This book sets the experiences of former communist countries as they head towards capitalism against the 'varieties of capitalism' paradigm, and provides a framework for comparing transformation processes, demonstrating how differing heritages of communist and pre-communist pasts are leading to different kinds of capitalist economies.

Government and Markets is the first book to tackle systematically and in a multidisciplinary fashion the role of democratic governments during and after the transition from plan to market. The role of governments during the transformation is important for eliminating the obstacles and putting into place the conditions for the emergence of a viable market economy. Moreover, governments need to play a key role in establishing a political-legal order that promotes political liberties and economic freedom. In contrast to other literature on the transformation process in formerly planned systems, this volume focuses also on the creation of autonomous and accountable governments as part of the liberal economic order. Finally, the volume analyzes the role of the legal state in creating a competitive market economy. Government and Markets addresses itself to scholars, politicians policy makers interested in the establishment of a democratic, competitive order in formerly planned political economic systems.

Maurice Dobb was the foremost Marxian economist of his generation in Britain. He was noted for his contributions to value theory, the theory of economic planning and the analysis of Soviet economic development. This set will re-issue 7 of his most important works.

This book addresses three big economic challenges from a dynamic perspective: European integration, economic growth, and global climate change. In the light of the recent crises of the European Union (EU), the first part of the book deals with challenges to the real, monetary and fiscal integration of the EU and required institutional adjustments. The second part of the book addresses fundamental challenges of advanced market economies like economic growth and changes of technologies. The final part focuses on the global challenge of climate change from an economic perspective and discusses policy strategies for a successful mitigation of climate change.

This book presents an analysis of Reagan's economic policy and its legacy both at home and abroad. With Europe facing new challenges and countries in transition seeking guidelines for their economic systems, the authors of this volume examine how the lessons of Reaganomics serve as valuable guideposts. The book looks at the essence and applicability of Reagan's economic policies and their political, policy-making, cultural and societal impact for Europe and transition economies.

This comparative study of industrial capitalism is an examination of state-economy relations in mixed economies ranging from the interventionist German and Japanese to the less interventionist Anglo-American. Following the postwar consensus that resulted in the 'golden age' (1950-1973) and ended with the energy crisis, the Anglo-American economies adopted neoliberalism while Germany and Japan remained interventionist. This resulted in the emergence of national types of capitalism. While analyzing the increased competition between them, the author also notes the influence of globalization as well as 'alternative capitalism' with the survival and re-emergence of industrial districts.

This book examines the major issues arising from the Korean financial crisis of 1997. It considers the strong prospects for rapid economic recovery and the emerging changes in Korea's international economic relations and business environment. The authors investigate the causes of the financial crisis and provide an evaluation of remedial measures and reforms currently being introduced in both private and public sectors of the Korean economy. The book identifies a paradigm shift in Korean economic policy and discusses Korea's new role in both the regional and global economy. It also examines the major developments reshaping Korea's international business environment through fundamental policy shifts in trade, foreign direct investment, labor relations, management practices and the emerging trends in e-commerce. Korea's Economic Prospects will be of interest not only to academics and policy advisors but also to individuals and corporations attempting to capitalize on emerging business opportunities in Korea.

This book is devoted to analyzing contemporary capitalism both in Japan and in the world economy by using the theoretical framework of the French regulation theory and by revisiting the theory of civil society in postwar Japan. The Japanese theory of civil society proposed unique thinking about "freedom and equality" and "human rights" in the postwar era but could not help to come up with effective concepts for an economic analysis of that capitalism of the period. On the other hand, the regulation theory born in the 1970s is well known by its definition of postwar capitalism as Fordism, based on the elaboration of a new conceptual framework, but it soon proved unable to directly explain Japan's experience by that central concept of Fordism. Inspired by consideration of Japanese civil society and also by the regulationist framework, the author has forged new analytical concepts such as "companyism" to understand Japanese capitalism including the recent "lost decades", and he elaborates more carefully the concepts of "growth regime" and "institutional change" to grasp the dynamics of the world economy including today's neoliberal trend. The original benefits of the book consist in 1) reviving a Japanese theory of civil society in the postwar period, 2) applying the regulation theory to the analysis of contemporary Japan, and 3) offering theoretical reflections on the conception of the world economy. Consequently, the author pays special attention to the relationship between the political and the economic as well as regulationist tools and the theory of civil society's perspective. The principal message of the book is that capitalism or the market economy must be supported by a sound civil society.

Brazil, Russia, India and China are four of the largest and most dynamic contemporary emerging economies in the world. Strong economic growth in each of these economies has been accompanied by the expansion of the advertising and consumer goods sectors. Using a series of country studies, this book explores the dynamics of global capitalism from the perspective of global advertising. The book highlights the on-going expansion of advertising and consumerism against the wider socio-economic, political and cultural contexts. It provides fresh insights about contemporary global priorities, and argues that advertising plays a key role linking culture and the economy. By presenting individual case studies of advertising campaigns, it offers examples of the globalisation of specific brands. Environmental implications of the expansion of advertising and its role in stimulating consumerism are explored in the context of the four emerging economies. The book compares and contrasts the individual country profiles, and makes an assessment of the validity of the argument regarding their projected importance and the likelihood of their future dominance of the global economy.

The transition from socialism to capitalism in the formerly communist part of the world is a unique historical process of large-scale institutional change, likely to be remembered as one of the central economic events of the twentieth century. The transition process raises fundamental questions about the workings of the capitalist system and the dynamics of institutional change. Transition sheds new light on these questions because it reveals how the constitutive part of the capitalist system are built up at various speeds, using different models, in varying order, and starting from different initial conditions. This book is an authoritative reader on the economics of transition and emphasizes a view of transition that addresses broader areas of economics, such as development, public finance, and economic history.

Both Mao Zedong and Deng Xiaoping drastically altered the course of contemporary China's economic development using opposing strategies. Mao froze China's economic system in a perennial state of consumer goods shortages and pervasive macro disequilibria. Deng, however, began thawing a rigidly structured system by introducing experimental reform measures. Mao's revolutionary rhetoric brought China's economy to the brink of bankruptcy. Deng's ideological pragmatism netted China glowing successes. Mao closed China to the outside world. Deng engineered China's reintegration into the world economy.

Dismantling a dysfunctional system and replacing it with a dynamic new one involving 1.2 billion people is risk-laden. Reform in China began in 1978. It was tentative and experimental, confining reform to organizational and administrative decentralization on farms. Successes on farms ushered in reform elsewhere in the economy. Over time, market-based coordinating mechanisms progressively began replacing the systeM's control devices. Results from decentralization internally reinforced those from liberalization externally. This consequently transformed China's stale, distorted system into a more competitive, bustling new one ready for developmental takeoff. Its meteoric rise among the world's leading markets in recent years has thrust China's economy to the forefront of growth and development. Controlled, phased reform is yielding dividends, not only for its own consumers but for international economic cooperation and growth as well.

In The Super-Rich , Stephen Haseler describes the dangerous growing tensions caused throughout the West by the triumphant new global capitalism. In a book for students of politics, economics and sociology, and the general reader, he outlines how a new global super-rich caste has emerged during a period in which the traditional 'middle-class' is facing serious insecurity and income loss. He argues that this new super-rich capitalism, if not balanced by a renewal of the state and community, will not only destroy politics and governance, but democracy as well, and he shows exactly how the European Union, and other embryonic 'regional' super-states, can combat these excesses of globalization, and restore a more 'social democratic' society.

Between the end of the Middle Ages and the Industrial Revolution, the long-established structures and practices of European agriculture and industry were slowly, disparately, but profoundly transformed. Transitions to Capitalism in Early Modern Europe, first published in 1997, narrates and analyzes the diverse patterns of economic change that permanently modified rural and urban production, altered Europe's economy and geography, and gave birth to new social classes. Broad in chronological and geographical scope and explicitly comparative, the book introduces readers to a wealth of information drawn from thoughout Mediterranean, east-central, and western Europe, as well as to the classic interpretations and current debates and revisions. The study incorporates scholarship on topics such as the world economy and women's work, and it discusses at length the impact of the emergent capitalist order on Europe's working people.

Finance, Governance and Economic Performance in Pacific and South East Asia focuses on key aspects of government policy, financial systems and their links to the economic miracle in Pacific and South East Asia. It also considers the financial crises that have affected those economies and their economic progress. The contributors examine the success of governance in the form of government involvement with the macroeconomy and with the deregulation of markets. Attention is drawn not only to the need for further liberalisation, but also the need to introduce regulatory structures to produce orderly markets. The book includes contributions on financial market opening in developing countries, the impact of FDI on the economic growth of the ASEAN economies, governance, human capital, labour and endogenous growth in Asia Pacific and lessons from the financial crisis as well as an overview of finance, development and growth. This book will be welcomed by those interested in financial economics and reform, the recent Asian crisis, and growth and development in the region.

Part 1 of this volume analyses the main issues in the theory of Applied Economics. Part 2 surveys the rise of capitalist enterprise and indicates the importance of certain institutions in the growth and working of the economic system at the start of the twentieth century. The concluding chapters stress the relevance of these considerations to the problems facing politicians and administrators.

Asset price bubbles have been and continue to be an area of major public policy concern in many countries. But while we know that the bursting of such bubbles is exceedingly painful and destructive to the economy, little is known of their causes. Indeed, there is little agreement even on the definition of a bubble and whether, whatever it is, is economically rational or irrational and reflect temporary excessive exuberance. Can bubbles be identified ex-ante before they burst? Often, one person's perceived bubble is another's perceived equilibrium price path. How and when is a bubble recognized? Should asset prices be a concern for monetary or fiscal policy makers and, if so how and when should policy-makers act? Should monetary policy attempt to target and stabilize asset prices the same as product prices? Should monetary policy act quickly at the beginning of the bubble or wait until the perceived bubble has been underway for some time? For how long? Will bubble restraining policies burst a bubble? Would it have burst on it's own? How can the damage done after bubbles be minimized? Does the experience of the U.S. in the 1920s and of Japan in the 1990s provide any lessons and guidelines for these and other countries in the 2000s?

The papers in this volume examine these and other aspects of asset price bubbles from the perspective of different times and different countries. The authors are experts who represent different countries, different economic philosophies, and different backgrounds - academic, government, bank regulatory agency and private. As a result, the papers add greatly to our storehouse of knowledge about asset price bubbles and hopefully will continue to moresuccessful public and private policies for restraining both the bubbles and their consequences and improving economic welfare.

First published in 1961, The Soviet Economy is a well informed work which seeks to acquaint students with the structure and problems of the economy of the USSR. In a balanced and perceptive analysis, Alexander Nove describes the organisation of economic life and of the planning system, analysing the practical and theoretical problems within the institutional structure of the Soviet system, and introducing the student to Soviet economic ideas and concepts. The subject is then related to the growth of the Soviet economy and to the extent to which both the institutions and the problems reflect the historical peculiarities of the USSR. The author does not try to argue for or against the system or to provide answers but aims to stimulate the reader to enquire further into the more important questions raised by the strengths and weaknesses of the Soviet economy.

First published in 1987, Administered Protection in America follows calls in the United States, at that time, for the protection of American industries and the preservation of jobs threatened by foreign competition. Professor Rugman's and Dr Anderson's work presents evidence that the United States already has a system of administered protection in place in the form of escape clauses, countervailing duty and anti-dumping procedures. The book argues that the application of these procedures by a largely decentralised administration has reduced United States state policy to a state of near anarchy. Rugman and Anderson argue that this is counterproductive for the United States and extremely harmful for America's trading partners in Europe, Canada and the Far East. The conclusion looks at discussions of trade negotiations with Canada, in which Canada was pursuing a bilateral free trade agreement with the United States.

First published in 1964, Was Stalin Really Necessary? is a thought-provoking work which deals with many aspects of the Soviet political economy, planning problems and statistics. Professor Nove starts with an attempt to evaluate the rationality of Stalinism and discusses the possible political consequences of the search for greater economic efficiency, which is followed by a controversial discussion of Kremlinology. The author goes on to analyse the situation of the peasants as reflected in literary journals, then looks at industrial and agricultural problems. There are elaborate statistical surveys of occupational patterns and the purchasing power of wages, followed by an examination of the irrational statistical reflection of irrational economic decisions. Professor Nove 's essay on social welfare was, unlike some of his other work, used in the Soviet press as evidence against over-enthusiastic cold-warriors, among whom the author was not always popular. Finally, the author seeks to generalise about the evolution of world communism.

Once in a while the world astonishes itself. Anxious incredulity replaces intellectual torpor and a puzzled public strains its antennae in every possible direction, desperately seeking explanations for the causes and nature of what just hit it. 2008 was such a moment. Not only did the financial system collapse, and send the real economy into a tailspin, but it also revealed the great gulf separating economics from a very real capitalism. Modern Political Economics has a single aim: To help readers make sense of how 2008 came about and what the post-2008 world has in store. The book is divided into two parts. The first part delves into every major economic theory, from Aristotle to the present, with a determination to discover clues of what went wrong in 2008. The main finding is that all economic theory is inherently flawed. Any system of ideas whose purpose is to describe capitalism in mathematical or engineering terms leads to inevitable logical inconsistency; an inherent error that stands between us and a decent grasp of capitalist reality. The only scientific truth about capitalism is its radical indeterminacy, a condition which makes it impossible to use science's tools (e.g. calculus and statistics) to second-guess it. The second part casts an attentive eye on the post-war era; on the breeding ground of the Crash of 2008. It distinguishes between two major post-war phases: The Global Plan (1947-1971) and the Global Minotaur (1971-2008). This dynamic new book delves into every major economic theory and maps out meticulously the trajectory that global capitalism followed from post-war almost centrally planned stability, to designed disintegration in the 1970s, to an intentional magnification of unsustainable imbalances in the 1980s and, finally, to the most spectacular privatisation of money in the 1990s and beyond. Modern Political Economics is essential reading for Economics students and anyone seeking a better understanding of the 2008 economic crash.

This book is the original autobiographical work by Henry Ford, founder of the Ford Motor Company. In this book, Ford details how he got into business, the strategies that he used to become a wealthy and successful businessman, and what others can do by learning from the examples he has outlined. Ford takes you through a journey of history, business and lessons to be learned from which he used to develop his financial empire.

The financial integration of the countries of Central and Eastern Europe and the Commonwealth of Independent States was arguably one of the most profound changes experienced by the world economy in the 1990s. This book examines these countries in reforming their financial systems in the fist decade of transition. Through case studies as well as more thematic approaches contributors deal with crucial elements of building a market based financial system, the transformation of the banking sector, and non-bank reform and regulation of financial markets. They emphasize the importance of institution-building to the process of financial sector transformation and highlight the lessons to be learned from transitional financial experiences.

First published in 1986, this work challenges underdevelopment analyses of Africaa (TM)s past experiences and future prospects, and builds upon a very wide range of recent historical research to argue that the impact of Capitalism has resulted in economic progress and significant improvements in living standards. In marked contrast to the dependency approach, they propose that the important political and economic differences between the experiences of developing countries should be stressed and analysed. The argument is supported by a detailed look at the emergence since 1900 of capitalist social relations of production in nine different countries.

Successful Transformations? contrasts the recent experience of economic development in Eastern Germany and the Czech Republic. It provides a comparative up-to-date account critically assessing the transition from central planning to a free market economy. The book highlights the very different paths that these two economies have taken. Eastern Germany has been absorbed almost entirely into the political and economic framework of West Germany. In contrast the Czech Republic - which is widely acclaimed to have made the speediest transition - has from the outset adopted an independent line. The book illustrates the strengths and weaknesses of these two different paths and addresses the key question as to whether the relative success of these two economies can point to a special policy regime which might aid economic transition in other former communist countries.