This important collection presents an authoritative selection of papers on "Institutional Conflicts and Complementarities" This publication is intent on building bridges between economics and the other social sciences. The focus is on the interaction between monetary policy and wage bargaining institutions in European Monetary Union (EMU). Institutional Conflicts and Complementarities is written by acknowledged experts in their field. The outcome is a broad analysis of the interactions of labour market actors and central banks. The volume addresses the recent changes in EMU. An important theoretical, empirical, and policy-relevant conclusion that emerges from Institutional Conflicts and Complementarities is that even perfectly credible monetary conservatism has long-term real effects, even in equilibrium models with fully rational expectations.

Global private regulations—who wins, who loses, and why Over the past two decades, governments have delegated extensive regulatory authority to international private-sector organizations. This internationalization and privatization of rule making has been motivated not only by the economic benefits of common rules for global markets, but also by the realization that government regulators often lack the expertise and resources to deal with increasingly complex and urgent regulatory tasks. The New Global Rulers examines who writes the rules in international private organizations, as well as who wins, who loses--and why. Tim Büthe and Walter Mattli examine three powerful global private regulators: the International Accounting Standards Board, which develops financial reporting rules used by corporations in more than a hundred countries; and the International Organization for Standardization and the International Electrotechnical Commission, which account for 85 percent of all international product standards. Büthe and Mattli offer both a new framework for understanding global private regulation and detailed empirical analyses of such regulation based on multi-country, multi-industry business surveys. They find that global rule making by technical experts is highly political, and that even though rule making has shifted to the international level, domestic institutions remain crucial. Influence in this form of global private governance is not a function of the economic power of states, but of the ability of domestic standard-setters to provide timely information and speak with a single voice. Büthe and Mattli show how domestic institutions' abilities differ, particularly between the two main standardization players, the United States and Europe.

Applying the new economics of organisation and relational theories of the firm to the problem of understanding cross-national variation in the political economy, this volume elaborates a new understanding of the institutional differences that characterise the 'varieties of capitalism' worldwide.

Why does corporate governance--front page news with the collapse of Enron, WorldCom, and Parmalat--vary so dramatically around the world? This book explains how politics shapes corporate governance--how managers, shareholders, and workers jockey for advantage in setting the rules by which companies are run, and for whom they are run. It combines a clear theoretical model on this political interaction, with statistical evidence from thirty-nine countries of Europe, Asia, Africa, and North and South America and detailed narratives of country cases. This book differs sharply from most treatments by explaining differences in minority shareholder protections and ownership concentration among countries in terms of the interaction of economic preferences and political institutions. It explores in particular the crucial role of pension plans and financial intermediaries in shaping political preferences for different rules of corporate governance. The countries examined sort into two distinct groups: diffuse shareholding by external investors who pick a board that monitors the managers, and concentrated blockholding by insiders who monitor managers directly. Examining the political coalitions that form among or across management, owners, and workers, the authors find that certain coalitions encourage policies that promote diffuse shareholding, while other coalitions yield blockholding-oriented policies. Political institutions influence the probability of one coalition defeating another.

This book examines and compares the 'old' institutionalism of Veblen, Mitchell, Commons, and Ayres, with the 'new' institutionalism developed from neoclassical and Austrian sources.

"In The Origins of Nonliberal Capitalism, German sociologists and American and Japanese political scientists draw extensively on the work of economists and historians from their home countries, as well as from the United Kingdom and France. The contributors analyze the historical origins of nonliberal capitalism in Germany and Japan from two perspectives: the emergence and survival of a capitalism that does not assume liberal ideas and ideology; and the causes of difference between the systems of Germany and Japan. They also outline the requirements for internally coherent national models of an embedded capitalist economy."--BOOK JACKET.

How can scholars develop better co-operation between competing theoretical approaches to conflict management? This study analyses real peacemaking strategies in Northern Ireland from 1969 to the present, including case-studies of the Brooke Initiative political talks and the Community Relations Council. In the light of this wealth of practical evidence, the theoretical debate is re-examined in order to develop a flexible and more inductive model of complementarity which can enable the best elements of all theoretical approaches to conflict management.

It is increasingly accepted that 'institutions matter' for economic organization and outcomes. The last decade has seen significant expansion in research examining how institutional contexts affect the nature and behaviour of firms, the operation of markets, and economic outcomes. Yet 'institutions' conceal a multitude of issues and perspectives. Much of this research has been comparative, and followed different models such as 'varieties of capitalism', 'national business systems', and 'social systems of production'. This Handbook explores these issues, perspectives, and models, with the leading scholars in the area contributing chapters to provide a central reference point for academics, scholars, and students.

Critical international theory encompasses several distinct, radical approaches that focus on identity, difference, hegemonic power, and order. As an applied theory, critical international theory draws on critical social theories to shed light on international processes and global transformations. While this approach has led to increasing interest in formulating an empirically relevant critical international theory, it has also revealed the difficulties of applying critical theory to international politics. What are these difficulties and problems? And how can we move beyond them? This book addresses these questions by investigating the intellectual currents and key debates of critical theory, from Kant and Hegel to Habermas and Derrida, and the recent work of critical international theory, including Robert Cox and Andrew Linklater. By drawing on these debates, the book formulates an original theory of complementarity that brings together critical theory and critical international theory. It argues that complementarity—a governing principle in international law and politics—offers a conceptual framework for working toward two goals: engaging the changing contexts and forms of resistance and redressing some of the difficulties of applying critical theory to international relations. In adopting three critical perspectives on complementarity to analyze the evolving social and political contexts of global justice, this book provides an essential resource for undergraduate and graduate students and scholars interested in the application of critical theory to international relations.

Whitley is one of the leading exponents of the 'business systems' approach which analyses the different character and organisation of firms in different national settings. Here he summarises his approach and links it to the capabilities and strategies of firms.