scholarly journals The Political Antieconomy of Transformations in CEE Countries

Ekonomika ◽  
2008 ◽  
Vol 83 ◽  
Author(s):  
Povilas Gylys
Keyword(s):  
Political Economy ◽  
Public Sector ◽  
Economic Analysis ◽  
Private Sector ◽  
Holistic Approach ◽  
Methodological Individualism ◽  
The Political ◽  
The Public ◽  
Negative Side ◽  
Economic Reality

Transformations in CEE countries traditionally are studied in the framework of methodological individualism. As a result, the scope of economic analysis is reduced to the development of the private sector. Thereby, part of economic reality, namely the public sector; is excluded from economic reality. The holistic approach allows to overcome this shortcoming. Holistically perceived transformations encompass the whole economy - both the private and the public sectors. Furthermore, it opens the possibility to widen the scope of investigations by introducing the negative side of transformations in economy as a whole. Conceptualization of this side allows formulating the concept of antieconomy. Introduction of this concept and the extension, development of the political economy tradition give the opportunity to speak about a new direction of scientific explorations - political antieconomy of trasformations.

Sociology after Fordism: Prospects and problems

2011 ◽  
Vol 14 (4) ◽  
pp. 537-556 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Holmwood
Keyword(s):  
Political Economy ◽  
Public Sector ◽  
Social Studies ◽  
Private Sector ◽  
Special Interest ◽  
Social Knowledge ◽  
Sociological Knowledge ◽  
The Public ◽  
Critical Knowledge ◽  
New Form

A number of commentators have suggested that the shift from a Fordist to a post-Fordist regime of political economy has had positive consequences for sociology, including the reinforcement of critical sociologies ( Burawoy, 2005 ; Steinmetz, 2005 ). This article argues that, although disciplinary hierarchies have been destabilized, what is emerging is a new form of instrumental knowledge, that of applied interdisciplinary social studies. This development has had a particular impact upon sociology. Savage and Burrows (2007) , for example, argue that sociological knowledge no longer has a privileged claim to authority and is increasingly in competition with social knowledge produced by the private sector and agencies of the public sector. The response of many sociologists to such claims has been to reassert the importance of the discipline as the purveyor of critically relevant knowledge about society. The article traces how the idea of internal critique within sociology has developed to embrace ‘knowing capitalism’ ( Thrift, 2005 ), at the same time as declaring the impossibility of sociological knowledge. The critique of sociology also becomes the critique of critique and what remains is the instrumentalization of knowledge. Where many sociologists continue to claim a special interest in critical knowledge, the article suggests that, in contrast, we potentially confront the problem that such knowledge may itself be facing a crisis of reproduction.

scholarly journals A Loosening Grip: Why Do Autocracies Engage in the Neoliberalization of Their Welfare Sectors?

2021 ◽  
Vol 22 (1) ◽  
pp. 140-164
Author(s):  
Ilia Viatkin ◽  
Kristina Komarova
Keyword(s):  
Political Economy ◽  
Public Sector ◽  
Free Market ◽  
Qualitative Comparative Analysis ◽  
Authoritarian Regimes ◽  
The Political ◽  
Modernization Theory ◽  
Departure Point ◽  
The Public ◽  
Theoretical Perspectives

Despite the wealth of studies on neoliberalism, research on why authoritarian states engage in processes of neoliberalization remains scarce. Therefore, our article seeks to explore why autocracies use neoliberal power practices, which, as suggested by Foucauldian governmentality approach to neoliberalism, are understood as governance techniques aimed primarily at disciplining and controlling populations through promoting the free market as a key form of societal organization. Empirically, these power practices can manifest in a state’s withdrawal from the provision of welfare services. However, scholars have argued that control over the public sector is essential to the maintenance of authoritarian regimes, and hence, governments must have compelling reasons to opt for its neoliberalization. In this study, we employ three mutually nonexclusive theoretical perspectives that suggest incentives that may motivate autocrats to retreat from the welfare sector; these are the authoritarian legitimation, authoritarian modernization, and political economy perspectives. By means of a fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis, we tested the foregoing theories on a sample of 42 autocracies active during 1980–2005. The results revealed that authoritarian modernization theory has the highest explanatory capacity, as it identifies two distinct pathways to public sector neoliberalization—internal and external policy considerations or one of the two—while the political economy perspective was an important theoretical concern in several cases. Overall, our paper contributes to research on the governmentality approach to neoliberalism and serves as a departure point for further investigations into neoliberal authoritarianism.

Structure and Coherence in the Political Economy of Public Finance

2009 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stanley L. Winer ◽  
Walter Hettich
Keyword(s):  
Public Finance ◽  
Political Economy ◽  
Public Sector ◽  
Median Voter ◽  
Collective Choice ◽  
Voter Model ◽  
The Political ◽  
The Public ◽  
Median Voter Model ◽  
Key Issues

The article provides an outline of the economics of the public sector and of its structure when collective choice is regarded as an essential component of the analysis. It identifies the key issues that must be faced by political scientists and economists who insist that collective institutions cannot be ignored in research on taxation and public budgets. It also reviews various alternatives to the median voter model; these alternatives are frameworks that interpret public policies as equilibrium outcomes in a multidimensional setting.

All Shook Up?

2020 ◽  
pp. 157-174
Author(s):  
Elizabeth Chatterjee
Keyword(s):  
Political Economy ◽  
Public Sector ◽  
Economic Reforms ◽  
Rent Seeking ◽  
The State ◽  
The Political ◽  
State Autonomy ◽  
The Public ◽  
Indian State ◽  
Dominant Classes

The Political Economy and Development of India (PEDI) outlined highly influential theories of both the Indian state and its bureaucracy. Professionals within the public sector were one of Bardhan’s three competing dominant classes, yet he was also clear that the state was an autonomous actor distinct from the rent-seeking officials who populated its lower ranks. Three decades later, economic reforms have ostensibly challenged the public sector’s economic, ideological, and policy dominance. This chapter argues that the Indian system remains more statist—and correspondingly less ‘pro-business’—than many scholarly interpretations today allow. Nonetheless, elite public sector professionals have become fragmented that challenge their coherence as a class, while new obstacles to effective state autonomy have arisen from the nexus between politicians and the petty bureaucracy.

scholarly journals Two Paradigms of Economic Development in CEE Countries

Ekonomika ◽  
2004 ◽  
Vol 68 ◽  
Author(s):  
Povilas Gylys
Keyword(s):  
Economic Policy ◽  
Economic Development ◽  
Public Sector ◽  
Negative Attitude ◽  
Methodological Individualism ◽  
Private Goods ◽  
The Public ◽  
Economic Reality ◽  
Economic Goods ◽  
Methodological Holism

The direction of economic development depends on the paradigmatic framework in which economic reality is perceived. In the framework of holistic paradigm also public and not only private goods are understood as economic goods. Correspondingly, the public sector is enclosed into economy. The individualistic approach presupposes reduction of economic reality to market and overtly or covertly negative attitude towards public sector as non-economic. The phenomenon of reflexiveness is present here. Methodological holism and methodological individualism give birth to different strategies of economic policy and finally lead to different outcomes of economic development.

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