Explaining the Prevalence of Illegitimate Wage Practices in Southern Europe: An Institutional Analysis

This paper proposes that the prevalence of illegitimate wage practices in Southern European societies results from the discord between the formal rules (formal institutions) and the socially shared unwritten rules that reflect citizens' beliefs (informal institutions). To evaluate this, a 2013 survey is reported on whether employers in five Southern European countries fraudulently evade tax and social security payments by paying employees a portion of their salary off the books. A strong association is revealed between the extent of wage under-reporting and the degree of institutional asymmetry across these societies. The implications for theorising illegitimate wage practices are then explored.     

Contracting in local public organizations: the institutional economics perspective

The institutional economics is one of the approaches to explain the utility of contracting of local public service provision. This paper described and critiqued the assumptions underlying institutional economics as it is used in organization theories. It also explains whether and why these assumptions hold in public sector organizations. Finally, it discusses implications from the institutional economics approach for the local agency. Local agencies taking new institutional economics perspective as the basis for its contracting decisions should take transaction risks and information asymmetry into account. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

论中国机构投资者制度构建与证券市场国际化

机构投资者是近几年来中国证券投资领域逐渐引起重视的投资主体。本文以机构投资者为中心,通过对规制机构投资者的证券市场资本流入和流出法律制度的对比,揭示了我国证券投资领域的国际化发展趋势。笔者认为:中国证券市场的国际化趋势不可避免;但是整个法律制度体系的配套建设,尤其是在针对不同投资主体、不同投资领域、不同位阶的法律制度整合方面,还有待于进一步完善。     

法眼和钱眼：深化中国院校研究的两维视角

院校研究需要多学科介入。在高等学校不断推进依法治校和科学理财的过程中,迫切需要院校研究不断深化高校管理和运行中的法学和经济学研究,以提供有针对性、专业性的政策咨询。     

In search for rules that secure gains from cooperation: the heuristic value of social dilemmas for normative institutional economics

We ask how normative statements are possible within an economic theory framework that recognises the importance of institutional arrangements. Instead of applying established outcome-oriented criteria of social welfare, we examine whether the rules of economic interaction allow the acquisition of gains from cooperation. We suggest to reconstruct any interaction as an existing or repealed social dilemma. This approach helps to identify common rule interests which create room for improvement of all parties involved, and to suggest desirable institutional reforms. Our policy applications include the unemployment problem and rural credit markets.      

国企改革与政府转型

传统的国有制使政府承担了无法承担的责任,这种制度安排不可能适应中国国内市场竞争化的要求。改革这种制度的本质要求是使企业的所有权从政府转向民间。要想获得国有企业改革的成功,不仅要求政府退出企业的日常经营活动,而且要求政府退出企业的改革决策,使企业真正享有制度选择权。     

域外视野：中国医闹之医疗纠纷解决机制探讨-兼与哥伦比亚大学李本教授商榷

医闹成了中国近二十年来重要的社会问题。李本教授在大量实证研究的基础上,从中国制度演变的角度对医闹进行了深入研究,认为患者对正式制度的信任缺失是医闹的重要根源,法律是在抗议与暴力的影响下发挥作用。法院审理医疗纠纷的过程中,判决许多没有过错的案件让医院承担责任折射出强烈的公正问题。中国政府在“医闹”中的过度回应及回应不足反映了改革后我国政府的作用及法律作用的不确定性。这些研究成果对我国当前医闹的治理及未来的制度改革都具有非常重要的参考价值。但笔者也认为,医疗纠纷审理中出现的一些不公正结果,不仅仅是中国问题,也是美国问题,过分强调中国体制或改革的原因无助于对中美两国共同问题的合理解释,究其原因,这在一定程度上与医疗证据认定的专业性及医疗专家对医疗过错认定的不确定性密切相关。     

新制度经济学视角下政府成本控制

政府成本是行政学研究领域中具有重要实践意义的课题,目前大部分关于政府成本的研究多从公共行政学、公共财政学甚至行政法学角度展开的。从我国目前政府成本过高的现状出发,以新制度经济学的视角,对政府成本重新界定,从制度内部来探讨政府成本的控制方法,对降低我国政府成本具有重大的现实意义。     

One size does not fit all: an analysis of the corruption preventative approach of the Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) in Bangladesh

ABSTRACT

This paper argues that the global citizens’ engagement movement against corruption does not always succeed in developing countries, such as Bangladesh. Drawing on the case of the preventative strategies of the Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) in Bangladesh, this paper shows that government-driven citizens’ engagement processes through community-based organisations (CBOs) are a ceremonial adaptation in response to isomorphic pressure from the donors. The outcomes from isomorphic pressure suggest that such donor-funded actions produce ‘isomorphic mimicry’ of successful corruption prevention programmes from other countries that do not succeed in the recipient country. A micro-level analysis based on interviews with stakeholders in Bangladesh demonstrates why isomorphic mimicry has failed to produce a robust anti-corruption prevention approach in Bangladesh.     

Correspondence

The viability and desirability of a finance-led growth regime is first assessed against the historical evidence about the many alternative regimes that have been proposed as successors to Fordism. A purely hypothetical model is then built by assembling various hypotheses derived from the observation of current American trends. The imposition of financial norms, such as shareholder value, requires a new and coherent architecture for the mode of governance of firms, the form of competition, the wage labour nexus and the objectives of monetary policy, public budget and tax system. According to the model, any requirement for increased profit has a variable macro-economic impact on wages and economic activity according to the size of accelerator effects and the relative importance of wage and profit in income formation. The stability of an equity-based regime depends on monetary policy which controls financial bubbles and thus the diffusion of finance may push the economy into a zone of structural instability. The next major financial crisis may originate in the USA whose economy approximates most closely to the model. But, the so-called American 'new economy' combines diverse but interdependent structural transformations: diffusion of Information and Communication Technologies, search for new rules for competition, increased flexibility in wages and employment, shift from manufacturing to services. Finance is an element in, but not the whole of, this complex emerging regime.