Capitalist firms, government-owned firms, nonprofit organizations, employee-owned firms, and labor unions are analyzed in detail. The problems limiting the efficiency of organizations are shown to be of a technical-administrative nature, where rationally-bounded members act in support of the goals set by the principals-controllers of the organization, or of an agency-managerial type, where they act to further their own interests.
The reasons, methods and outcomes of system change in general and in Russia and Eastern Europe in particular are analyzed, using the analytical apparatus developed in the monograph.
This monograph charts a new course for comparative economics as the field devoted to the study of the organization of economies, their behaviour, and outcomes. It examines economic systems as mechanisms for coordinating decisions and allocating resources at the macro level of national companies, cartels and franchises. A systemic approach to the description and comparison of economic syste

This book is not only a fascinating biography of one of the greatest painters of the seventeenth century but also a social history of the colorful extended family to which he belonged and of the town life of the period. It explores a series of distinct worlds: Delft's Small-Cattle Market, where Vermeer's paternal family settled early in the century; the milieu of shady businessmen in Amsterdam that recruited Vermeer's grandfather to counterfeit coins; the artists, military contractors, and Protestant burghers who frequented the inn of Vermeer's father in Delft's Great Market Square; and the quiet, distinguished "Papists Corner" in which Vermeer, after marrying into a high-born Catholic family, retired to practice his art, while retaining ties with wealthy Protestant patrons. The relationship of Vermeer to his principal patron is one of many original discoveries in the book.