Transaction cost economics and business administration

This paper traces the origins of transaction cost economics to three seminal people who had an intense interest in business: Ronald Coase, Chester Barnard, and Herbert Simon. By contrast with the neoclassical theory of the firm, which is a top-down construction, the transaction cost economics theory of the firm is a bottom-up construction—which is to say that it is much more microanalytic (the transaction is made the basic unit of analysis) and is comparative in its mode of analysis. Several top-down maxims that have their origins in economic theory are examined in a bottom-up way, which serves to uncover conceptual and/or implementation problems with each. I furthermore examine growing applications of transaction cost reasoning to business administration and within the social sciences.     

基于模块化理论的柔性流程及其影响因素的实证研究

模块化系统理论指出模块化设计能够提高系统的柔性。模块化程度高的业务流程具有“封装”和“即插即拔”的特性,使得业务流程更具有柔性,可快速的相应环境的变化。本文在模块化系统理论和交易成本经济学的基础上提出了模块化业务流程影响因素模型和相关假设,顾客需求的多样性、供应商专业化程度将促成流程的模块化设计,流程的实物资产专用性、人力资产专用性、程序资产专用性将减少流程模块化设计的吸引力。实证结果支持了这些研究假设。     

威廉姆森最新研究成果文献综述

自获诺奖以来,威廉姆森着重于对交易成本经济学进行总结和完善,以及拓展交易成本经济学的应用范围。以下将对威廉姆森自2010年以来的三篇最新论文中的观点提炼总结并做简单地评述。     

市场营销起源的交易成本经济学解释

信息不对称和交易成本的存在严重影响了市场交易活动的有效进行,不利于分工的深化和生产效率的提高,进而又影响了社会整体利益的提高。市场营销正是为了解决以上交易难题而产生的,营销组合同样是通过降低信息不对称的程度和减少交易成本而发挥其作用的。从交易成本经济学的角度解释市场营销的起源,可以揭示出营销学与经济学之间的内在联系,为营销理论的深化提供了一个新的切入点,并且为营销实践提供了理论支撑。     

TRANSACTION COST ECONOMICS: THE PRECURSORS

Theories commonly progress through four stages, from informal to pre‐formal to semi‐formal and fully formal. This paper reports on the earliest stage of transaction cost economics that extended from the 1920s to the 1970s. That the gestation stage lasted so long is partly because transaction cost economics departed significantly from the then‐prevailing economic orthodoxy. Also, and related, it is an interdisciplinary undertaking. As reported herein, transaction cost economics selectively combines economics, organisation theory and law and is the product of the contributions of some of the finest minds in those three fields.     

国外交易成本经济学实证研究应用领域的扩展

近年来,国外交易成本经济学的实证研究领域已从传统的产业组织经济学扩展到了市场营销、财务管理、会计、关系型契约等多个领域。本文对国外交易成本经济学在这些领域的实证研究作了简要的回顾,希望能够为我们的研究提供参考。     

Vertical Integration,Organizational Governance,and Firm Performance: Evidence from Italian Business Groups

Assuming transaction cost economics as a normative tool, we investigate the relationship between firms' ‘observed’ vertical integration choices and their economic performance. We use a two‐stage methodology: in the first, a measure of governance misalignment is computed as a difference between the governance form (i.e., ownership or outsourcing) predicted by transaction cost economics and the form actually observed; the second stage consists of estimating a performance equation where the misalignment variable is introduced together with a set of independent variables. Compared with previous studies, we introduce two novelties: we use the business group as the unit of analysis to detect the ownership of vertically related productions; we assess the moderating role of geographic agglomeration in reducing the need of vertical integration. Our results confirm the importance of technology and price uncertainty in influencing vertical integration; moreover, the misalignment variable is significant in the case of profitability, but not in the case of growth. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Revisiting agency and transaction costs theory predictions on vertical financial ownership and contracting: electronic integration as an organizational form choice

This paper provides an organizational economics foundation to guide managers in matching the comparatively more efficient organizational mode with transactional characteristics such as: (1) the degree of (human capital) asset specificity involved in the transaction, (2) the degree of uncertainty surrounding the transaction, and (3) the number of trading partners (suppliers and buyers) in the vertical supply chain. The key role of technology, and more specifically the e‐business infrastructure and its effects on organizational mode choice, is highlighted. The main results from this analysis suggest that changes in information technology are changing the nature of transaction costs leading to more efficient management through an electronic integration solution thus favoring contracting and outsourcing than would have been technologically possible when Williamson's Markets and Hierarchies (Markets and Hierarchies: Analysis and Antitrust Implications. Free Press: New York, 1975) was published. It is emphasized that the transaction cost economics principles are durable but that the breathless advances in information technology, especially in the past decade, have comparatively favored lower transaction costs of markets over hierarchies. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

江、浙、沪商务成本结构性趋势比对及差异原因与启示研究

本文对江、浙、沪商务成本结构性趋势进行比对，研究差异原因，并探讨对政府和企业的启示。研究表明：一般而言，随着经济发展，要素成本不断上升，交易成本逐步下降，而商务成本总体呈现上升趋势。经过比对，发现要素成本上海最高，江苏最低；交易成本上海最低，粗略认为浙江交易成本略低于江苏。在此基础上，本文分别从政府和企业两个角度，对政府政策与企业选址提出相应对策和建议。     

The Structuring of Interfirm Exchanges in Business Know-How: Evidence from International Collaborative Ventures

This study investigates the effect of transaction cost considerations on the apportionment of residual bearing, and the assignment of managerial control between two firms involved in the exchange of business know-how. Data were collected from contractual agreements between multinational enterprises and indigenous firms that formed collaborative ventures in developing countries. A simultaneous-equation model was employed to test hypotheses that were derived under a theoretical framework based on the new institutional economics. The empirical results are supportive of the hypotheses. © 1997 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Is a Long‐term Business Relationship an Implied Contract? Two Views of Relationship Disengagement*

ABSTRACT Current knowledge of business‐to‐business relationship dissolution centres upon definitions of relationship dissolution, models of dissolution, antecedents for dissolution, and dissolution strategies. In this paper an empirical case example of a terminated business relationship in the aftermath stage of the dissolution process is presented. William Baird sued Marks and Spencer for £53.6 m for breach of contract. The relationship between the actors was long‐term, exclusive, and involved substantial investment in specific assets. There was no written contract in place, yet one actor considered that the relationship was equal to an implied contract. The contribution of the paper is to discuss the possibility for legal redress using the transaction cost economics, relational contracting, and industrial networks literatures.     

国际化经营的商务模式创新:宏碁的经验

运用TSV模型和交易成本理论分析了台湾宏碁集团国际化初期的商务模式。研究发现:控制型国际化模式会造成组织成本边际递增;将内部交易外部化为市场交易,可消除代理成本,并能使市场化交易成本边际递减;合作式网络化的非控制型国际化商务模式有可能实现更低的模式成本。     

企业融资交易的契约安排：一个交易费用经济学的分析框架

交易费用经济学理论将股权契约和债权契约视为对融资交易不同的契约治理结构。债权契约具有古典契约的特征,是一种按规则运作的契约治理结构;股权契约具有弹性治理的特征,是一种关系型契约治理结构。依据交易费用经济学理论关于交易与契约匹配的一般机理,可以得出融资交易的契约安排机理:低资产专用性融资交易选择债权契约,高资产专用性融资交易选择股权契约,中等资产专用性融资交易选择混合性融资契约,这既可达到交易费用的最小化,又可实现交易效率的最大化。究竟哪类契约在现实融资契约安排中占主导地位,这取决于融资交易包含的资产专用性大小。     

Antecedents of vertical integration: Transaction cost economics and resource-based explanations

This article focuses on antecedents of vertical integration. A model of vertical integration derived from transaction cost economics and the resource-based view is tested empirically with data from the mechanical maintenance services market in the hydroelectricity industry. The results show that asset specificity and closeness to present competence are positively related to vertical integration, while tacit knowledge is negatively related to vertical integration. The positive interaction effect between asset specificity and closeness to present competence on vertical integration is also supported, indicating that the decisions on insourcing and outsourcing can benefit from using transaction cost economics and the resource-based view in tandem.     

Real Options, International Entry Mode Choice and Performance

abstract    Recent scholarship suggests that combining insights from real option theory with transaction cost economics may improve decision-making models. In response to this suggestion we develop and test a model of international entry mode choice that draws from both perspectives. Examining samples of Dutch and Greek firms entering Central and Eastern European markets, we found that adding real option variables to a transaction cost model significantly improved its explanatory power. Additionally, firms that used the combined real option/transaction cost predicted choices had significantly higher levels of subsidiary performance satisfaction than firms that did not. Our results suggest that effective managerial decision-making may involve more than mere transaction cost minimization considerations; real option value creation insights also appear to influence the success of decision outcomes.     

Explaining Downstream Integration

We examine the downstream integration decision by businesses, deriving hypotheses from the transaction cost literature which are empirically tested for a sample of 1392 businesses operating in a wide spectrum of industries. Our results provide corroboration for each dimension of the transaction cost framework in explaining why firms might integrate their downstream business activities. Given the large cross-sectional sample, our results provide some evidence of the general validity of the transaction cost framework within the context of downstream integration.     

The impact of knowledge diversity: Integrating two economic perspectives through the dynamic capability approach

This paper analyzes the two economic perspectives underlying the contradictory results of existing studies regarding the relationship between diversity and performance and integrates them using the dynamic capability approach. Transaction cost economics suggests that knowledge diversity has a negative impact on cost-saving performance, whereas evolutionary economics suggests that knowledge diversity has a positive impact on value-creation performance. According to the dynamic capability approach, the perspective of transaction cost economics is shown to relate to ordinary capabilities, whereas the perspective of evolutionary economics is shown to relate to dynamic capabilities. The former should be pursued in subservience to the latter.     

Learning trajectory in offshore OEM cooperation: Transaction value for local suppliers in the emerging economies

We focus on the unique role of offshore OEM cooperation as a learning opportunity for local suppliers in the emerging economies. In particular, we conceptually argue and empirically confirm the links between learning intent, capability enhancement, governance mode, and overall innovativeness from the perspective of local suppliers in offshore OEM cooperation in China as well as the influence of local business culture within these links. We address two issues: (1) offshore OEM cooperation can be a unique opportunity for local suppliers with strong intent to learn from foreign buyers for capability enhancement and (2) the moderating effects of trust and contact as two distinctive governance modes. Addressing the two issues, we make two specific contributions to the research on inter-firm cooperation, both of which derive from the often-neglected theoretical lens of transaction value. Our general contribution lies in the extension of the transaction value perspective by specifying its dual tenets of inter-firm co-specialization and shared-trust as the central theme of inter-firm cooperation to complement the transaction cost economics and also contextualize the research on inter-firm cooperation in terms of different partners’ perspectives as well as different governance modes.     

Uncovering the hidden transaction costs of market power: A property rights approach to strategic positioning

A central construct in competitive strategy research is market power, the ability to raise price above marginal cost. Positioning research focuses on attempts to build, protect, and exercise market power. However, this approach contains hidden assumptions about transaction costs. Parties made worse off by the exercise of market power can negotiate, bargain, form coalitions, and otherwise contract around the focal firm's attempts to appropriate monopoly profits—depending on transaction costs. We build on property rights economics to explain how transaction costs affect positioning and offer propositions about successful positioning in an environment with transaction costs.