晚清捐官、政治取向与辛亥革命

经济发展与政治变革之间的关系一直是学术界关注的焦点问题.现有研究对晚清时期政治变革的原因仍然存在多种不同的解释,文章回应了学术界关于社会流动和辛亥革命的探讨,以晚清捐官制度为切入点,通过对近代政治变革的影响因素和制度变动进行梳理,提出引发辛亥革命的新假说.研究发现,捐纳是促使辛亥革命爆发的重要因素之一,捐纳官员的政治意识和政治取向不仅直接影响其所任职地区的革命响应,而且也通过乡土关系网络影响其籍贯地精英阶层的政治态度.捐官制度作为晚清提升社会流动性的重要工具,不仅促进了近代新兴官僚阶层的崛起,而且通过新式教育、民众反抗、革命团体等途径推动了近代政治权利格局的变化,加速了辛亥革命的进程.捐纳制度通过对阶层流动性和官员政治意识的影响促进了近代政治制度的变革,这为我们理解中国传统社会精英群体的转变和政治制度间的关联变动提供了重要的实证依据.     

Trade,technology, and China's rising skill demand1

China has experienced rising wage inequality due to rising relative demand for skilled labour. In this paper, we use a sample of 1,500 firms to investigate the impact of trade and technology on China's rising skill demand. We find that export expansion had a negative direct effect (Heckscher–Ohlin type) and a positive indirect effect (export‐induced skill‐biased technical change) on skill demand; the net effect was found positive and accounted for 5 percent of rising skill demand of the sample firms. We find that technical change in Chinese firms was on average skill‐neutral, but majority foreign‐owned firms experienced skill‐biased technical progress that accounted for 22 percent of the rising skill demand of the sample firms.     

Oligarchs,political regime changes,and firm valuation1

This paper examines the impact of a regime shift on the valuation of politically powerful oligarch firms. Focusing on the Yeltsin–Putin regime shift in Russia, we find that the valuations of oligarch‐controlled firms are significantly higher under the Putin regime than under the Yeltsin regime after controlling for industry and time effects. The findings suggest that the increasing cost of extracting private benefits outweighs the reduction in the value of political connections following the political regime change. The results are also consistent with changes in the risk of state expropriation. Our results indicate that effects driven by the political regime change complement the traditional view that increased ownership concentration improved the performance of Russian oligarch firms.     

Economic Mode1ling, Ideology, Politics and Social Research:

In March this year, Peter Dixon became the second Director of the Institute, succeeding Professor Ronald Henderson, In this article, he comments on media reaction to his appointment and gives some views on the future direction of the Institute.     

Growth,reform indicators and policy complementarities1

In order to assess the growth implications of policy complementarities, this paper applies second‐best results to reform indicators. During the transition from central planning to EU integration, which corresponds to a policy cycle, a complementarity index based on structural indicators compiled by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) decreases and then increases while the level of reforms tends to rise throughout. Corrected for initial conditions, the extent of macroeconomic stabilization and endogeneity, the level of reforms and changes in their complementarity are found to be positively related to output growth. The study uses panel data for 27 countries between 1989 and 2004.     

Productivity,innovation and convergence in Poland1

This paper provides evidence on factors driving productivity growth in the new EU member states, focusing on Polish manufacturing industries. The results obtained indicate that companies in Poland benefit significantly from transfer of technologies accumulated in more developed economies. No strong evidence is found on immediate technology transfer. The significant effect of domestic innovation activity is mainly due to its impact on the speed of convergence and is particularly strong in high‐tech industries, relatively privatized industries and industries initially further from the technological frontier.     

Evolution,complex systems and technological change 1

A particularly weak area of mainstream economics is its theoretical capacity to handle structural economic change. And yet the advent of major new technologies, combined with the growing integration of the international economic system, has placed structural change high on the policy agenda. This paper suggests an alternative theoretical approach. By portraying economic systems as complex open systems it is possible to view their long-term evolution in a more realistic way. However, in order to do this it is also necessary to borrow from other disciplines such as biology, physics and computer science where research of a similar genre has been carried out. The paper explores what this means for our understanding of many of the underlying concepts associated with technological change and ends with a programmatic plea to broaden the disciplinary bounds of economics.