Transforming Management in Central and Eastern Europe analyses changes in enterprises in seven European countries since 1989 - Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Romania, Russia, and Slovakia. Economic trends have differed vastly between these countries, but nevertheless, there are common objectives, common problems, and significant similarities in developments. This book shows the continuities, as well as the discontinuities, between the Socialist and the post-Socialist periods. It argues that Central and Eastern European countries are developing a distinctive, hybrid form of post-Socialist economic system, largely dominated by enterprise managers in alliance with state administrations-politicized managerial capitalism. Privatization has not transformed management practices, competition has.

This book presents in a concise and accessible way why the EU institutional system exists in its present form, how the EU fits into the world as a system of governance, and who is involved in EU policy processes. It outlines the historical context which has shaped the EU system, gives a summary of the system's basic principles and structures, and describes its actors, procedures and instruments. The main theme is to show that EU decision-making is not just a matter of action at some higher and separate level, of 'them and us', but rather that it involves different forms of cooperation between European, national and regional authorities, as well as interaction between public and private actors. Numerous short case studies illustrate how people's day-to-day activities are affected by EU decisions, and how individuals' concerns are represented in the decision-making process. The book provides insights and examples which will be very helpful for all students of European integration. It will also be a valuable resource for European citizens wishing to understand the basic realities and rationales, as well as some of the dilemmas, behind EU policy-making.

A number of developing countries, including small island states have common problems that have affected their development and growth. Knowledge Management (KM) initiatives can be used to address some of these issues, but these developing countries need to understand what is needed to implement them, in order to improve economic conditions. While many of these countries have access to technologies that can be used to assist in knowledge management, relevant and low cost KM initiatives need to be considered in improving their existing KM processes. Sectors critical to the growth of these developing countries include health care, crime management, disaster recovery management, small and medium size enterprise development. Knowledge Management for Development: Domains, Strategies and Technologies for Developing Countries highlights the opportunities in these sectors and provides advice as to how these countries should go about understanding, building and adopting the relevant KM strategies and technologies. This book identifies appropriate technologies which should be considered to increase productivity within the identified sectors in the developing countries and also sectors in where knowledge management initiatives can yield maximum value. It also considers the constraints of these territories, recommending appropriate technologies and strategies for KM initiatives. It provides advice on how these technologies should be adopted in these sectors of developing countries. Investing in these strategies should benefit these countries development and growth.

Agent-based models are tools that provide researchers in economic fields with unprecedented analytical capabilities. This book describes the power of agent-based models along their methodology, and it provides several examples of applications spanning from public policy evaluation to financial markets.

This book calls for a radical reappraisal of economic policy in the UK. It argues that a much lower exchange rate is needed to re-establish sufficient manufacturing capacity to enable Britain to pay its way in the world. Mills makes the case for the removal of balance of payments constraints to achieve growth and avoid endless austerity.

This book explores the changing socio-economic and technological landscape of the 21 century and what it means. It adopts an industrial economic approach, whilst proposing a road map leading to the adoption of a 'societal market economy' model as an appealing and politically acceptable third-way between capitalism and socialism.

At a time when we are faced with fundamental questions about the sustainability and morality of the economic system, Capitalism and Its Critics provides a kaleidoscopic history of global capitalism, from colonialism and the Industrial Revolution to the ecological crisis and artificial intelligence.

John Cassidy adopts a bold new approach: he tells the story through the eyes of the system’s critics. From eighteenth-century weavers who rebelled against early factory automation to Eric Williams's paradigm-changing work on slavery and capitalism, to the Latin American dependistas, the international Wages for Housework campaign of the 1970s, and the modern degrowth movement, this absorbing narrative traverses the globe. It looks at familiar figures – Smith, Marx, Luxemburg, Keynes, Polanyi – from a fresh perspective, but also focuses on many less familiar, including William Thompson, the Irish proto-socialist whose work influenced Marx; Flora Tristan, the French proponent of a universal labour union; John Hobson, the original theorist of imperialism; and J. C. Kumarappa, the Indian exponent of Gandhian economics.

Singapore, South Korea and Taiwan - East Asia's newly industrialised economies (the NIE-3) - experienced a profound development transformation over recent decades. Christopher Dent makes a comparative study of their foreign economic policies, highlighting how the NIE-3 have engaged with the international economic system in an increasingly dynamic way. The book develops a new macro-framework of foreign economic policy analysis that provides the structure for this study. The author argues that the 'development context' of the NIE-3's foreign economic policies is grounded in their common development statism and semi-peripheralisation. He further contends that it is the pursuit of economic security that primarily motivates their respective foreign economic policies. This new conceptualisation of economic security in the context of foreign economic policy will appeal to academics, researchers and students in wide range of disciplines including: Asian studies, international relations, international political economy, economics and politics.

This book examines human-interest stories, unpacking from them violence inherent to neoliberalism, and considers if it is possible to find in these stories hints of people and labour that suggest other narratives.

The book aims to present "traditional features" of regional science (as geographical concepts and institutions), as well as relatively new topics such as innovation and agglomeration economies. In particular it demonstrates that, contrary to what has been argued by recent economics literature, both geography and institutions (or culture) are relevant for local development. In fact, these phenomena, along with the movement of goods and workers, are among the main reasons for persisting development differentials. These intriguing relationships are at the heart of the analysis presented in this book and form the conceptual basis for a promising institutional approach to economic geography.

This edited collection investigates the role of Italy in pursuing the EU five targets by 2020: R&D/innovation expenditures; the energetic measures for climate change; migration; the counter actions against poverty and social exclusion. This ambitious book uses a multidisciplinary approach and original field studies to tackle this important topic.

This book offers an analytic history of Britannia (first England and Wales and then Great Britain) over eight hundred years of political turmoil, intermingled with economic stagnation, followed by the engine of the industrial revolution. The book draws on economics, political science, public choice, philosophy and the law to probe in depth into the evolution of Britannia from an impoverished feudal and then post-feudal autocracy into a constitutional monarchy with limited suffrage that provided the fulcrum for industrial and commercial success, making Britannia, by 1884, the richest nation, per capita, on the planet. The book challenges head-on the Whiggist liberal notion of Macaulay and Trevelyan that the path from oppression to freedom was one of unimpeded progress. Among its novel features, the book draws upon the dictator's handbook, as modeled by Bueno de Mesquita and Alistair Smith to evaluate the period of varying autocracy, 1066-1688. The book draws upon modern public choice theory and legal history to evaluate the fragile, corrupt constitutional monarchy that oversaw the initial phase of post-Glorious Revolution Britannia, 1689-1775. At each stage, the philosophical battle between those who sought order and unity and those who sought individual liberty is meticulously outlined. The book draws on the contributions of the Scottish Enlightenment (Hume, Ferguson and Smith) and of classical liberal philosophy (John Stuart Mill) to explain the final vault of Britannia from a weak and corrupt to a robust and admired constitutional monarchy grounded on the rule of law, over the period 1776-1884.

This book offers important new insights into recent advances and perspectives in the field of political economy of development in Southeastern European countries. In addition, it provides theoretical and empirical contributions to political economy of development in an international context. Written by authors from Greece, Serbia and Turkey, the book covers a broad spectrum of topics - from macroeconomics and economic policy to international political economy and globalization. Presenting new and original ideas, this is a valuable resource for anyone wishing to gain a deeper understanding of political economy of development in Southeastern Europe: academicians, policymakers and business practitioners.

The people of the Middle East face puzzling political realities as they enter the new millennium. Robust Western-style democracies have not yet emerged in the Middle East, yet at the same time, many Middle Eastern countries have experienced an important increase in political liberties in the last two decades. Economic Development and Political Reform addresses critical trends in the Middle Eastern political economy in the 1980s and 1990s and builds upon the cross-regional political science literature concerning political and economic reforms in the developing world. The book argues that external capital has had a decisive impact on economic and political development in the region. The author focuses mainly on Turkey, Morocco, Egypt and Kuwait and also considers important developments in other Middle Eastern countries. He demonstrates that Middle Eastern states lacking substantial exogenous revenues - including oil and foreign aid - have experienced severe fiscal crises and have been forced to pursue neo-liberal economic strategies. By contrast, those states with greater exogenous resources have undergone milder economic crises and developed more populist economic models. Providing new theoretical perspectives on Third World political and economic reform, this innovative volume will be of particular interest to political economists, international governmental and developmental organizations, international financial institutions and non-governmental organizations in this region.

Why do markets exist? How are they maintained? What are market systems and how are they formed? This book addresses these fundamental questions and challenges the traditional view that markets and market systems are 'natural', asserting instead that they are ideologically coloured and of dubious scientific value.

This book tries to integrate the different arrangements devised in the MTS for small and large NMEs into one analytical framework and explores two sets of rules (GATT/WTO-minus and GATT/WTO-plus) along three historical stages (shaping, weakening and strengthening). The focal point of this book is to uncover the composition and structure of the NME treatment in the MTS, its evolving logic and process, and the nature and trend of the political-economic relations between NMEs and the MTS.

Is it possible for visionary leaders to adhere to their idealism and integrity without becoming casualties of corporate conservatism and executive-level politics? This book says "yes," arguing for the need for visionary change agents in organizations and resolving the paradox of visionary change in a bureaucratic environment. Why do many companies state they want change but then often fire employees who truly rock the boat in their efforts to shift the paradigm to make improvements? How should "disposable visionaries"-leaders who are passionate about new ideas, but who underestimate or intentionally ignore the political environment that supports maintaining the status quo and consequently are in danger of losing their jobs-keep their passion regardless of the opposition... and also keep their jobs? Written with wit and filled with poignant insights and well-documented examples, this book provides practical advice and encouragement to those who are driven to promote new ideas and reach new levels of achievement. Not just for executive-level corporate leaders frustrated by their company's resistance to change, the information and inspiration presented will be enlightening to anyone who has ever been puzzled or annoyed by obstructive internal politics at work. Readers will come away with effective ways to deal with politics, champion breakthrough innovation, be recognized as their organization's most valuable asset, and unlock their potential to change the competitive playing field. The book will also be invaluable for business students who need to be aware of potential obstacles they will likely face as they embark on their careers. Helps visionaries to identify their character traits, both positive and negative, and gives them direction on how to hang on to their idealism while more clearly perceiving how their actions affect others in the organization, including their managers, corporate leadership, or board of directors Describes a previously undocumented yet common dynamic that has frustrated many ambitious employees, told from the visionary's own viewpoint Explains how to manage visionaries more effectively by encouraging them to make meaningful contributions that can be embraced and claimed by others in the organization Enables leaders who are change agents to improve their chances of staying in an executive position long enough for their ideas to gel and take positive effect Features interesting profiles of (ultimately) successful visionaries-maverick leaders who were often initially fired or smothered for their methods and mindsets-throughout the book

This book acts as a welcome foil to current thinking on the concept of globalisation, which tends to be divided into two distinct camps: one which suggests that the neo-liberal model has triumphed and has no realistic alternative, and another which argues that globalisation, in its most extreme form, does not really exist, rather having evolved gradually from the very beginnings of industrialisation. Bob Milward presents an alternative view of globalisation and argues that indeed there has been a continuum in capitalist development, but that this has been forged by historical processes and the dynamism of the competitive forces of capitalism. He identifies the emergence of monopoly capitalism as an important shaping factor, and in so doing sheds light on issues of underdevelopment, multinational imperialism and crises in advanced capitalist economies. This radical, multidisciplinary account of the condition of the global economy, encompassing a critique of the neo-liberal foundations of orthodox global analysis, will appeal to an extensive audience. Students, researchers and academics in the fields of economics, heterodox economics, economic geography, politics, sociology, development studies, international relations and public policy will find Globalisation? Internationalisation and Monopoly Capitalism to be an engaging read.

This volume will bring together international and national scholars and activists to provide historical overviews of the main efforts to date to pass unconditional basic income guarantee legislation in their respective countries and/or across regions of the globe. Each contributing author will be asked to address a specific set of issues or substantive content. Such issues will include who are or were the main people and groups involved in support or against such legislative efforts, what are or were the main theoretical and pragmatic reasons for the success or failure of BIG-related initiatives to date, what legislative alternatives compete with BIG for political favor, what if any relationship is there between a country's level of economic development and factors affecting the legislative fate of BIG measures, what the prospects are for the future. Ideally, each contribution or chapter would be country or region specific, although several contributors will make international or cross-country comparisons. A concluding chapter will identify commonalities and differences across countries and possibly regions to the extent contributing sufficiently address a common set of question as suggested above and it will draw lessons for advancing social policies in general and BIG policies in particular.

The selected papers in this volume were prepared under the research project on "EU Eastern Neighborhood: Economic Potential and Future Development (ENEPO)" funded by the EU Sixth Framework Program. They discuss the broad spectrum of development issues in the EU Eastern Neighborhood and economic relations between the enlarged EU and its Eastern neighbors in the former USSR. Individual chapters address areas of economic and social development, trade, energy, investment, migration, costs and benefits of economic reforms, development assistance and political economy of policy reforms. In particular, they examine interrelations and mutual synergies between trade liberalization, inflow of foreign investment, economic and institutional reforms and a reduction of income and development disparities. The publication thus closes an important knowledge gap in respect to the economic, social and institutional development of the CIS region and its economic relations with the EU.

In this landmark work, Neil Gilbert addresses the long-standing tensions between capitalism and the progressive spirit. Challenging the contemporary progressive outlook on the failures of capitalism, Capitalism and the Progressive Spirit analyzes the empirical evidence for conventional claims about the real level of poverty, the presumed causes and consequences of inequality, the meaning and underlying dynamics of social mobility, and the necessity for more social welfare spending and universal benefits. A careful reading of the research reveals that these issues are far less serious than contemporary progressive claims would have the public believe. Progressive leaders, however, remain firmly wedded to the established social agenda, which conveys a vision of the good society that disregards the historically unprecedented and wide-spread abundance in the advanced post-industrial countries. Meanwhile, the progressive agenda inadvertently caters to the corrosive effects of insatiable consumption and the commodification of everyday life, from which modern capitalism profits. The analysis suggests that it is time to resist the material definition of progress that stands so high on the current agenda and envision alternative ways for government to advance society.

The Arab Spring constitutes perhaps the most far-reaching political and economic transition since the end of communism in Europe. For too long, the economic aspirations of the people in the region, especially young people, have been ignored by leaders in Arab countries and abroad. Competing views as to how best to meet these aspirations are now being debated in the region. The outcome will shape Arab societies for generations to come.
The authors of this book argue that significant economic reforms must accompany the major political transitions that are underway. Although each country has a different economic structure and history and must make its own way forward, there are spill-overs from trade and investment linkages, the contagion of news cycles, interaction of people and sharing of expectations that are too great to ignore. Some common foundation of the new Arab economies is needed. Towards that end, this volume addresses four central challenges of economic reform in the Arab world. First, with two-thirds of the population under the age of 30, the disproportionate burdens of unemployment and poor education can no longer be heaped on youth. Second, while some government policies may have improved the living standards of Arab citizens in the past, they have also entrenched cronies, enriched a small elite, and become unaffordable. Third, if Arab economies are to compete in the 21st century they cannot depend solely on oil and gas money, remittances, and tourism, but will require active, independent private sectors. And finally, the relative isolation of Arab economies--both from each other and from the world--must end.
Rather than providing specific lists of recommendations, this book sets forth a set of guidelines and priorities for reformers who will begin creating new opportunities for youth, rebuilding the institutions of the state, diversifying the private sector, and cooperating with each other and integrating with the world economy.

Human Capital, Trade and Public Policy in Rapidly Growing Economies argues that only two centuries ago, no society had ever enjoyed sustained growth in living standards. The contributors to this book aim to discover why the world today exhibits a predilection for perpetual self-improvement.In particular, the book focuses on the forces underlying long-lasting growth in East Asia's Newly Industrialized Countries (NICs). Drawing from the experiences of Hong Kong, South Korea, Singapore and Taiwan, it questions whether public policy can contribute to removing barriers towards accumulation of wealth, and if so, what development policy should be put in place to remedy the existing distortions or market failure problems. Theoretical and empirical analyses are also used to broach other important issues, such as: Why do some economies experience growth while others decline? What are the major determinants of long-term growth and development? Is human capital the main driving force? Does international trade play a crucial role? This book will appeal to those with an interest in development and public policy.