Making green discourses matter in policy-making: Learning from discursive power struggles within the policy area of car taxation

This paper is about stability and change in the policy-making discourse of a traditional neoclassical policy area, the area of car taxation. Stability is here related to the unquestioned continuation of a traditional neoclassical economics perspective in policy-making, whereas change is related to the introduction and impact of environmental concerns. The aim of the paper is to investigate, what makes green discourses matter in traditional policy-making. It is based on an in-depth study of policy-making processes related to car taxation in two environmental front-runner countries, Sweden and Denmark.Making green discourses matter in policy-making is an important contemporary environmental challenge. Therefore, as Tian Shi argues, we need more research into the institutional setting of the policy-making process. Ecological economics as a policy science has to have a broad understanding of the political economic nature of the policy process. Taking this standpoint as the point of departure, the paper seeks to uncover questions such as, what is the policy-making reality in which Swedish and Danish green discourses have to make a difference? How do existing neoclassical regimes react, when green actors attempt to influence policy-making from an environmental point of view? And to what extent can green discourses actually have an impact on the policy world within the area of car taxation?The paper concludes that the traditional neoclassical economic discourse is particularly robust and resistant against alternative green discourses. Stability rather than change is the dominating picture. This does not imply that environmental concerns will not be taken into account in the future. Rather it implies that only the changes, which keep up the existing order, or enhance the narrow power-related interests of the dominating actors, will materialise more or less easily. The rest is a power struggle in which timing, coalition-building, persistence and thorough knowledge about the field in question is of importance. In this struggle change agents will also benefit from the ability to rethink dominating ways of thinking and doing in an environmentally benign way. A rethinking that is based on environmental values while at the same time holding positive visions that are ‘compatible’ with the existing dominating discourse.     

中国经济体制改革时期制度变迁的特征分析

从实质上说，中国经济体制改革的过程就是一个制度的重建过程，即以适应市场经济的制度安排取代适应计划经济的制度安排取代适应计划经济的制度安排的过程。在这一制度重建的进程中，市场取向的制度变迁表现出八个方面的典型特征：一是制度变迁需求的内性性；二是制度变迁供给的滞后性；三是制度变迁目标的动态性；四是制度变迁过程的渐进性；五是制度变迁轨迹的路径依赖性；六是从单项制度变迁向制度结构变迁演进；七是强制性制度变迁与诱致性制度变迁相结合；八是宏观经济制度变迁与微观经济制度变迁同步进行。     

文化变迁与教育价值观

文化变迁是历史发展的必然。我国文化现代变迁的主要特征为开放性、多元性。在重视人与人之间的关系、轻视人与自然之间关系的中国传统价值观的直接影响下,传统的中国教育价值观具有如下特点:重视教育的工具价值,轻视其内在价值;群体利益高于个人利益;重视教育的道德伦理价值,轻视其认知价值。当前,我们要注意科学价值观与人文价值观的有机结合,做好教育价值观的转型工作。     

制度变迁对中国汽车工业增长贡献的实证分析

中国汽车工业增长是粗放型的，技术的贡献极低，而制度变迁贡献的潜力非常大。为此，一方面，要加快汽车工业的技术创新进程；另一方面，要深化汽车工业领域的市场化的制度变迁进程，以推动汽车工业走上高效、集约武增长之路。     

Regulatory ‘Balancing’ and the Efficiency of Green R&D

We identify and analyse several dynamic implications of setting environmental standards such as to balance marginal costs and benefits. The adoption of such a regulatory approach is shown to effect (i) the speed of improvement of abatement technologies; (ii) the direction (in a sense to be defined) of that improvement; (iii) its source and the distribution of the rents from it; and (iv) the rate of development of defensive (averting) technologies. Existing views are thoroughly synthesised in the context of a simple diagrammatic model, several new results are derived and at least one conventional wisdom questioned. The message of the analysis for legislators and regulators is that cost–benefit balancing should be done with care.     

A DEA Approach to Understanding the Productivity Growth of Malaysia's Manufacturing Industries

This paper seeks to explain the productivity growth performance of Malaysia's manufacturing sector using a panel data of 28 industries from 1981–1996. Here, the data envelopment analysis technique is used to calculate and decompose the Malmquist index of total factor productivity (TFP) growth into technical change, change in technical efficiency and change in scale efficiency. This allows the identification of the sources of productivity growth which is crucial for policy formulation. It was found that the annual TFP growth of the Malaysian manufacturing sector was low at 0.8% and this was driven by small gains in both technical change and technical efficiency, with industries operating close to optimum scale.     

银行保险的制度变迁理论分析以及对我国的启示

20世纪80年代以来,无论是一直实施混业经营的欧洲,还是近几年重新走上混业经营之路的美国,银行保险都成为一种潮流和趋势。银行保险业务的产生及发展,既源于微观领域经营环境和竞争环境的变化,也源于宏观领域制度管制的放松和信息技术的迅猛发展,更源于银行保险经济学机理带来的范围经济和协同效益。银行保险作为一种制度创新的产物,更多地体现为从销售渠道创新到业务产品创新,再到组织模式创新的金融一体化的制度变迁过程。本文从制度变迁理论的角度对银行保险的产生动因以及演变发展进行分析,以期对我国银行保险的走向提供借鉴。     

构建电网经营企业的特色企业文化

阐述了企业文化的建立要切切实实地以人为本,要让企业员工真正参与到文化建设中来,开发和利用企业的知识资源,继承和发扬原有企业丈化中优秀的部分,剔除企业文化中不适应市场环境和对企业发展不利部分,树立新型的、健康的、有别于其他企业的经营理念,实现组织的高效率,只有这样,才能真正构建电网经营企业的特色企业文化。     

The potential benefits of herbicide-resistant transgenic rice in Uruguay: Lessons for small developing countries

In many developing countries, the potential benefits from adopting a transgenic variety developed by a multinational corporation are limited by the crop’s small production base. This paper presents an ex-ante evaluation of the economic impact of herbicide resistant transgenic rice in a small developing country, Uruguay. To fully account for the multinational’s market power, the firm’s seed markup is assumed to affect the adoption rate for the variety. Stochastic simulation techniques are employed to understand how potential benefits may vary with changes in technology, yield, costs, and adoption parameters. The results indicate a $1.82 million mean net present value for producers from the development and utilization of transgenic rice in Uruguay and $0.55 million for the multinational. These relatively small multinational firm benefits suggest that a firm will not undertake significant efforts to develop transgenic varieties adapted to local conditions without either strategic partnerships with local institutions or access to wider regional markets.     

The REIT Modernization Act of 1999

This article examines two effects of the passage of the REIT Modernization Act (RMA) of 1999: its impacts on REIT shareholder wealth and changes in REIT systematic risk in the period following its passage. The results indicate a modest positive wealth effect associated with the legislative events leading to its enactment. Our estimates of the wealth gain probably underestimate the true wealth gain because of the partially anticipated nature of the legislative process. We also document a significant decline in the systematic risk of REITs subsequent to the passage of the RMA. The evidence suggests that this decline is not attributable to a provision of the RMA that allows REITs to establish taxable subsidiaries.