This book represents the manifestation of a long-term effort to explore the multifaceted impact of neo-liberal globalisation on institutional reform in the developing world, with special reference to the transformation trajectory of State Planning Organisation in Turkey. Analytically, it strives to locate the in-depth analysis of Turkish development planning and the changing fortunes of the State Planning Organisation within the broader context of the 'states versus markets' debate in the political economy literature in order to assess the technical viability and institutional manifestations of development planning under the profound and ever increasing pressures of globalisation. To this end, a comparative institutional theoretical framework is adopted which engages critically with the neo-classical/neo-liberal approach to macroeconomic policy making, and gauges the potential influence of domestic institutional structures in generating effective responses to changes in global economy.

The last quarter century has been marked by the ascension of neoliberalism--market deregulation, state decentralization, and reduced political intervention in national economies. Not coincidentally, this period of dramatic institutional change has also seen the emergence of several schools of institutional analysis. Though these schools cut across disciplines, they have remained isolated from and critical of each other. This volume brings together four--rational choice, organizational, historical, and discursive institutionalism--to examine the rise of neoliberalism. In doing so, it makes tremendous methodological strides while substantively enlarging our knowledge about neoliberalism. The book comprises original empirical studies by top scholars from each school of analysis. They examine neoliberalism's rise on three continents and explore changes in macroeconomic policy, labor markets, taxation, banking, and health care. Neoliberalism appears as much more complex, diverse, and contested than is often appreciated. The authors find that there is no convergence toward a common set of neoliberal institutions; that neoliberalism does not incapacitate states; and that neoliberal reform does not necessarily yield greater efficiency than other institutional arrangements. Beyond these important empirical contributions, this book is a methodological milestone in that it compares different schools of institutionalist analysis by seeing how they tackle a common problem. It reveals a second movement within institutionalism--one toward rapprochement and cross-fertilization among paradigms--and explains how this might be furthered with benefits throughout the social sciences. In addition to the editors, the contributors are Sarah L. Babb, Ellen M. Bradburn, Bruce G. Carruthers, Terence C. Halliday, Colin Hay, Edgar Kiser, Peter Kjaer, Jack Knight, Aaron Matthew Laing, David Strang, and Bruce Western.

In the aftermath of the Asian financial crisis of the late 1990s, international financial institutions suggested various neoliberal quick-fix solutions for reforming economic management within East Asian countries. This book brings together scholars of political economy, law and sociology to interrogate the seemingly unproblematic notions - the rules of law, good corporate governance, and flexible labour market - that inform neoliberal policy prescriptions. It also discusses how these concepts have been translated and practiced in East Asia, exploring the philosophical and empirical bases of the suggested solutions and examining the extent to which they have been followed.

This book is about institutional change, how to recognize it, when it occurs, and the mechanisms that cause it to happen. It is the first book to identify problems with the "new institutional analysis," which has emerged as one of the dominant approaches to the study of organizations, economic and political sociology, comparative political economy, politics, and international relations. The book confronts several important problems in institutional analysis, and offers conceptual, methodological, and theoretical tools for resolving them. It argues that the paradigms of institutional analysis--rational choice, organizational, and historical institutionalism--share a set of common analytic problems. Chief among them: failure to define clearly what institutional change is; failure to specify the mechanisms responsible for institutional change; and failure to explain adequately how "ideas" other than self-interests affect institutional change. To demonstrate the utility of his tools for resolving the problems of institutional analysis, Campbell applies them to the phenomenon of globalization. In doing so, he not only corrects serious misunderstandings about globalization, but also develops a new theory of institutional change. This book advances the new institutional analysis by showing how the different paradigms can benefit from constructive dialogue and cross-fertilization.

This book seeks to clarify the positive and negative lessons in the experiences of late development under neoliberal globalization. Dic Lo explores competing theories, with a view to constructing an alternative synthesis that transcends neoliberalism, placing greater emphasis on solidarity and humanistic development.

Critics of globalization often portray neoliberalism as an extremist laissez-faire political-economic philosophy that rejects government any sort of government intervention in the domestic economy. Like most over-used terms, it is more complicated than this introductory sentence suggests. This volume seeks to move beyond these caricature depictions and definitions as well as the emotional rhetoric that has unfortunately dominated both the scholastic and political debate on neoliberalism and global market-oriented reform. This book emphasizes that there are in fact a variety of neoliberalisms that share a common emphasis on the role of the market. Beyond this however, its usages and applications appear much more varied according to the cultural, economic, political, and social context in which it is used. A host of eminent contributors, including Douglass C. North, Arthur T. Denzau, Thomas D. Willett, Mark Blyth, Colin Hay, Craig Parsons, and others provide a rigorous assessment of the significance of neoliberal ideas on economic policy. Through their detailed international case studies the contributors to this book show how varied its impact has in fact been and the result is a book that will stimulate further debate in this most controversial of subject matters. Ravi K. Roy is a Research Scholar at the Claremont Institute for Economic Policy Studies. Arthur T. Denzau is Professor of Economics at Claremont Graduate University. He is also a Research Associate at the Center for American Business at Washington University (St. Louis).Thomas D. Willett is Horton Professor of Economics at Claremont Graduate University. He is also Director of the Claremont Institute for Economic Policy Studies

Globalization and the Politics of Institutional Reform in Japan illuminates Japan’s contemporary and historical struggle to adjust policy and the institutional architecture of government to an evolving global order. This focused and scholarly study identifies that key to this difficulty is a structural tendency towards central political command, which reduces the country’s capacity to follow a more subtle allocation of authority that ensures political leadership remains robust and non-dictatorial. Thus, Motoshi Suzuki argues that it is essential for a globalizing state to incorporate opposition parties and transgovernmental networks into policy-making processes. Providing an in-depth analysis of the theories of institutional change, this book introduces readers to a wealth of perspectives and counterarguments concerning analysis of political decision-making and policy adjustment on both the national and international scale. Placing Japanese policy reform in the global context and relating policy reform to leadership’s political strategies, the author gives a detailed chronological and analytical overview of Japan’s challenging institutional, political and bureaucratic transformations since the Meiji Restoration of the late nineteenth century. Analysis of globalization and policy reform in a non-liberal state, and the relationship between politicians and bureaucrats from an international perspective is included. For those interested in historical and contemporary Japanese politics from a theoretical perspective, particularly the implications of globalization and the politician–bureaucrat relationship, this is an indispensable resource.