Description
Book SynopsisThis book presents a concept of interactive economic institutions and systems, considered by the author to be a bottleneck to scientific progress.
In the author's evaluation of contemporary institutional economics, the focus is on the interaction of complex economic structures in terms of their coordination routines, emergent behavioural characteristics and also their economic performance. Differences of behaviour characteristics and economic performances are explained as consequences of differently structured coordination routines. The book demonstrates that complexity, rather than being part of the problem of institutional analysis, can be made part of the solution.
Economic Institutions and Complexity will appeal to academics and researchers of New Institutional Economics, microeconomics, evolutionary economics, political science, organization sociology and behavioural science.
Trade Review'. . . the framework Schenk presents in Economic Institutions and Complexity
constitutes a significant methodological contribution in providing the institutional approach with desirable first analytical steps to characterize economic systems as complex. The analysis is highly valuable and contributes greatly to achieving a better understanding of institutions and their role in economic systems. The book offers an excellent starting point for institutional economists interested in taking a complexity perspective in their analyses. It is also of interest for economists dissatisfied with current explanations of institutional behavior provided by mainstream approaches.' -- Mercedes Bleda, Journal of Evolutionary Economics
'Over the last decades, Karl-Ernst Schenk has elaborated and constantly enriched his unique approach to institutional economics. In this profound, insightful book he presents the contours of a theory of institutions, of their internal and external mechanisms of co-ordination, and of their economic performance. Schenk's original and fruitful approach is designed to accommodate a degree of economic complexity in the economic interactions and their evolution over time which has rarely been considered elsewhere in New Institutional Economics. The insights he offers show the author's long-standing engagement in, and thorough understanding of, comparative economic systems research.' -- Ulrich Witt, Max Planck Institute for Research into Economic Systems, Jena, Germany
'Well-structured and thought provoking, this book represents a major contribution to the reconstruction of institutional economics on the basis of an integration of "old" neoclassical transaction with "new" evolutionary approaches highlighting structural interactions, complexity and creative openness. This outstanding work will inspire institutional economists who wish to develop their field along an integrated, interdisciplinary and comparative policy approach.' -- Kurt Dopfer, University of St Gallen, Switzerland
Table of ContentsContents: Preface Introduction Part I: Paradigms and Reasoning 1. Paradigms: Property Rights and Transaction Cost Analysis 2. How to Represent Economic Institutions and Systems Part II: Towards Complex Morphology 3. Systems, Components and Links 4. Coordination Routines: Economic Policy Regimes 5. Coordination Routines: Governance 6. Behaviour and Multi-level Morphology Part III: Analysis of Complex Morphology 7. System Patterns: Dominant Governmental Direction 8. System Patterns: Dominant Regulatory Regimes 9. System Patterns: Dominant Commercial Regimes 10. Conclusion: Complexity, Emergence and Specification Bibliography Index
