Uncertainty,Control, and Karl Polanyi’s Protective Response

Post-Keynesian institutionalist economists like Wallace Peterson and John Kenneth Galbraith recognized that the impact of uncertainty on economic wellbeing depends in part on the degree of control people have over the sources and consequences of it. Given the inability of government and other large institutions to reduce uncertainty or to provide citizens with the ability to manage it, mediating structures are considered as an alternative means of promoting economic security. The article concludes by describing and evaluating several of these alternatives.     

美国社会规制研究的三种路径

当西方社会规制研究兴起于20世纪70年代初,除了规制经济学中的公益理论和规制捕获理论影响到社会规制研究外,经济学的成本效益分析、公共选择、政治学的制度主义都渗入到社会规制的研究中.本文主要介绍这三种分析路径在西方社会规制研究中运用,并作出简要的评论.     

发展中国家经济安全问题的制度分析

在市场经济全球化迅速发展的背景下,制度因素已成为影响发展中国家经济安全的最大瓶颈.因此,拟从新制度主义的视角,从制度结构和制度供求两个维度对发展中国家经济安全的影响机制进行深入系统的阐释,在此基础之上,提出应对经济安全问题的具体对策和措施.     

苏联模式影响下的绿地资源管理——从历史 制度主义视角之“路径依赖”解读

历史制度主义是新制度主义中的重要分支，强调政 策是随着时间的推移而被制度塑造的，存在着“路径依赖”现 象，这意味着在过去制度环境中做出的政策选择影响现在的政 策结果。中国城市治理制度深受苏联模式的影响，若想理解以 及应对规划管理中存在的问题，首先需探索其历史。提供了一 种从规划历史切入分析的视角以更好地理解与解决规划管理中 的现存问题，进而构建具有我国发展特色的规划管理理论分析 方法。首先探讨了历史制度主义在制度分析中的应用及优势， 然后通过探讨与分析我国绿地资源管理现状证明苏联模式如何 通过“路径依赖”影响现在的绿地资源管理机制，将历史制度 主义分析方法应用于理解我国的规划管理实践中，在我国自然 资源部成立的改革大背景下提出相应政策建议。     

Institutional plasticity in public-private interactions: Why Japan’s port reform failed

This study applies the concept of institutional plasticity to analyze institutional change, and investigates why actors are unable to change institutions even when change is apparently necessary. Employing historical institutionalism, the analysis focuses on public-private interactions in the recent port reform in Japan. The study’s findings reveal four limits to institutional plasticity due to the respective roles of key actors – the central government, the local port authority, and business entities – in the process of policy reform. The study suggests that while institutional plasticity may enable variation within an existing developmental trajectory or even creation of an entirely new path, insufficient institutional plasticity constrains the creation of new institutions and inhibits institutional change.     

Modeling and Measuring Economic Reality: Reply to the Reviews

To begin with, we'd like to express our appreciation to our three commentators for their thoughtful and helpful reviews. Like the founders of the subject, we believe, and our reviewers seem to agree, that structural econometrics has the potential to enable us to develop serious working models of how different economies actually operate, and also to tell us something about the changing patterns of their growth and transformation. But both we and our reviewers agree that there is a great deal wrong with the way econometrics is practiced today.     

From goulash communism to goulash populism: the unwanted legacy of Hungarian reform socialism

The systemic change of 1989/1990 is usually identified as the critical juncture in the modern economic history of post-communist economies. While the change itself was indeed a remarkable moment in time, a branching point from which a multitude of new paths originated in most of the countries in Central and Eastern Europe, this was only partially true in the case of Hungary. If a critical juncture is sought for Hungary, it is more likely to be 1968, the year the New Economic Mechanism was launched. By applying the conceptual framework of historical institutionalism, the article argues that what made Hungary unique during the communist era and what rendered its position as a (one-time) frontrunner proved to be a serious constraint after the systemic change. The legacy of a pre-born welfare state, the constant need for compensating potential losers of any economic reform, along with short-sighted decision-making, have together generated specific path dependencies in the Hungarian trajectory of economic development.     

The transfer of HRM policies and practices to a transitional business system: the case of performance management practices in the US and Japanese MNEs operating in Vietnam

This paper focuses on employee performance management (PM) to explore how multinational enterprises (MNEs) localise their human resources within their subsidiaries in a developing country. It uses qualitative research methods to examine four US and four Japanese MNEs operating in Vietnam. The paper identifies both home and host country effects as significant factors in the transfer of MNEs' PM policies and practices. The US firms emphasised financial and non-financial measurements and utilised a wide range of PM management tools and techniques. These techniques, despite being unfamiliar in Vietnam and possibly considered incompatible with Vietnamese culture, were transferred successfully to the Vietnamese subsidiaries. The Japanese firms' PM approach was characterised by a more informal form of regular performance review, within a strictly top-down process and which suffered from accusations of bias and lack of transparency by Vietnamese respondents. This paper argues that the transitional period in Vietnam from a centrally planned economy to a market-oriented one has made the national business system more receptive to new and seemingly contrasting practices. It provides no evidence to support the argument that transfer of practices is more likely, where the cultures of the countries involved are relatively similar.     

Neoliberalization,Housing Institutions and Variegated Gentrification: How the ‘Third Wave’ Broke in Amsterdam

Neil Smith argues that in the last two decades gentrification has become a generalized global urban phenomenon. His theory is at a high level of abstraction, as it links urban gentrification to globalization, financial capitalism and neoliberalization. With these global processes, all cities have experienced ‘third wave’ gentrification. The theory, however, leaves little room for variegations of gentrification, apart from characterizing geographical differences as idiosyncrasies or as minor variations. This downplays the role of intervening mechanisms that impinge upon the pursuit and social outcomes of gentrification. This article aims to amend abstract theory by looking at Amsterdam from a historical institutional perspective. In Amsterdam, gentrification was particularly made possible by a process of neoliberalization within the housing system. However, as institutional change is incremental and based on layering and conversion, many older institutional arrangements remain in place. These arrangements tend to slow gentrification and assuage social consequences. Nevertheless, neoliberal modifications to the housing system have been accelerating the pursuit of gentrification. Current policies will very likely lead to exclusionary displacement.