This volume presents contributions that analyse the extraordinary impact of digital technology on business, services, and the production of value in many sectors of the economy. At the heart of this book is the fact that the entire digital economy is now worth almost 6% of global GDP, and it continues to grow at an unprecedented rate. The volume covers the general debate on taxation and the digital economy with the chapters by Russo, Makiyama and Boccia, before completing the analysis with discussion of three national case studies covering the U.S. (Pagano), U.K. (Leonardi) and Italy (Boccia and Leonardi). Contributors are leading experts in the fields of taxation and the digital economy and contextualise the key issues surrounding the digitalisation of the economy from an international perspective.

An influential sociologist revives materialist explanations of class, while accommodating the best of rival cultural theory. Following the collapse of the Soviet Union, analysis of class and other basic structures of capitalism was sidelined by theorists who argued that social and economic life is reducible to culture-that our choices reflect interpretations of the world around us rather than the limitations imposed by basic material facts. Today, capitalism is back on the agenda, as gross inequalities in wealth and power have pushed scholars to reopen materialist lines of inquiry. But it would be a mistake to pretend that the cultural turn never happened. Vivek Chibber instead engages cultural theory seriously, proposing a fusion of materialism and the most useful insights of its rival. Chibber shows that it is possible to accommodate the main arguments from the cultural turn within a robust materialist framework: one can agree that the making of meaning plays an important role in social agency, while still recognizing the fundamental power of class structure and class formation. Chibber vindicates classical materialism by demonstrating that it in fact accounts for phenomena cultural theorists thought it was powerless to explain. But he also shows that aspects of class are indeed centrally affected by cultural factors. The Class Matrix does not seek to displace culture from the analysis of modern capitalism. Rather, in prose of exemplary clarity, Chibber gives culture its due alongside what Marx called "the dull compulsion of economic relations."

This book looks at how varieties of capitalism emerge over time and across different geographies, and is comprised of submissions from scholars around the globe. Covering a wide range of territories including Europe, the Americas, Africa, and Asia across both the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, this edited volume considers the roles that the state and business working together play in the emergence of different economic systems. Whilst most analyses focus on identifying different types of capitalism, the chapters in this volume instead focus on how these different types develop, the drivers of their emergence, and the people and organisations behind the developments. The geographical spread of analyses allows the reader to delve into how different countries have managed and even created their economic systems providing comparative insights into our understanding of how different national economic models develop over time. This book was originally published as a special issue of Business History.

The book is an exploration, on both theoretical and empirical grounds, into the nature and the transformation of the state in the neoliberal era. Nowadays, a widespread crisis of legitimation affects the institutions and authority of the state; similarly, and especially after the Great Crisis of 2008 to present, the European project is increasingly questioned by populist and neo-nationalist forces, which politically advance in the state and society, and promote further coercive-oriented reconfiguration of state powers and apparatus. The 'nationalist international', the 'new populists' and/or the 'rise of new international fascism' are questions on the verge of international scholarship and political debate. However, many of these studies often miss the specificity and critical importance of the study of the state and of state (institutional and ideological) powers; even more importantly, the phenomenon of populism/neo-authoritarianism is interpreted by the mainstream as a clear break with traditional centrist parties, with the result of neglecting the past authoritarian tendencies that accompany the entire history of neoliberalism. This book aspires to be a guide for political activist and policy-makers: specifically, by showing how the state is of critical importance to the making of neoliberalism in institutional and cultural terms, it also aims to rethink the state as the arena of politics and, accordingly, as the key site to promote alternatives to neoliberalism.

Marking the 25th anniversary of Ukraine as a sovereign nation, this book traces its economic transformation since 1991. Post-communist transition has been a highlight of recent history, and Ukraine stands out as one of its most interesting and puzzling cases. Havrylyshyn offers the first comprehensive treatise on the entire period, providing a thorough description of the slow evolution of economic reforms, exploring how and why performance in this regard fell far behind the leaders in transition. Testing several conventional hypotheses, the author argues that while Russian imperialism may form part of the explanation, the self-serving interests of domestic elites and new oligarchs may be even more important. Radically revising the traditional argument that reforms were delayed to allow nation building, this book contends that it was due more to the interests of the non-lustrated elite, who needed time to become the new capitalists.

This book adds a crucial focus on morality to the growing literature on the history of capitalism by exploring social and cultural perspectives on the economic order that has dominated the modern world. Taking the study beyond narrow economic confines, it traces the entanglement between moral sentiments and capitalism, examining both moral critiques and moral justifications. Company bankruptcies, systems of taxation, wealth, and the running of stock exchanges were attacked on moral grounds, while ideas of economic justice and the humanization of capitalism loomed large over moral critiques. Many movements, from antislavery to labour campaigns, were inspired by aspirations to improve capitalism and halt the moral decay that was felt to have affected large sections of society. This book questions how moral sentiments are defined and have changed over time, and how these relate to both capitalism and anti-capitalism. Covering a range of different social movements and ethical issues, the 13 chapters present a moral history of capitalism, understood not simply as an economic system but as an order that encompasses all areas of modern life.

This volume explores the policy dynamics, economic commitments and social impacts of the fast evolving Sino-LAC relations. China's engagement with Latin America and the Caribbean has entered into an era of strategic transition. While China is committed to strengthening its economic and political ties with Latin America and the Caribbean, Latin America as a bloc is enthusiastically echoing China's endeavor by diverting their focus toward the other side of the ocean. The transitional aspect of China-LAC ties is phenomenal, and is manifested not only in the accelerating momentum of trade, investment, and loan but also in the China-CELAC Forum mechanism that maps out an institutional framework for decades beyond. While Latin America is redefined as an emerging priority to the leadership in Beijing, what are the responses from Latin America and the United States? In this sense, experts from four continents provide local answers to this global question.

The Economics and Politics of China's Energy Security Transition clarifies China's energy and foreign policies through a comprehensive examination of energy sources, providing an insider's unique perspective for assessing China's energy policies. China's historic decline in coal consumption since 2013-2014 and a plateauing of its carbon dioxide emissions have given China an unprecedented opportunity to decarbonize while growing its economy. In response to global questions about China's institutional, administrative, and political challenges and risks, this book provides the answers that everyone is asking.

The focus of this edited volume is to identify challenges facing organizations in achieving zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 and a new energy economy, and to explore solutions from various sectors of the economy to enable the transition to a zero emissions future. Research presented here is divided into three parts, with an introductory statement on growth and sustainability. Part one discusses strategies towards a sustainable economy under a zero emissions goal. Part two contains industry specific case studies focusing on construction and related activities. Part three is devoted to country specific case studies from the Asia-Pacific region. Each of the chapters address one or more of the following issues: restoration, mitigation, adaptation and/or promoting resilience in the face of climate change as part of achieving a sustainable economy. The volume is multi-disciplinary in nature, drawing on various disciplines in social science, business, environment and policy, and will be of interest to UN development agencies, academic institutions, government policy makers, NGOs and business leaders.

This book provides an updated and comprehensive review of the development of Japan's local government system over the past half century. It corrects the view that Japan is over-centralized by providing examples of expanding local government autonomy over time. Such examples include the success of local initiatives in anti-pollution, healthcare, and welfare policies. It also shows that gradual and controlled decentralization, as practised in Japan, has helped avoid coordination problems while providing time and resources for local governments to build capacity to undertake development projects, programmes, and planning. In so doing, it offers an alternative to the view that maximum autonomy quickly granted is the best way to develop local governments.

This book purports to investigate and compare the economic development experiences in both Taiwan and South Korea in last two decades. Taiwan and South Korea's economic development after WWII is a well-known story. However, their development after the successful post-war industrialization has not been comprehensively studied. The book examines whether the three factors -the role of private business, government policy, and foreign influence-that had contributed to Taiwan's and Korea's post-war development, are still relevant during the post-industrial development era. Researchers in the fields of global political economy, Asian economic development and East Asian studies will find this book a fresh and invaluable contribution to the literature. The book will also be of value to policy makers in developing countries in drafting their national development policies, diplomats conducting economic diplomacy with Taiwan and South Korea, and business people planning to expand their business interests in Asia.

This book is a contribution to the debate about the transition process, and focuses on structural institutions in Russia and the East.

In transitional countries with unfavourable initial conditions and weak institutions, economic and social performance can only in part be explained by the approaches followed in the field of macroeconomic adjustment, privatization, and liberalization. By reviewing the impact of initial conditions on industrial and institutional conditions in the gradual and late reforming countries, this book aims to rekindle the debate surrounding these largely neglected issues.

This book analyzes the evolution of foreign trade cooperation between Russia and China in the context of the rapidly growing global economy, especially in the Asian-Pacific region. The approach presented in the book is characterized by a comprehensive view on macroeconomic dynamics and the process of evolving means of production. The authors describe characteristics of national innovational economies with examples from countries in the Asian-Pacific region.

Mutant Ecologies traces the spinning of new synthetic threads into the web of life. It is a critical cartography of the shifting landscapes of capital accumulation conjured by recent developments in genomic science, genome editing and the biotech industry. CRISPR crops, fast-growing salmons, heat-resistant Slick (TM) cows, Friendly (TM) Mosquitoes, humanised mice, pigs growing human organs - these are but a few of the dazzling new life-forms that have recently emerged from corporate and university laboratories around the world, all promising to lubricate the circuits of capital accumulation in distinct ways. The deliberate induction of genetic mutations is increasingly central to business operations in a number of sectors, from agriculture to pharmaceuticals. While the Nobel Committee recently proclaimed the life sciences to have entered 'a new epoch', the authors show how these technological innovations continue to operate within a socio-historical context defined by the iron rules of capitalist competition and exploitation. Capital no longer contents itself with simply appropriating the living bodies of plants and animals. It purposefully designs their internal metabolism, and in that way it redesigns the countless living vectors that constitute the global biosphere. It is driving a biological revolution, which will ripple through the everyday lives of people everywhere.

This textbook examines how far economic integration in Europe has come. Is it still more useful to view the European Union countries as a set of individual economies, or does it now make more sense to look at them as forming one larger economy? The book attempts to answer this question in a range of expert contributions dealing with all the major aspects of European economic integration, including trade, economic growth, demographics, labour markets, industrial structures, foreign direct investment, monetary integration and eastern enlargement.

China's economic reform not only significantly improved the living conditions of the Chinese people but also provides a useful model of economic transition from central planning to a market economy. How did the Chinese economic reform succeed? What are the issues still to be addressed? And what are the lessons? This volume brings together thirty articles by prominent economists in the field of Chinese economic studies. It offers authoritative and thorough assessment and analyses of the Chinese experiences during the reform period.

This pioneering book explores the meaning of the term "Black social economy," a self-help sector that remains autonomous from the state and business sectors. With the Western Hemisphere's ignoble history of enslavement and violence towards African peoples, and the strong anti-black racism that still pervades society, the African diaspora in the Americas has turned to alternative practices of socio-economic organization. Conscientious and collective organizing is thus a means of creating meaningful livelihoods. In this volume, fourteen scholars explore the concept of the "Black social economy," bringing together innovative research on the lived experience of Afro-descendants in business and society in Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Colombia, Guyana, Haiti, Jamaica, and the United States. The case studies in this book feature horrific legacies of enslavement, colonization, and racism, and they recount the myriad ways that persons of African heritage have built humane alternatives to the dominant market economy that excludes them. Together, they shed necessary light on the ways in which the Black race has been overlooked in the social economy literature.

For mainstream economics, cultural production raises no special questions: creative expression is to be harvested for wealth creation like any other form of labour. As Karl Marx saw it, however, capital is hostile to the arts because it cannot fully control the process of creativity. But while he saw the arts as marginal to capital accumulation, that was before the birth of the mass media. Engaging with the major issues in Marxist theory around art and capitalism, From Printing to Streaming traces how the logic of cultural capitalism evolved from the print age to digital times, tracking the development of printing, photography, sound recording, newsprint, advertising, film and broadcasting, exploring the peculiarities of each as commodities, and their recent transformation by digital technology, where everything melts into computer code. Showing how these developments have had profound implications for both cultural creation and consumption, Chanan offers a radical and comprehensive analysis of the commodification of artistic creation and the struggle to realise its potential in the digital age.

This book explores omissions, or silences, in previous investigations of agrarian transformations by foregrounding indigenous experiences of capitalist development. Providing a rich and detailed ethnographic study, Mercedes Biocca shows how capitalist processes are perceived, experienced, and either confronted or accepted depending on the different ways in which dispossession, resistance and negotiation have become embedded in the collective local memory. Challenging accounts that efface the agency of subalterns in shaping rural dynamics, and ignore the diversity of perspectives within indigenous groups, Biocca untangles the connections between global, national and local spatial scales in her analysis of accumulation by dispossession. Using two case studies, the Qom People in Pampa del Indio and the Moqoit people in Las Tolderías, she presents the main transformations that have taken place in the Argentine agricultural sector during the hegemony of post-neoliberalism while centring the perceptions and roles of subalterns within these transformations.

This monograph presents potential remedies for some of the current environmental issues in developed countries in a theoretical or empirical manner with the interdisciplinary approaches of economics, statistics, and engineering. The book illustrates effective economic and environmental policies for environmental challenges and factors where corrective policies to date may have failed. The importance of this essential book has is related to the transition in the major concerns of the people or governments in developed countries shifting from economic growth to the stability of life and environmental preservation as their economies have matured. The environmental issues dealt with here include forest environment tax introduced as part of local taxes, air pollution reduction policies for mobile emission sources, introduction of renewable energies and power fuel cell technology, the mechanism of city agglomeration and dispersion, and measurement of environmental sustainability. In analytical methods, some research employs theoretical approaches such as the mathematical economic model or nonlinear dynamic model. Other analyses are implemented with empirical or statistical tools such as the long-run general equilibrium model, the input-output model, and the dynamic optimization model, among others.

This book explores the reasons behind Europe's poor performance in terms of overall growth and its progressively diminishing role in the global context. Recognizing that the big challenge is to restore confidence and hope in Europe, potential solutions are discussed. The volume comprises a selection of contributions to the XXVI Villa Mondragone International Economic Seminar (Rome, 2014), the most recent of a series of seminars that have provided outstanding scholars with an opportunity to discuss key topics in economic research. In recent years the persistence of high unemployment and low growth has increased the Euroscepticism that has targeted the euro and the Brussels bureaucracy. Readers will find this book a fascinating source of information on current thinking regarding topics such as European industrial policy, European governance, unemployment, the euro and competitiveness, trade and financial integration, the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership, anticorruption policies, and energy and climate policies. In particular, it examines the structural reforms and commitment to development that will be required for Europe to become a region characterized by social justice, dynamism, and opportunities for all.

Research suggests that innovation and technological change are crucial for the economic recovery of the former centrally planned countries in Central and Eastern Europe. This book analyses the development of innovation systems and technology policy in this region from various perspectives, demonstrating not only its importance but also its complexity.Included in the book are discussions on: the process of transforming the innovation systems in Central and Eastern Europe a comparison of R&D between 'East' and 'West' gradualism versus 'Big Bang' as the preferable strategy for reform innovation at the firm level productivity and competitiveness the ability to identify and exploit external knowledge in adopting up-to-date technology The authors conclude that rebuilding innovation systems in Central and Eastern Europe will require considerable time, and that there is no 'best practice' or ideal strategy which can be clearly recommended. This book will be warmly welcomed by scholars working in the fields of transition studies, innovation and technology, as well as policy makers involved in designing technology policy in transition economies.

This book offers a philosophical and macro-historical analysis of secularism, supported by an investigation of various contemporary cases. Starting with an in-depth theoretical discussion of the meaning of secularism, it subsequently presents a historical study on the secularization of norms and identities in Europe. The respective case studies cover topics such as the epistemologies of secularism, liberalization and embedded secularism, the relationship between modernity and secularism, the socio-anthropology of secularism, Turkish modernization as a cultural revolution, the political economy of secularism in Turkey, and the secular rationale of the EU neighborhood policy.

This book examines selected actions and investments of the European Central Bank (ECB) from a climate and sustainability standpoint. Shedding new light on the topic from various angles - ethical, philosophical, political, economical and legal - it situates sustainability mainstreaming in the finance and investment field at all levels. The former ECB President Mario Draghi once said that he considered sustainable development and an intact environment to be human rights, and therefore enshrined in the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights. The acting ECB President Christine Lagarde added that the future path for the climate is uncertain, but it would remain within our power to influence it. However, with all that in mind the ECB's policy of buying assets as securities is often questionable. This volume analyzes these actions in connection with sustainability, and puts forward practical recommendations for improving the ECB's investment strategy on its way creating a sustainable financial market.