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on Business, Economic and Financial History |
| By: | Martin H. Saavedra; Tate Twinam |
| Abstract: | During World War II, the U.S. government incarcerated all West Coast Japanese Americans in internment camps. We ask how this forced displacement affected Japanese American enclaves. Using the recently digitized 1940 and 1950 full-count censuses, we measure changes in the racial composition of neighborhoods across 14 major cities. We find that internment reduced the Japanese American population of enumeration districts within the exclusion zone by 25–50% relative to their 1940 levels, and that these individuals were replaced by African American in-movers in a nearly 1-to-1 fashion. Outside the exclusion zone, new Japanese American enclaves formed, but did not approach the scale of their historic West Coast counterparts. |
| JEL: | J15 N92 R23 |
| Date: | 2025–11 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:34510 |
| By: | Álvarez Nogal, Carlos; Prados de la Escosura, Leandro |
| Abstract: | Contemporary perspectives highlight significant inequality in early modern Spain.Quantitative measures of inequality are often either broad and rough or based on local orscattered estimates, which do not offer a precise overall picture over time. The sale of theBull of the Crusade provides an opportunity to examine inequality trends consistently inearly modern Spain. The Bull of the Crusade was a form of almsgiving granted by the Popeand collected by the Hispanic Monarchy, widely purchased by a population convinced of itsspiritual benefits. There were two types of bulls: the standard 2 Reales bull for ordinarypeople and the 8 Reales bull for the wealthy and individuals of high social standing. Weargue that the ratio of the 8 Reales to the 2 Reales bulls sold reflects concentration at theupper end of the distribution. Three main phases emerge: fluctuations around a flat trendfrom 1570-1630, a sustained decline in the following century, and a notable upward trendthereafter, reaching its peak in the late eighteenth century. A closer study reveals distinctpatterns within the Crown of Castile and the Crown of Aragon that converged in the lateeighteenth century. |
| Keywords: | Top income concentration; Inequality; Early modern Spain |
| JEL: | N33 O15 Z12 |
| Date: | 2025–11–25 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cte:whrepe:48551 |
| By: | Álvarez Nogal, Carlos; Prados de la Escosura, Leandro |
| Abstract: | In early modern Spain, state capacity has been regarded as weak in the historical literature.In this paper, we assess the Spanish Monarchy's ability to implement its policies through anoutput measure rather than an input-specifically, the distribution of the Bull of theCrusade. Furthermore, we explore how shifts in state capacity influenced subjective wellbeing.In a religious society like early modern Spain, spiritual satisfaction functions as ameasure of subjective well-being. It was achieved by reducing the perceived time spent inPurgatory after death to atone for sins committed during life, which could be done bypurchasing indulgences. Consuming the Bull of the Crusade, an affordable form ofalmsgiving, granted a plenary indulgence and, therefore, eliminated the need for penance inthe afterlife for all sins committed prior to its purchase. Obtaining the bull reduced deathanxiety and increased life satisfaction. Our measure of subjective well-being-thelogarithmic ratio of bulls sold to the population, both normalised-indicates whetherspiritual satisfaction was attained. Subjective well-being declined in the late 1570s and1580s during years of severe financial crisis, in the 1640s during the Catalan Revolt, andcollapsed during Spain's War of Succession (1701-14) and its aftermath. Reductions in statecapacity coincided with decreases in spiritual satisfaction, while demand for bulls remainedrelatively stable over time. Declines in state capacity appear to be the primary factor behindthese decreases in spiritual satisfaction and, consequently, lower subjective well-being. |
| Keywords: | State capacity; Subjective well-being; Spiritual satisfaction; Early modern Spain; Bulls |
| JEL: | E70 H27 I31 N33 Z12 |
| Date: | 2025–11–24 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cte:whrepe:48535 |
| By: | Barry, Annabel; Goddard, Caroline; Park, Anna |
| Keywords: | Social and Behavioral Sciences |
| Date: | 2025–09–10 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cdl:cshedu:qt5mb65447 |
| By: | Luke N. Condra; Daniel B. Jones; Randall P. Walsh |
| Abstract: | How does the trauma associated with exposure to racial violence affect economic outcomes? We study this question in the context of lynchings of Black citizens in the American South between 1880 and 1940 and provide systematic evidence of long-run economic impacts of that violence for the broader community and the effects’ persistence across generations. First, using data on averted lynchings and matched placebos as counterfactuals, we show that children indirectly exposed to the racial trauma of lynchings (proxied by close proximity to the victim’s household location) exhibit a reduction in occupational income score and likelihood of holding a white collar occupation, in their prime earning years as adults. We also observe intergenerational effects: children of the individuals who were exposed (as children) to lynchings see, as adults observed in 1940, a reduction in their income relative to counterfactual individuals. By documenting long-run and intergenerational economic effects of exposure to lynchings, we add empirical evidence to an interdisciplinary literature that identifies racial trauma as a distinctive and durable form of psychological harm. |
| JEL: | N0 |
| Date: | 2025–11 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:34523 |
| By: | Julia Baarck (ifo Institute); Moritz Bode (University of Copenhagen and CEBI); Andreas Peichl (ifo Institute) |
| Abstract: | This paper is the first to show that intergenerational income mobility in Germany has decreased over time. We estimate intergenerational persistence for the birth cohorts 1968-1987 and find that it rises sharply for cohorts born in the late 1970s and early 1980s, after which it stabilizes at a higher level. As a step towards understanding the mechanisms behind this increase, we show that parental income has become more important for educational outcomes of children. Moreover, we show that the increase in intergenerational persistence coincided with a surge in cross-sectional income inequality, providing novel evidence for an "Intertemporal Great Gatsby Curve''. |
| Keywords: | intergenerational mobility; social mobility; income; education; inequality; |
| JEL: | J62 I24 D63 |
| Date: | 2025–10–31 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:rco:dpaper:550 |
| By: | Y. Y. Ding; S. Mckinstry; P. Su (Audencia Business School) |
| Abstract: | This paper examines the accounting system of the Chinese Imperial Maritime Customs Service, a Chinese government department led from 1861 to 1907 by Robert Hart, an Irishman, who reported directly to the Chinese Government in his capacity as Inspector General. Utilising reports produced by the system and instructions given to staff for its operation, the paper outlines the system's main features. It shows how Hart transformed it from being an inward-looking accounting system involved in the collection of duties and the payment of operational expenses reporting to the Government only, to one that created a mass of publicly available data on Chinese international trade that was provided across the world as well as to the Chinese Qing Government. The paper evaluates the system and sets it in the context of recent accounting history by commenting on its Western and Chinese features. |
| Keywords: | customs, reporting, accountability, Chinese accounting, Western accounting |
| Date: | 2025–11 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:journl:hal-05369325 |
| By: | Cesere, Cathy |
| Keywords: | Engineering |
| Date: | 2024–09–26 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cdl:cshedu:qt6vg9n81h |
| By: | Sidharth Gat |
| Abstract: | Many economic theories have been introduced over the course of history to articulate our understanding of the economy. Classical theories by Adam Smith and David Ricardo's Comparative Advantage have been foundational for the last century's work. Improvements have been achieved over time, incorporating insights from many disparate fields of study: contemporary frameworks like Behavioural Economics and Information Economics, which incorporate psychological insights and deviation from rational decision-making and insights from network theory and how the information flow affects the market behaviour, respectively. In this paper, I motivate the necessity of incorporating insights from Physics, and also show that trade as a phenomenon described by the comparative advantage theory cannot exist without the law of conservation of Energy, and incorporating this law leads to axiomatic completeness of the theory. Further, I also argue that while the economy is not a zero-sum game in terms of wealth, it does require at least one associated zero-sum parameter for trade and economy as phenomena to exist. |
| Date: | 2025–11 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arx:papers:2511.14034 |
| By: | Gemma Dipoppa; Annalisa Pezone |
| Abstract: | All states adopt systems to surveil political activists. How do they decide whom to watch and why? We study the logic of state surveillance using the first complete individual-level database of those monitored by a state — 152, 000 Italians born between 1816 and 1932, encompassing both democratic and authoritarian regimes. We focus on education: exploiting a discontinuous expansion in primary schooling in municipalities above a population and age threshold, we show that cohorts exposed to more years of school experienced an uptick in surveillance. The effect is largest for working classes, who were monitored for longer periods, subjected to harsher measures, and disproportionately targeted when affiliated with communist ideologies. Yet treated cohorts did not become more politically active, indicating that surveillance expanded not in reaction to increased mobilization, but as a preventive strategy rooted in fears of working-class empowerment. These findings reveal how states view educated yet excluded groups as politically threatening and prioritize their surveillance, potentially generating inequalities in groups' ability to influence political change. |
| JEL: | N43 N44 O33 O38 P00 |
| Date: | 2025–11 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:34492 |
| By: | Alex Boutry (REIGENN - Représentations et identités. Espaces germanique, nordique et néerlandophone - SU - Sorbonne Université) |
| Abstract: | The evolution of the Danish tax system between the twelfth and fourteenth centuries illustrates a conflict between the desire to adapt to Western standards and the resistance of local populations attached to ancestral customs. The Danish kingdom, initially structured around an embryonic Nordic economy and tax system, gradually saw the emergence of a more complex tax system, influenced by the Roman Church and the southern kingdoms. This transformation led to a gradual loss of the unchanging freedoms of the bønder, who became subject to the fiscal will of an increasingly powerful king. Although refusals to adapt and attempts at revolt made themselves felt between the eleventh and twelfth centuries, the opposition faced by the royal power gradually diminished, allowing the legitimization of a fiscal policy that marked Denmark's integration into the feudal model of the Christian West. |
| Abstract: | L'évolution du système fiscal danois entre le XII e et le XIV e siècle illustre un conflit entre la volonté d'adaptation aux normes occidentales et la résistance des populations locales attachées aux coutumes ancestrales. Le royaume danois, initialement structuré autour d'une économie et d'une fiscalité embryonnaires nordiques, voit émerger progressivement un système fiscal plus complexe, influencé par l'Église romaine et les royaumes méridionaux. Cette transformation entraîne une perte progressive des libertés immuables des bønder, qui deviennent assujettis aux volontés fiscales d'un roi toujours plus puissant. Si les refus d'adaptation et les tentatives de révoltes se font sentir entre le XI e et le XII e siècle, l'opposition à laquelle le pouvoir royal fait face diminue progressivement, permettant la légitimation d'une politique fiscale marquant l'intégration du Danemark au modèle féodal de l'Occident chrétien. |
| Keywords: | tax revolts, tax policies, tax systems, taxation, révoltes fiscales economy, politiques fiscales, systèmes fiscaux, fiscalité, économie |
| Date: | 2025–11–18 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:journl:hal-05371394 |
| By: | Danyang Xie (Society Hub, HKUST (Guangzhou)); Heng-Fu Zou (The World Bank, Washington, D. C. 20433, USA; Institute for Advanced Study, Wuhan University, Wuhan, 430072, China; China Economics and Management Academy, Central University of Finance and Economics, Beijing, 100081, China) |
| Abstract: | This paper embeds the republican spirit of innovism-dignity for ordinary people, liberty of entry and speech, and fair reward-into a modern ideas-based growth model to explain the Great Enrichment. Innovism is treated as a produced, nonrival social technology that multiplies production and raises the effectiveness of research, reconciling economic history with a semi-endogenous Jones framework. Small, persistent gains in civic permission and legal predictability sustain the frontier’s one-to-two percent per-capita growth as demographics slow, while backsliding lowers the slope. The model yields transparent balanced-growth conditions, ties adjudication and entry reforms to capital deepening, and shows how open science enhances research productivity. |
| Date: | 2025–11–24 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cuf:wpaper:803 |
| By: | Sutherland, Ewan |
| Abstract: | The 1979 Conservative Party manifesto omitted denationalisation. By 1983 the manifesto had the privatisation of BT as a central plank, but not sector regulation or corporate lobbying and litigation. Cable & Wireless, had already been sold, reversing the nationalisation of 1946 and echoing the privatisations of 1928 and 1938. It was dwarfed by the three tranches of BT shares, which helped popularise shareholding in the short term for the better off . Margaret Thatcher claimed privatisation was the "British cure". Yet where monopoly persisted or was turning slowly to oligopoly, it required a complex regulatory state to substitute for competition. Managing competition and the creative destruction of technological change had driven Derby and Disraeli to incorporate telegraphy into the state, and Baldwin to privatise parts of the Post Office. However, it was Thatcher who opened the way to the complexity of the regulatory state, with ever more QUANGOs. Since 2016, the UK has had four Conservative prime ministers, who inter alia have promised fibre and 5G to every home, but who faced a complex system of regulatory governance offering few easy interventions. They encouraged private equity investments in fibre, negotiated extended geographic coverage with mobile operators, and forced property owners to rent space for network equipment. Spurred on by the US, they banned Chinese equipment for national security reasons. The National Farmers' Union (NFU) had questioned Thatcher about the willingness of a commercial BT to provide service in rural areas, an issue that persists today, only partly resolved by state aid. Privatisation diffused into developed and developing economies. Yet it was never adopted alone, but only as part of a package with financialisation, liberalisation and regulation, while companies responded by developing skills in lobbying and litigation. The number of QUANGOs grows, despite occasional threats of bonfires. |
| Keywords: | Financialisation, Privatisation, Regulatory Governance, Telecommunications |
| Date: | 2025 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:itse25:331308 |
| By: | Ryo Hongo (School of Economics, Kwansei Gakuin University) |
| Abstract: | This is the Japanese translation of E.H. Chamberlin's article 'An Experimental Imperfect Market' (1948). The article analyzed the results of those experiments which he had conducted in his course at Harvard University and showed that the prices and trading volumes in the experiments deviated from the equilibrium predicted by the standard supply and demand theory. For this contribution, he is often cited as one of the most important precursors in experimental economics (Smith 1962). |
| Keywords: | experimental economics, imperfect competition, Monopolistic Competition, Vernon Smith. |
| JEL: | B13 |
| Date: | 2025–12 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:kgu:wpaper:301 |
| By: | Sindoni, Raffaele; Blake, Dawn; McCovey, Louisa; Carroo, Isaac; Gormley, Jasmine; Barker, Jake |
| Abstract: | In this research, we present the Indigenous Circular Economy (IndCE); not as a novel framework, but as an enduring system of stewardship, resilience, and relationality practiced by Indigenous communities for generations. As Indigenous (Yurok/Hoopa) and non-Indigenous co-authors, we draw on historical analysis, forest science, Yurok oral tradition, and Traditional Ecological Knowledge (TEK) to demonstrate how IndCE repairs the ecological and cultural harm of capitalist economies by weaving together forest health with human health. Through a case study of the Yurok Tribe in Northern California, we highlight how IndCE is not just a cultural or local economic alternative. It is a paradigm shift away from economic perspectives that ignore culture, history, land, and non-human & human relationships. The Yurok stewardship practices that support its IndCE (e.g. Good Fire) provide a slew of benefits: wildfire risk mitigation, ecosystem restoration, economic revitalization, and cultural resilience. The Yurok case reveals the urgency of legitimizing and resourcing Indigenous-led ecological governance. We identify persistent policy and funding barriers that undermine this work and offer concrete paths forward to support it. This paper contributes to broader debates on sustainable economics, Indigenous rights, and community-led conservation. It also raises critical questions for non-Indigenous communities about how some state systems may sometimes obstruct, rather than support, regenerative land stewardship, cultural continuity, and ecological care. The Yurok model shows that another type of economy is not only possible; it already exists. |
| Date: | 2025–11–25 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:osf:socarx:jznrf_v1 |
| By: | Leonardo N. Ferreira; Haroon Mumtaz; Gabor Pinter |
| Abstract: | We study macroeconomic fluctuations in the United Kingdom over seven centuries (1271--2022) using a time-varying VAR with stochastic volatility. We identify business cycle shocks as innovations explaining the largest share of future output variance. Before 1900, these shocks display a stagflationary, supply-driven pattern, while post-1900 shocks become demand-driven, raising both output and inflation. Output volatility declines over time, peaking in the seventeenth century. Monetisation had large real effects in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, shifting to more inflationary impacts thereafter. Our results highlight how business cycle dynamics evolve with institutional, monetary, and structural transformations. |
| Date: | 2025–11 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arx:papers:2511.15643 |
| By: | Juan Carlos De Pablo |
| Abstract: | Las contribuciones de Hicks van más allá de la “IS-LM” y “Valor y capital”. Quien en 1972 recibió el premio Nobel economía fue mucho más que eso. Sin encarar una evaluación integral de su obra, el objetivo de estas líneas es mucho más modesto: descubrir “otro” Hicks, el agudo observador, tanto de la realidad como de la teoría. |
| Date: | 2024–06 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cem:doctra:875 |
| By: | Pies, Ingo |
| Abstract: | Dieser Aufsatz rekonstruiert aus ordonomischer Perspektive die Ratlosigkeit, mit der George Stigler 1979 der säkularen Ausdehnung staatlicher Aktivitäten im 20. Jahrhundert gegenüberstand. Stigler interpretierte das Staatswachstum handlungstheoretisch (als Akteursproblem) als Ergebnis von Rent-Seeking und führte es damit kausal auf die Präferenzen von Bürgern und Interessengruppen zurück. Normativ geriet er so in eine Sackgasse, da innerhalb demokratischer Verfahren kaum noch Reformoptionen denkbar schienen, nachdem Präferenzen als Ursache der staatlichen Entwicklung ausgemacht waren. Diese Blockade ist methodischer Natur. Sie lässt sich auflösen, indem man die Staatsausdehnung situationstheoretisch (als Ordnungsproblem) erklärt - als Folge institutioneller Fehlanreize und öffentlicher Denkfehler. Zwei umfangreiche Anhänge erläutern den methodischen Zugang des ordonomischen Forschungsprogramms zu einer kritischen Auseinandersetzung mit sozialistischen Ideen. |
| Abstract: | This article, from an ordonomic perspective, reconstructs the sense of helplessness George Stigler articulated in 1979 as he grappled with the secular expansion of state activity throughout the twentieth century. Stigler interpreted this growth in action-theoretical terms, attributing it to rent-seeking behavior, thus ultimately tracing its causes to the preferences of citizens and interest groups. Normatively, however, this led him into a conceptual impasse: within democratic procedures, reform appeared nearly impossible once preferences were assumed to be the driving force behind state development. This deadlock is methodological in nature. It can be overcome by reframing the expansion of the state in situation-theoretical terms-as a consequence of institutional incentive failures and widespread cognitive biases. Two comprehensive appendices elaborate on the ordonomic research program's methodological approach to critically engaging with socialist ideas. |
| Keywords: | Staatsausdehnung, Markt, Rent-Seeking, Sozialismus, Liberalismus, Moralparadoxon der Moderne, state expansion, market, rent-seeking, socialism, liberalism, moral paradox of modernity |
| Date: | 2025 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:mlucee:333388 |
| By: | Hie Joo Ahn; Thomas R. Cook; Taeyoung Doh; Elias Kastritis; Jesse Wedewer |
| Abstract: | This paper uses text data from Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) meeting transcripts to estimate the reference levels of full employment, inflation, and financial conditions perceived by voting members and to uncover time variation in the Taylor rule parameters. We construct topic dictionaries on economic slack, inflation, and financial markets, and infer reference levels from members’ sentiment using a state-space model. The estimated employment reference level indicates that FOMC voting members generally perceived the labor market as tighter than implied by the Congressional Budget Office’s estimates between the mid-1980s and early 2000s, whereas the two measures align closely during the Great Recession and its subsequent recovery. The members’ perceived inflation target varies widely in the 1970s and 1980s, trends downward in the 1990s, and stabilizes slightly below two percent thereafter. The estimated Taylor rule exhibits shifting policy weights over time—stronger emphasis on inflation stabilization before the mid-1990s, greater responsiveness to employment deviations thereafter, and renewed emphasis on the inflation trend following the Great Recession—while interest-rate smoothing remains substantial throughout. |
| Keywords: | Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC); Taylor rule; Federal Reserve monetary policy; sentiment |
| JEL: | C32 E43 E52 E58 |
| Date: | 2025–11–25 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:fip:fedkrw:102162 |
| By: | Kremer, Anna |
| Abstract: | Meeting others with different backgrounds brings up new ideas. This paper shows that this not only matters for a background in heterogeneous industries or nationalities, but that regional differences matter too. Regions within a country vary in their traditions and culture. Cultural homogeneity within regions becomes mixed due to internal migration, which, like international migration, increases the diversity of a place. In a novel approach, I look at diversity in German municipalities, measured by different family names, and investigate its effect on the number of generated patents. I use a unique dataset from a 1996 phonebook and casualty lists from WWI. There is a positive association between innovation and diversity when defined by the share of new names, a deconcentration measure, or a Shannon index. Causality is established by using instrumental variables estimations with historical borders. I show that intra-country diversity affects patenting positively and conclude that regional differences matter for economic outcomes. |
| Keywords: | cultural diversity, innovation, family names, patents, local level, Germany |
| JEL: | R11 O30 Z13 |
| Date: | 2025 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:tudcep:333401 |
| By: | Harding, David |
| Keywords: | Social and Behavioral Sciences, 150w, UCB, Women Faculty in Sociology |
| Date: | 2025–10–27 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cdl:cshedu:qt981562ss |
| By: | Juan Carlos De Pablo |
| Abstract: | El objetivo principal de esta monografía es reflexionar sobre la obra de un par de colegas nacidos hace cien años. Por un lado, Robert Merton Solow, que nació el 23 de agosto de 1924 y falleció el 21 de diciembre de 2023, después de que yo empezara a escribir esta nota. Por el otro, Arnold Carl Harberger, que vino al mundo el 27 de julio de dicho año y sigue presente entre nosotros. El trabajo incluye al final las biografías de ambos economistas. |
| Date: | 2024–04 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cem:doctra:865 |
| By: | Mostafa Elkhanchoufi (ENCG - Ecole Nationale de Commerce et de Gestion - UH2C - Université Hassan II de Casablanca = University of Hassan II Casablanca = جامعة الحسن الثاني (ar)); Malak Kasmi; Anouar Ammi |
| Keywords: | territoires, cultures, développement, Géopolitique, Géoéconomie, histoire, Afrique |
| Date: | 2025 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:journl:hal-05310358 |
| By: | Boyer, Marcel; Panot, Molivann |
| Abstract: | This article examines the evolution of inequality since 1920, highlighting the need to rebalance research and public debate toward the forms of inequality that matter most for social welfare. While income and wealth disparities have received overwhelming attention in academia and public policy circles, consumption inequality, a more relevant indicator, has declined over the last two and a half decades. The main characteristics of developments in income and wealth inequality over time (since 1920) are presented: the share of the top 1% of earners followed a downward trend until the 1970-79 decade, and an upward trend thereafter, returning to levels comparable to those of the 1920s. The share of the top 10% of earners followed a similar movement. Despite the prominence of distributional issues in contemporary debates, comprehensive measures of consumption inequality remain underdeveloped. Yet the need for such metrics is urgent. Progress over the past 25 years—led in part by initiatives at Statistics Canada—offers a promising foundation for more accurate and policy-relevant assessments of economic well-being. One important factor has been the development of social transfers in kind ( STiK), which add significant resources and benefits to households in the lowest income quintile to a greater extent than to those in the highest quintile. |
| Date: | 2025–11 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:tse:wpaper:127082 |
| By: | Charles Barthold (OU - The Open University [Milton Keynes]); Layla Branicki (University of Bath [Bath]); Guillaume Delalieux (ULR - La Rochelle Université, EOLE - Environnement Organisation LEgislation (ex LITHORAL, Laboratoire Interdisciplinaire Territoire Histoire Organisation RégulAtion Loi) - ULR - La Rochelle Université) |
| Abstract: | This article contributes to critical theory building in relation to political corporate social responsibility (PCSR) by conceptualizing the underlying processes and practices through which corporations seek to counter threats posed by activist groups. We argue that the problematic nature of PCSR is entangled not only in its state-like aims, but also in its covert deployment of military tactics towards the maintenance of corporate hegemony. We illuminate how corporations use counterinsurgency tactics to undermine the ability of activists to hold them accountable for their wrongdoing. Building on the work of Gramsci, we propose that counterinsurgency tactics combine elements of force and persuasion that enable corporations to maintain hegemony (i.e., secure consent over time). We ask: How are counterinsurgency tactics used by corporations to neutralize activist pressures and maintain corporate hegemony? We draw upon historical sources regarding the Nestlé infant milk boycott case to undertake a genealogical analysis that exposes counterinsurgency tactics enabling corporations to counter activists and sustain their hegemony. We find that Nestlé deployed four key counterinsurgency tactics to nullify activist pressures (suppressing external support, isolating the activist(s), capturing the dialogue, and covert intelligence gathering). From our analysis, we propose the term corporate counterinsurgency and theorize the historic use of corporate counterinsurgency tactics as an example of a hegemonic strategy that enables corporations to covertly undermine activist pressures. We conclude by calling for further reflexivity in organizational studies research on the military origins of PCSR, and by outlining how activist organizations might mobilize against corporate counterinsurgency tactics. |
| Keywords: | power, political corporate social responsibility, Gramsci, genealogy, counterinsurgency, activism, activism counterinsurgency genealogy Gramsci political corporate social responsibility power |
| Date: | 2024–07–26 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:journl:hal-05369051 |
| By: | Paula Eugenia Gobbi; Anne Hannusch; Pauline Rossi |
| Abstract: | Much of the observed cross-country variation in fertility aligns with the predictions of classic theories of the fertility transition: countries with higher levels of human capital, higher GDP per capita, or lower mortality rates tend to exhibit lower fertility. However, when examining changes within countries over the past 60 years, larger fertility declines are only weakly associated with greater improvements in human capital, per capita GDP, or survival rates. To understand why, we focus on the role of family institutions, particularly marriage and inheritance customs. We argue that, together with the diffusion of cultural norms, they help explain variations in the timing, speed and magnitude of the fertility decline. We propose a stylized model integrating economic, health, institutional and cultural factors to study how these factors interact to shape fertility transition paths. We find that family institutions can mediate the effect of economic development by constraining fertility responses. |
| Keywords: | Fertility transition, culture, Family institutions |
| JEL: | J13 |
| Date: | 2025–11–28 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:eca:wpaper:2013/397122 |
| By: | Francisco María Pertierra Cánepa; Nicolás Charo Naimo |
| Abstract: | El trabajo analiza críticamente la historia económica de la Argentina desde la redacción de la Constitución de 1853 hasta nuestros días, con especial interés en el estudio de las causas que provocaron una constante involución moral y social, para finalmente, traducirse en crisis económicas recurrentes e hiperinflaciones, que destruyeron y sumieron en una alarmante pobreza a uno de los países con mayores riquezas naturales y prestigioso capital humano. A partir de ello, se realiza un estudio detallado de potenciales soluciones para favorecer el cambio radical del modelo económico, basados en el regreso al espíritu y los principios de los hombres que construyeron una nación que llegó a ser uno de los faros del mundo en solo 50 años, entre 1870 y 1920. Consecuentemente, se propone al fideicomiso como la herramienta adecuada para fortalecer y acelerar el proceso de cambio de la matriz económica y social argentina, asegurando los fines del Estado al promover las inversiones productivas de carácter federal, estimulando una mayor participación del sector privado, y con ello, el crecimiento sostenido y a largo plazo. Esta investigación realiza un aporte de valor concreto y de aplicación práctica con una visión integral, focalizando en el objetivo primordial de este tipo de fideicomisos que es la satisfacción del interés público y las potenciales sinergias que podrían lograrse al complementar las políticas públicas con la iniciativa empresarial del sector privado en Argentina. Finalmente, se realizan propuestas clave que pueden crear mejoras en los procesos de cambio, transformación y gestión del Estado, aplicando medidas estratégicas con las ventajas que ofrece la figura del fideicomiso, las cuales permiten explotar el potencial dinamizador de la economía real a través de la promoción de empleo genuino, el crecimiento y los proyectos sostenibles. |
| Keywords: | Argentina, Crisis Económica, Decadencia y Cambio, Costos de Agencia y Costos Ocultos, Fidecomisos del Estado, Fondos Fiduciarios, Interés común, Crecimiento y Desarrollo Sostenible, Economías Regionales, Bienes Improductivos, Business Plans, Proyectos mixtos. |
| Date: | 2024–03 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cem:doctra:863 |