States of Liberalization

States of Liberalization
Author: Mitchell P. Smith
Publisher: State University of New York Press
Total Pages: 258
Release: 2012-02-01
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 0791482839

As economic competition is introduced into areas formerly served by public sector monopolies, to what extent do governments lose discretion over their use of the public sector? States of Liberalization examines the impact of the European Union's rigorous single-market competition policy on the abilities of Western European governments to use the public sector to achieve political objectives. Examining several politically contentious sectors, including government purchasing of goods and services, postal services, and public sector financial institutions, Mitchell P. Smith explores and explains the scope and the limits of this transformation. While European economic integration and the application of European Community competition policy have substantially infused competition into public services, the process has been more modest, and more deliberate, than a simple reading of Europe's potent market-making mechanisms would predict.

The State After Statism

The State After Statism
Author: Jonah D. Levy
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Total Pages: 494
Release: 2006-10
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 9780674022768

The state also rises : the roots of contemporary state activism / Jonah D. Levy -- The transformation of the British state : from club government to state-administered high modernism / Michael Moran -- The forgotten center : state activism and corporatist adjustment in Holland and Germany / Anton C. Hemerijck and Mark I. Vail -- Exiting Etatisme? new directions in state policy in France and Japan / Jonah D. Levy, Mari Miura, and Gene Park -- The state and the reconstruction of industrial relations institutions after fordism : Britain and France compared / Chris Howell -- Building finance capitalism : the regulatory politics of corporate governance reform in the United States and Germany / John W. Cioffi -- From maternalism to "employment for all" : state politics to promote women's employment across the affluent democracies / Ann Shola Orloff -- The state in the digital economy / John Zysman and Abraham Newman -- Building global service markets : economic structure and state capacity / Peter Cowhey and John Richards -- The transformation of European trading states / Richard H. Steinberg -- The State and statism : from market direction to market support / Jonah D. Levy.

Women, the State, and Political Liberalization

Women, the State, and Political Liberalization
Author: Laurie A. Brand
Publisher: Columbia University Press
Total Pages: 344
Release: 1998
Genre: Human rights
ISBN: 023111267X

Brand focuses on three countries--Jordan, Tunisia, and Morocco--with special attention to issues such as access to contraception and abortion, labor, pension, criminal legislation, protection against harassment and violence, and the degree of women's participation in government.

The Order of Economic Liberalization

The Order of Economic Liberalization
Author: Ronald I. Mckinnon
Publisher: JHU Press
Total Pages: 260
Release: 1993-10
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 9780801847431

Can knowledge of financial policies in developing countries over four decades help the socialist economies of Asia and Eastern Europe become open market economies in the 1990s? In all these countries the loss of fiscal and monetary control has often resulted in high inflation that undermines the liberalization process itself. In the second edition of The Order of Economic Liberalization, Ronald McKinnon builds on his influential work on the liberalization of financial markets in less developed countries and outlines the progression necessary to move from a "repressed" to an open economy. New to this edition are chapters that contrast the gradual Chinese approach to liberalizing domestic and foreign trade with the "big bang" approach followed by some Eastern European countries and republics of the former Soviet Union. Financial control and macroeconomic stability, McKinnon argues, are more critical to a successful transition than is any crash program to privatize state-owned industrial assets and the banking system.

Varieties of Liberalization and the New Politics of Social Solidarity

Varieties of Liberalization and the New Politics of Social Solidarity
Author: Kathleen Thelen
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 281
Release: 2014-03-31
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1107053161

This book examines contemporary changes in labor market institutions in the United States, Germany, Denmark, Sweden, and the Netherlands, focusing on developments in three arenas - industrial relations, vocational education and training, and labor market policy. While confirming a broad, shared liberalizing trend, it finds that there are in fact distinct varieties of liberalization associated with very different distributive outcomes. Most scholarship equates liberal capitalism with inequality and coordinated capitalism with higher levels of social solidarity. However, this study explains why the institutions of coordinated capitalism and egalitarian capitalism coincided and complemented one another in the "Golden Era" of postwar development in the 1950s and 1960s, and why they no longer do so. Contrary to the conventional wisdom, this study reveals that the successful defense of the institutions traditionally associated with coordinated capitalism has often been a recipe for increased inequality due to declining coverage and dualization. Conversely, it argues that some forms of labor market liberalization are perfectly compatible with continued high levels of social solidarity and indeed may be necessary to sustain it.

China's Regulatory State

China's Regulatory State
Author: Roselyn Hsueh Romano
Publisher: Cornell University Press
Total Pages: 321
Release: 2011-10-15
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 080146286X

Today's China is governed by a new economic model that marks a radical break from the Mao and Deng eras; it departs fundamentally from both the East Asian developmental state and its own Communist past. It has not, however, adopted a liberal economic model. China has retained elements of statist control even though it has liberalized foreign direct investment more than any other developing country in recent years. This mode of global economic integration reveals much about China’s state capacity and development strategy, which is based on retaining government control over critical sectors while meeting commitments made to the World Trade Organization. In China's Regulatory State, Roselyn Hsueh demonstrates that China only appears to be a more liberal state; even as it introduces competition and devolves economic decisionmaking, the state has selectively imposed new regulations at the sectoral level, asserting and even tightening control over industry and market development, to achieve state goals. By investigating in depth how China implemented its economic policies between 1978 and 2010, Hsueh gives the most complete picture yet of China's regulatory state, particularly as it has shaped the telecommunications and textiles industries. Hsueh contends that a logic of strategic value explains how the state, with its different levels of authority and maze of bureaucracies, interacts with new economic stakeholders to enhance its control in certain economic sectors while relinquishing control in others. Sectoral characteristics determine policy specifics although the organization of institutions and boom-bust cycles influence how the state reformulates old rules and creates new ones to maximize benefits and minimize costs after an initial phase of liberalization. This pathbreaking analysis of state goals, government-business relations, and methods of governance across industries in China also considers Japan’s, South Korea’s, and Taiwan’s manifestly different approaches to globalization.

The Politics of Economic Liberalization in Indonesia

The Politics of Economic Liberalization in Indonesia
Author: Andrew Rosser
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 258
Release: 2013-07-04
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 1136855866

This book examines the dynamics shaping the economic process of economic liberalisation in Indonesia since the mid-1980's. Much writing on the process of economic liberalisation in developing countries views economic liberalisation as the victory of economic rationality over political and social interests. In contrast, this book argues that economic liberalisation should not be understood in these terms, but rather in the way that political social interests shape processes of economic reform in both a positive and negative sense. Specifically, Rosser argues that economic liberalisation needs to be understood in terms of the extent to which economic crises shift the balance of power and influence within society away from coalitions opposed to reform and towards those in favour of reform. In the Indonesian context, the main coalitions that need to be examined in this respect are the politico-bureaucrats and the conglomerates who have generally opposed reform and mobile capitalists who have generally supported reform. Based on extensive original research, and providing much new material, the book considers the politics of economic policy-making in Indonesia in a range of sectors including the capital market, intellectual property law, the banking industry, and the trade and investment sectors. Analysing why the nature of economic policy in Indonesia has varied over time, this study argues that there is nothing inevitable about a transition to a fully-fledged liberal market order in Indonesia, and outlines possible future scenarios for the country's political economy.

Public Services and International Trade Liberalization

Public Services and International Trade Liberalization
Author: Barnali Choudhury
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 379
Release: 2012-11-01
Genre: Law
ISBN: 1139789767

Does public service liberalization pose a threat to gender and human rights? Traditionally considered essential services provided by a state to its citizens, public services are often viewed as public goods which embody social values. Subjecting them to market ideology thus raises concerns that the intrinsic social nature of these services will be negated. Moreover, as those most likely to be reliant on public services, public service liberalization may also further marginalize women. Nevertheless, states continue to increasingly liberalize public services. Barnali Choudhury explores the implications of public service liberalization. Using primarily a legal approach, but drawing from case studies, empirical research and gender theories, she examines whether liberalization under the General Agreement on Trade in Services and other liberalization vehicles such as preferential trade and investment agreements compromise human rights and gender objectives.

Trade Liberalization

Trade Liberalization
Author: Romain Wacziarg
Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2018
Genre: Free trade
ISBN: 9781788111492

This compelling two-volume collection presents the major literary contributions to the economic analysis of the consequences of trade liberalization on growth, productivity, labor market outcomes and economic inequality. Examining the classical theories that stress gains from trade stemming from comparative advantage, the selection also comprises more recent theories of imperfect competition, where any potential gains from trade can stem from competitive effects or the international transmission of knowledge. Empirical contributions provide evidence regarding the explanatory power of these various theories, including work on the effects of trade openness on economic growth, wages, and income inequality, as well as evidence on the effects of trade on firm productivity, entry and exit. Prefaced by an original introduction from the editor, the collection will to be an invaluable research resource for academics, practitioners and those drawn to this fascinating topic.