Individualism, Collectivism, and Opportunism: A Cultural Perspective on Transaction Cost Economics

2002 ◽  
Vol 28 (4) ◽  
pp. 567-583 ◽  
Author(s):  
Chao C. Chen ◽  
Mike W. Peng ◽  
Patrick A. Saparito
Keyword(s):  
Human Nature ◽  
Transaction Cost ◽  
Global Economy ◽  
Transaction Cost Economics ◽  
Economic Organization ◽  
Cultural Perspective

Researchers criticize the transaction cost economics (TCE) paradigm for over-generalizing the assumption of opportunism as human nature. We suggest that opportunistic propensity is affected by cultural prior conditioning of individualism-collectivism (I-C). Specifically, we propose that individualists have a higher opportunistic propensity in intra-group transactions, and collectivists in inter-group transactions. Our cultural specification of opportunism helps TCE to more effectively accommodate some criticisms and more realistically deal with problems of economic organization in today’s global economy.

scholarly journals The Argumentational Texture of Transaction Cost Economics

1995 ◽  
Vol 16 (4) ◽  
pp. 605-623 ◽  
Author(s):  
Niels Noorderhaven
Keyword(s):  
Transaction Cost ◽  
Transaction Cost Economics ◽  
Asset Specificity ◽  
Economic Organization ◽  
Economic Institutions

The deconstruction method was used to analyze a seminal text in transaction cost economics, viz., Oliver Williamson's Economic Institutions of Capitalism. This deconstructive reading revealed that the assumption of opportunism that gives rise to the problem of economic organization as formulated by William son also tends to undermine the proposed solution to this problem. The plausi bility of unified governance as a solution to the problem of opportunism in transaction relations with asset specificity is shown to hinge on the temporary deferment of the assumption of opportunism. Thus, transaction cost economics finds itself in an impasse of thought: actors have to be assumed to be both opportunistic and not-opportunistic if the logic of the theory is to be main tained.

From transaction costs to transaction value: Overcoming the frictional paradigm

2020 ◽  
pp. 51-81
Author(s):  
D. P. Frolov
Keyword(s):  
Transaction Costs ◽  
Transaction Cost ◽  
Path Dependence ◽  
Transaction Cost Economics ◽  
Cost Minimization ◽  
Low Cost ◽  
Coase Theorem ◽  
Transactional Analysis ◽  
Transaction Sector ◽  
Transaction Value

The transaction cost economics has accumulated a mass of dogmatic concepts and assertions that have acquired high stability under the influence of path dependence. These include the dogma about transaction costs as frictions, the dogma about the unproductiveness of transactions as a generator of losses, “Stigler—Coase” theorem and the logic of transaction cost minimization, and also the dogma about the priority of institutions providing low-cost transactions. The listed dogmas underlie the prevailing tradition of transactional analysis the frictional paradigm — which, in turn, is the foundation of neo-institutional theory. Therefore, the community of new institutionalists implicitly blocks attempts of a serious revision of this dogmatics. The purpose of the article is to substantiate a post-institutional (alternative to the dominant neo-institutional discourse) value-oriented perspective for the development of transactional studies based on rethinking and combining forgotten theoretical alternatives. Those are Commons’s theory of transactions, Wallis—North’s theory of transaction sector, theory of transaction benefits (T. Sandler, N. Komesar, T. Eggertsson) and Zajac—Olsen’s theory of transaction value. The article provides arguments and examples in favor of broader explanatory possibilities of value-oriented transactional analysis.

Governance of supplier-customer relations: An empirical review

2007 ◽  
Vol 158 (12) ◽  
pp. 406-416
Author(s):  
Jon Bingen Sande
Keyword(s):  
Transaction Cost ◽  
Empirical Research ◽  
Customer Relations ◽  
Transaction Cost Economics ◽  
Exchange Theory ◽  
Forest Industry ◽  
Relational Contracts ◽  
Relational Exchange ◽  
Exchange Relationships ◽  
Relational Exchange Theory

The forest industry is riddled with exchange relationships. The parties to exchanges may have diverging goals and interests, but still depend upon each other due to non-redeployable specific assets. Formal and relational contracts may be used to deal with the resulting cooperation problems. This paper proposes a framework based on transaction cost economics and relational exchange theory, and examines to what extent empirical research has found formal and relational contracts to deal with three different governance problems. To that end, I review the results from 32 studies in a range of settings. These studies generally support the view that exchanges characterized by high degrees of specific assets should be supported by formal and relational contracts.

Ronald Coase and the Difference between Markets and Firms

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Abraham A. Singer
Keyword(s):  
Transaction Cost ◽  
Economic Activity ◽  
Transaction Cost Economics ◽  
Theory Of The Firm ◽  
Tabular Form ◽  
Specific Investment ◽  
The Difference ◽  
Marginal Revolution ◽  
The Way

This chapter reviews the development of transaction cost economics and unpacks its theory of the firm. The chapter begins with the marginal revolution in economics and how it altered the way economists understood the corporation. It then reviews the work of Ronald Coase and Oliver Williamson, explaining how they provided a novel account of firms. Transaction cost economics emphasizes how firms use hierarchy and bureaucracy to overcome problems of opportunism and asset-specific investment to coordinate some types of economic activity more efficiently than markets can. The transaction cost account of the corporation’s productivity component is shown in tabular form in comparison with its historical forerunners reviewed in the previous chapter.

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