Alliance or alone? how to build interorganizational information systems

This article shows that the builders of interorganizational information systems (IOSs) struggle most with the problem of whether to build them alone or in an alliance mode. It is suggested that the situation should be studied in the light of the transaction costs involved in the application ofthe IOS. The nature of the application to be handled through the IOS should be the main detemrlnant of IOS design. According to the study, as derived from the transaction cost approach, applications with low transaction

costs are suitable for alliance networks whereas those with high transaction costs should be constructed from an organization's own resources. A market-hierarchy/decision-maker model for determining the righi way to participate in IOSs is introduced. There is a visible trend leading to a proportionally greater use of markets. Information technology lowers transaction costs, and more and more products and services become suitable for marketing through IOSs. A case example is dmwn from the Finnish Insurance Industry, where direct writing is the dominant governance structure. The transaction costs in motor vehicle insurance are studied.     

Reforming the local public sector: economics and politics in privatization of water and solid waste

Several empirical studies have analyzed the factors that influence local privatization. We examine the influence of transaction costs and political factors on local governments’ choices through new variables. We consider two relevant services accounting for different amounts of transaction costs: water and solid waste delivery. Our results show that privatization is less common for water, which has higher transaction costs. Furthermore, we find that municipalities with a conservative ruling party privatize more often regardless of the ideological orientation of the constituency. Finally, we find that intermunicipal cooperation may be a suitable organizational form for some municipalities.     

我国中小企业可持续发展研究--中小企业研发战略联盟的构建与应用

R&D strategic alliance is important for enterprises' sustainable development and it is a worth research for us.This paper firstly analyzes the condition and situation of the small and medium-sized enterprises' strategic alliance. Then it points out that the small and medium-sized enterprises should choose a suitable alliance organization, ally themselves with big enterprises, strive for the support of the government, and develop their technology through technology unions. Finally, it suggests that the government should create better innovation environment for R&D strategic alliance. A new way is also put forward for the application and foundation of the small and medium-sized enterprises' R&D strategic alliance in China. It is also helpful for the sustainable development of small and medium-sized enterprises.     

“诺思第二悖论”及其新破解

在新制度经济学家看来,制度的一个重要作用是降低作为经济运行的"摩擦力"的交易费用。理论上,交易费用会随着一国制度的进步和完善而降低。但是,据瓦利斯和诺思测算,美国自1 870年到1 970年的1 00年间总量交易费用占GNP的比例不仅没有降低,反而越来越高了。这种理论(随着制度的进步交易费用应该越来越低)与实际(测量到总量交易费用越来越高)的矛盾被称之为"诺思第二悖论"。瓦利斯和诺思测量到的总量交易费用并非交易费用的全部,表面上测量到的总量交易费用上升了,但"理论上"的总量交易费用是下降的,即是说,随着制度的进步,不仅每笔交易的交易费用下降了,理论上的总量交易费用也是下降的,所谓"诺思第二悖论"是不存在的。     

Transaction costs and the property rights approach to the theory of the firm

The standard property rights approach is focused on ex ante investment incentives, while there are no transaction costs that might restrain ex post negotiations. We explore the implications of such transaction costs. Prominent conclusions of the property rights theory may be overturned: A party may have stronger investment incentives when a non-investing party is the owner, and joint ownership can be the uniquely optimal ownership structure. Intuitively, an ownership structure that is unattractive in the standard model may now be desirable, because it implies large gains from trade, such that the parties are more inclined to incur the transaction costs.     

我国商品住宅交易费用测量研究——以2008年北京市商品住宅交易费用为例

房地产业作为第三产业,是交易服务部门,其中存在大量的交易活动,交易就会产生摩擦成本。由于房地产的特性及其行业市场交易的特征,房地产市场中的交易主要表现为权益交易,交易过程要受到制度的严格约束,所以其摩擦成本也是相对稳定的,可以通过定量分析测算。本文以房地产业为研究对象,按照房地产行业的交易部门特性及其所有费用来测算2003年至2008年我国房地产业的宏观交易费用;并选取商品性住宅为样本,根据诺思在人类行为理论基础上对交易费用和转换费用的划分,只测量通过市场的各种交易费用的启示,把商品性住宅开发分为生产阶段和交易阶段,生产阶段的交易费用部分和交易阶段的所有费用定义为交易费用,通过分析其价格构成,列出可测量的交易费用和转换费用单项,然后运用正向相加法和逆向剔除法,测量2008年北京市商品性住宅微观交易费用,为优化该行业效益提供实证分析基础。     

Factors that influence transaction costs in development offsets: Who bears what and why?

Environmental policy instruments generate transaction costs to public and private parties. There is a growing literature reporting on the size of transaction costs produced by environmental policy instruments. This paper extends that literature through an analysis of the factors that influence transaction costs in environmental policy and how this influence occurs. The theory based factors that influence transaction costs are categorised as: 1) transaction characteristics; 2) transactor characteristics; 3) nature of the institutional environment; and 4) nature of the institutional arrangements. We examined how these factors influenced transaction costs through the analysis of two Australian-based development offset schemes with different policy designs. We found evidence of all four theory-based categories of influence in the policy case studies. The degree of influence and how each factor influenced transaction costs varies across the two policies and between parties. Policy design as a component of the institutional environment had a particularly large bearing on transaction costs of offset buyers and the policy administrator. An important contribution to transaction cost theory assumes the institutional environment as given.     

The transaction costs perspective on international supply chain management; evidence from case studies in the manufacturing industry in the Netherlands

Transaction costs are barriers for internationalisation processes. This paper investigates the practical relevance of transaction costs economics (TCE) for international supply chain management (SCM) in this era of globalisation, which is characterised by splitting up the supply chain in more and more parts. The analysis is based on data from in-depth interviews with seven manufacturing companies in the Netherlands which are actually engaged in this modern way of organising production. It is shown that the balance between transaction costs and sheer production costs (transformation costs) plays a prominent role in the strategic decisions on how and where to organise production. Especially intangible (or ‘soft’) transaction costs are important in this respect. The analysis provides insight in practical experience in the manufacturing industry in the Netherlands with transaction costs and shows how transaction costs affect decisions on transaction management, personnel policy and internationalisation of R&D. This study is to our knowledge the first to confront the theory of TCE with practice of manufacturing firms in their internationalisation decisions using in-depth interviews instead of survey data.     

The Cost of Misaligned Governance in R&D Alliances

Transaction cost economics argues that aligning transactionswith governance structures leads to more efficient outcomes.While empirical evidence demonstrates that firms choose governanceconsistent with transaction cost predictions, the performanceimplications of governance choices are less well explored. HereI examine the cost of misaligned governance in the context ofresearch and development (R&D) alliances. Two costs of misalignmentare evaluated: excessive contracting hazards and excessive bureaucracy.Using a sample of R&D alliances in the telecom equipmentindustry, I find that alliance governance selected accordingto transaction cost arguments improves collaborative benefitssubstantially over governance not so selected. Interestingly,governance misalignments imposing excessive bureaucracy reducecollaborative benefits more than misalignments imposing excessivecontracting hazards. These results provide empirical evidenceof the cost of misaligned governance and have implications forresearch on the limits of internal organization and links betweenorganizational form and innovation.     

The nature of Coasean property

The Coase Theorem is widely regarded as pointing to the importance of positive transaction costs for the analysis of economic institutions. Various interpretations of the Coase Theorem regard transaction costs as some set of impediments to contracting, or more broadly, as the costs of providing institutional solutions to conflicts over resource use. The abstract nature of the Coasean hypothetical tends to promote an abstract notion of property as a thin entitlement: a right in a designated person to take certain actions or derive value from a set of resource attributes. On this view, property is like a collection of tiny contracts. The property rights furnished by actual property law are much more coarse grained than this, and property is correspondingly “incomplete” for transaction costs reasons. Property and contract are substitutes in some situations, but they often are not interchangeable—because of Coasean transaction costs.     

Developing business ethics theory and integrating economic analysis into business ethics teaching – a conceptualization based on externalities and diminishing marginal utility

Contrary to understandings that treat ethical considerations and economic thinking as separate if not antagonistic issues, we advocate a holistic view that links business ethics to consequentialist economic concepts and their concern about how scarce means should be used for the attainment of (given) ends. We believe that business ethics students will profit from a development of business ethics theory that facilitates an outcome-based evaluation of business strategies anchored in the economic concepts of externalities, game theory, equilibria, efficiency, transaction costs, and diminishing marginal utility. We outline how moral judgments about (socially irresponsible) business behaviors, which often lack theoretical grounding and self-critical examination, can be made both more consistent and transparent through a systematic application of these theoretical concepts. We furthermore point out that, in this evaluative exercise, business ethics analysts should make all assumptions explicit to meet their task of facilitating informed public debates and informed moral choices.     

Transaction costs and environmental policy design

This article synthesizes the growing empirical literature on transaction costs to identify pragmatic design recommendations for environmental and natural resource policies. The New Institutional Economics literature recognizes that appropriate policy choice and design will be a function of the specific characteristics of the problem. The physical and institutional determinants of both transaction costs and abatement costs should be considered in the policy design process due to potential interactions between them. Analysts also need to incorporate the extent to which the technologies, institutional environment, governance structures, or policy designs can be changed; some factors can only be adjusted to or “designed around” while others can be designed differently. This framework highlights the importance of property rights since transaction costs will be incurred to obtain or retain property rights and since the rights assignment may affect both the magnitudes and distribution of costs. Another implication is that education and extension programs or use of behavioral economics concepts to affect choices can be cost-effective in some circumstances. Policy design should take advantage of economies of scale and foster technical change. Appropriate sequencing of policy instruments may decrease transaction costs, particularly if there is potential for technical change.     

Improving environmental decisions: A transaction-costs story

A multidisciplinary team of researchers made efforts to influence the design and implementation of environmental policy in Australia. A focus of these efforts was the development of the Investment Framework for Environmental Resources (INFFER). In addition, the team undertook a range of communication activities, training, user support, and participation in committees and enquiries. Transaction costs were relevant to these efforts in a variety of ways. Environmental managers perceived INFFER to involve relatively high transaction costs. A balance was struck between the system having simplicity (and low transaction costs) and delivering environmental benefits. Transaction costs were factored into the planning and prioritisation processes developed. For example, public and private transaction costs are accounted for in the calculation of benefit:cost ratios and in the choice of policy mechanisms. There are diverse roles that transaction costs play in the processes of developing, implementing and influencing environmental policy programmes. A key observation is that appropriate strategic investment in transaction costs can improve decisions and increase net benefits from an environmental programme. A well-designed decision process can involve incurring transaction costs at one stage in order to save transaction costs at a later stage.     

Induced Institutional Innovation and Transaction Costs: The Case of the Australian National Native Title Tribunal

The theory of induced innovation says that technological innovations which economize on relatively scarce inputs will be invented and adopted. Hayami and Ruttan have hypothesized that this model also holds for institutional innovations. Coase and Williamson suggest that economic organization, such as vertical integration, is the result of transaction cost minimization. Coase discusses the transaction costs of negotiation versus other alternatives for solving externality problems. This paper brings these previously unconnected threads of the literature together and incorporates transaction costs in an induced institutional innovation model.

This conceptual model is brought to bear on the issue of institutional innovations over time in relation to the National Native Title Tribunal. In addition to the reductions in transaction costs from a negotiated settlement rather than litigation, there are other advantages of negotiation. These may include improved “quality” of settlements, improved relations between the negotiating parties, and more timely resolution.     

A Cooperative Game Theory of Noncontiguous Allies

This paper develops a cooperative game-theoretic representation of alliances with noncontiguous members that is based on cost savings from reducing overlapping responsibilities and sequestering borders. For various scenarios, three solutions (the Shapley value, nucleolus, and core's centroid) are found and compared. Even though their underlying ethical norm varies, the solutions are often identical for cases involving contiguous allies and for rectangular arrays of noncontiguous allies. When transaction costs and/or alternative spatial configurations are investigated, they may then differ. In all cases the cooperative approach leads to a distribution of alliance costs that need not necessarily coincide with the traditional emphasis on gross domestic product size as a proxy for deterrence value (the exploitation hypothesis). Instead, burdens can now be defined based upon a country's spatial and strategic location within the alliance.     

科斯三定理的新表述与新证明

科斯第二定理指出,在交易费用大于零的现实世界,产权的不同界定会对资源配置效率产生影响。政府(或法院)的基本原则应该是把权利界定给能以较低交易费用解决外部性问题的一方。科斯第三定理的准确含义是,在交易费用大于零的现实世界,制度安排的生产本身是有成本的,净收益最大的制度安排就是最佳的选择。科斯第二、三定理为市场经济中普遍存在的外部性问题提供了新的解决措施和科学的决策原则,间接意味着科斯并非政府干预的完全反对者,科斯定理也不足以成为有些学者把新制度经济学定性为新自由主义的充分理由。     

Water quality trading with asymmetric information,uncertainty and transaction costs: A stochastic agent-based simulation

We examine the efficiency of emissions trading in bilateral and clearinghouse markets with heterogeneous, boundedly rational agents making decisions under imperfect and asymmetric information, and transaction costs. Results are derived using a stochastic agent-based simulation model of agents’ decision-making and interactions. Trading rules, market structures, and agent information structures are selected to represent emerging water quality trading programs. The analysis is designed to provide a strong test of the efficiency of trading occurring through the two market structures. The Differential Evolution algorithm is used to search for market trade strategies that perform well under multiple states of the world. Our findings suggest that trading under both bilateral and clearinghouse markets yields cost savings relatively to no trading. The clearinghouse is found to be more efficient than bilateral negotiations in coordinating point–nonpoint trading under uncertainty and transaction costs. However, the market under both structures is unlikely to achieve or even approximate least-cost pollution control allocations. Expectations of gains from water quality trading should, therefore, be tempered.     

构建物流联盟基础上的现代物流配送

物流配送是物流系统中是最接近消费者的重要环节，它通过运用先进的信息技术和管理来优化配送系统，提高物流服务水平和竞争力。目前，我国物流配送发展中还存在不少问题，应通过建立物流联盟，来降低企业交易费用，发挥资源互补优势，增强供应链竞争力，提高物流配送服务水平。     

Institutional Economics as Theory of Policy Change: Impact of Past Policy Failures on Present Policy

Social scientists have developed several theories for understanding or evaluating policy change over time. Since all costs or benefits are not internalized owing to positive transaction costs, policymaking is always implemented under cost underestimation conditions and, therefore, is imperfect. I call this trait policy failure in this article. Furthermore, I show that a new framework combining the social costs approach and the legal/economic approach in institutional economics is suitable and can be applied to evaluating how past policy failures affect present policy, providing as an example the Fukushima nuclear disaster in Japan.     

Dual distribution as a vertical control device

This article posits transaction costs as the reason manufacturers use dual distribution (i.e., sell to customers through both independent and company- owned distributions). The authors base their analysis on Williamson's four types of transaction costs, and identify eight explanations for dual distributions. These reasons are lifecycle considerations, lack of distributor competition, information costs, facilitation of collusion, manufacturer opportunism, price discrimination, customer service and manufacturer efficiencies. They conclude that the competitive effect of dual distribution depends on which of the above explanations is relevant. If more than one explanation is valid, it may be necessary to balance the competitive effects in both the manufacturing and retail markets to evaluate the practice.