A Picture of Health? David Wield: Unemployment Tom Hewitt and Ines Smyth: Is the World Overpopulated? Phil Woodhouse: Environmental Degradation and Sustainability Alan Thomas and David Potter: Development and Lack of Development Section 2: The Making of the Third World: Janet Bujra: Diversity in Pre-capitalist Societies Henry Bernstein: Capitalism and the Expansion of Europe Labour Regimes and Social Change under Colonialism David Potter: Colonial Rule Tom Hewitt: Decolonization, the `Golden Age', and the Crisis of the Eighties Andy Kilminster: Socialist Development Section 3: Understanding Contemporary Third World Development: Tony McGrew: The `New' Global Order: Historical Transition or Transformation? David Potter: Third World Politics: Changing State Forms? Ruth Pearson: Gender Matters in Development Gordon Wilson: Technology in the Third World Tim Allen: Taking Culture Seriously Janet Bujra: Class Struggles and the Ideology of `Race' in East Africa Richard Middleton: Music and Cultural Expressions David Wield and Gavin Kitching: Development Options in the Context of Industrialization Alan Thomas and Tim Allen: Conclusion

The Comparative history of public policy

Abstract: Introduction - puzzles of political economy, Francis, G. Castles social protection by other means - Australia's strategy of coping with external vulnerability, Francis G.Castles learning from catastrophes - West Germany's public policy, Manfred G.Schmidt the comparative history of public policy in Israel, Michael Shalev "pillarization" and "popular movements". two variants of welfare state capitalism - the Netherlands and Sweden, Goran Therborn Japan's creative conservatism - continuity under challenge, T.J.Pempel the United Kingdom - paradoxes of an underground statism, Patrick Dunleavy taking exception - explaining the distinctiveness of American public policies in the past century, Edwin Amenta and Theda Skocpol.

Trade Strategy and the Dependency Hypothesis: A Comparison of Policy, Foreign Investment, and Economic Growth in Latin America and East Asia

Abstract: The role of state policy in the industrialization of Third World nations has become the subject of increasing interest in recent years. In the past, the debate over economic development has either focused on the traditional modernization approach' or the dependency theory of underdevelopment.2 Dependency theorists base their model of development on the belief that foreign investment from core countries is harmful to developing nations' long-term economic growth. Economic relationships between the core and the periphery are structurally detrimental for the latter because of the inherent dynamics of international capitalism. Yet, despite the claims of dependency theory, the recent experience of the East Asian newly industrialized countries suggests a wider range of development possibilities which include government policies specifically designed to attract foreign investment. These countries appear to have structured their domestic economies in order to mitigate the pernicious effects of dependent relationships with core countries. This raises new questions about the development process and the role of policy and foreign investment in the economic transactions between core and peripheral countries. Dependency theory, a neo-Marxist predecessor of world-systems research, claims that First World nations become wealthy by extracting surplus labor and resources from the Third World. Capitalism perpetuates a global division of labor which causes the distortion of developing countries' domestic economies, declining growth, and increased income inequality.3 Those countries on the periphery cannot become fully modernized as long as they remain in the capitalist world

Controlling the Market for Corporate Control: The Historical Significance of Managerial Capitalism

Abstract: What mode of corporate governance can best enable U.S. industrial enterprises to create value and contribute to national economic prosperity? During the 198Os, amid dramatic changes in the financial structures of major U.S. industrial corporations, many economists extolled the “value-creating” virtues of “the market for corporate control”-the exercise of control over the disposition of corporate assets and revenues by means of financial claims acquired through the medium of public securities markets. 1 A willingness to rely on the market for corporate control to determine the investment strategies of industrial corporations is consistent with the market-oriented ideology of mainstream economics. But, as I shall argue here, the belief in the efficacy of the market for corporate control is inconsistent with the history of successfu1 capitalist development in the United States and abroad over the past century.2 The history of successful capitalist development, marked by changing international industrial leadership, shows that value-creating investment strategies ).Increasingly require that business organizations exercise control over, rather than be controlled by, the market for corporate control. My arguments may be counterintuitive to economists trained to believe that superior economic performance is secured by market coordination rather than organizational (or planned) coordination of econonomic activity. For conventional economists, the “efficient” economy is one in which free markets in labor and capital permit the reallocation of factors of production to their “optimal” uses. From this perspective, any impediments to the “optimal" allocation of scarce resources to alternative uses--at any time and also over time as more efficient uses appear-are deemed to be "market imperfections.”

British privatization--taking capitalism to the people.

Abstract: From 1983 to 1986, John Moore served in the Thatcher government in Britain, launching that country's privatization program. In "British Privatization--Taking Capitalism to the People, " he describes the thinking behind privatization, the objections raised against it, and the actual measures taken to implement it. With privatization, corporate performance has improved and the government has been able to focus on regulation, not ownership. But in the end, says Moore, the greatest success of British privatization was that it transformed the public's attitude toward ownership and economic responsibility.

The Agrarian Origins of American Capitalism

Abstract: Allan Kulikoff's book aims to trace the rural origins and growth of capitalism in America, challenging earlier scholarship and aiming to chart a new course for future studies in history and economics. Kulikoff argues that long before the explosive growth of cities and big factories, capitalism in the countryside changes our society - the ties between men and women, the relations between different social classes, the rhetoric of the yeomanry, slave migration and frontier settlement. The essays in this book examine the debates swirling around capitalism in America, aiming to illuminate the battles between small farmers and speculators over land, money and credit through case studies of the yeoman classes, the languages of rural class and the migration of both whites and slaves. Three pivotal essays on the American Revolution show its importance for the coming of capitalism and in the resistance to it. Looking at capitalism from the farm and the village, Kulikoff challenges the received wisdom that capitalism began in New York, Philadelphia and Boston. He studies the formation of the yeoman class in the context of the household and its work life - who milked the cows and who cut the wheat. By showing how farms fed world markets, Kulikoff asks scholars to redefine local studies within the milieu of broad economic relations. This book should invite debate and controversy among historians and social scientists.

Beyond the city limits : urban policy and economic restructuring in comparative perspective

Abstract: Preface Part I: Introduction 1. Urban Restructuring: A Critical View - John R. Logan and Todd Swanstrom Part II. Urban Policy: National and International Comparisons 2. Political Paradoxes of Urban Restructuring: Globalization of the Economy and Localization of Politics? - Edmond Preteceille 3. Industrial Restructuring, State Intervention, and Uneven Development in the United States and Japan - Richard C. Hill 4. Political Responses to Urban Restructuring: The British Experience under Thatcherism - Michael Parkinson Part III. The Limits and Possibilities of Local Policy 5. Economics, Politics, and Development Policy: The Convergence of New York and London - Susan Fainstein 6. Postindustrialism with a Difference: Global Capitalism in World Class Cities - H. V. Savitch 7. Urban Deals in Comparative Perspective - Harvey L. Molotch 8. Space for Progressive Local Policy: Examples from the U.S. and the U.K. - Pierre Clavel and Nancy Kleniewski Part IV. Reflections 9. Beyond the City Limits: A Commentary - Saskia Sassen 10. Theoretical Methods in Comparative Urban Politics - John Walton About the Contributors Subject Index Author Index

Nicholas Kaldor: The Economics and Politics of Capitalism as a Dynamic System

Abstract: Nicholas Kaldor (1908-1986) was one of this century's most original thinkers on economics, his influence on British economic policy second only to that of Keynes. This book traces the development of Kaldor's thought as it underwent a remarkable evolution from his membership of the Austrian neoclassical school to his embracing of radical Keynesianism. He was also extremely quick to grasp essential changes in economic reality and to forge analytical tools to explain them. Although he was innovative from 1938 onwards, much of his seminal work belongs to a coherent project of research which made him, together with Joan Robinson and Michal Kalecki, a leading representative of the post-Keynesian school, an outstanding critic of the neoclassical theory of equilibrium, growth, and distribution, and a convinced opponent of the monetarist school. The book also seeks to show how economic policy and political economy were closely connected in Kaldor's work. It was this that made Kaldor one of the most lucid and radical champions of the economic policies which, by blending political freedom with social justice, have been the outstanding feature of the great European tradition of social democracy.

Squaring Accounts: Commercial Bookkeeping Methods and Capitalist Rationalism in Late Qing and Republican China

Abstract: Accounting has been defined as “the art of classifying, recording, and reporting significant financial events to facilitate effective economic activity” (Davidson 1968:14). The description, terse as it is, evokes the image of accounting's role as overseer in the global formation of mercantile and industrial capitalism. According to the historical sociologists Werner Sombart and Max Weber, methodical accounting methods were basic attributes of the development of modern capitalism in the West, and in the West alone. Yet, as Gary Hamilton observes, “uniqueness is a comparative claim, as well as a presumption underlying much historical research” (1985:66–67). In other words, claims of singularity should be redocumented by sound historical comparisons, rather than continually inferred on the basis of conventional wisdom.