Volume VIII of Acta Historiae Neerlandicae again presents studies on the history of the Low Countries which it is hoped will be of interest to foreign scholars. The intention has been to deal with a fairly long period, and many differing aspects, of the subject. So institutional, political, economic, social and cultural history all receive a fair share of attention, and together the studies cover a considerable number of centuries. It is, however, striking to note how even this restricted number of studies reflects prevailing viewpoints among today's Low Countries' historians. Clearly there is considerable stress on economic and social questions. Traditional studies such as those of former Belgian historians on medieval history, or those of the Dutch on the seventeenth century, are now giving way to works that are problem directed. Power structures, the position of the bourgeoisie, reactions of the intelli gentsia and theologians to societal problems, have now more attraction for scholars than the glories of late medieval wealth in Flanders or Holland's Golden Age. Terms such as Guerilla warfare, Struggle, Depression, typify today's critical approach to society in general.

The Role of Management Controls in Transforming Firm Boundaries and Sustaining Hybrid Organizational Forms aims to demonstrate how controls have been used to mitigate risk and to facilitate collaboration in inter-firm transactions. The authors aim to highlight the central themes and identify emergent research streams that offer promise for advancing our understanding of inter-firm management controls. The monograph considers two streams of empirical management accounting research that are distinguished by their focus and typical research methods -- one stream of research focuses on the determinants of investments in contracts and other management controls while the other stream focuses on how the stability of hybrid forms is affected by individual managers who both negotiate and manage inter-firm transactions under the influence of management controls. The thesis of this study is that inter-firm management control is central to generating the returns to hybrid organizational forms. Following an introduction, the authors examine how contracts are used to control opportunistic hazards and to facilitate coordination in inter-firm transactions. The next section moves beyond the formal contract to consider other mechanisms of control that are employed to mitigate risk and sustain hybrid organizational forms. Sections 2 and 3 focus on the contingent relationship between transaction risks and management controls and are premised on firms maximizing long-run profits using a combination of revenue maximization and cost minimization. Section 4 reviews an emergent stream of behavioral research that investigates how individual managers, who negotiate and transact on behalf of firms, influence and are influenced by management controls. The authors conclude in Section 5 with a discussion of directions for future research.