‘Commerce and manufactures gradually introduced order and good government,’ wrote Adam Smith in his Wealth of Nations, ‘and with them, the liberty and security of individuals.’ However, Philipp Rössner shows how, when looked at in the face of history, it has usually been the other way around.
This book follows the development of capitalism from the Middle Ages through the industrial revolution to modern day, casting new light on the areas where pre-modern political economies of growth and development made a difference. It shows how order and governance provided the foundation for prosperity, growth and the wealth of nations.
Written for scholars and students of economic history, this is a pioneering new study that debunks the neoliberal origin myth of how capitalism came into the world.
Economic and social change is accelerating under the twin impact of globalisation and the new information technologies. But how are these processes interrelated? Are they impelling us towards a common socio-economic future? What can governments do if they want to manage and steer the direction of development?
This book addresses these questions with particular reference to the European Union, which has made the development of a socially cohesive, knowledge-based economy its central task for the present decade. It assesses both the challenges and the policy instruments that are being deployed, focussing in particular on the dynamics of the ‘new economy’; the new organisational architectures associated with rapid innovation; the transformation of education and training; the implications for social cohesion and exclusion and the role of policy benchmarking in promoting policy learning and enhancing national performance.
The European Challenge presents the most up-to-date research on the development of the knowledge-based economy and its social and policy implications. Its accessible and integrated treatment of the processes of economic, social and technological change make it an invaluable resource for those studying and researching in the fields of public and social policy, organisational and technological change and innovation. It is also highly relevant to policy-makers who need to understand and manage this change.
This ambitious collection follows the evolution of capitalism from its origins in 13th-century European towns to its 16th-century expansion into Asia, Africa and South America and on to the global capitalism of modern day.
Written by distinguished historians and social scientists, the chapters examine capitalism and its critics and the level of variation and convergence in its operation across locations. The authors illuminate the aspects of capitalism that have encouraged, but also limited, social responsibility and environmental sustainability.
Covering times, places and topics that have often been overlooked in the existing literature, this important contribution to the field of economic history charts the most comprehensive chronology of capitalism to date.
Social Policy Review 15 continues the tradition of providing a different style and approach to policy issues from that found in most academic journals and books. Welfare and Welfare Reform in the USA, Europe and the UK combines issues such as globalization, Europe and pensions with examination of the current and historical contexts of social policy. Chapters have been purposely chosen to review a varied and interesting selection of topical social policy developments and to set these in a broader context of key trends and debates.
Published in association with the UK Social Policy Association.
economies of industrialization had been laid in the seven or eight centuries before. Oeconomies of failure and success: between Smithian and Schumpeterian growth Perhaps one of the sharpest interpretations was offered by Marx ( Das Kapital , Vol 1). For Marx the manufactories – the type of industrial enterprise used by Smith in the Wealth of Nations to illustrate the efficiency gains that accrued from the division of labour – did not represent an interim stage in the business history of capitalism (as claimed by later historians), but a phenomenon sui generis
Chapters 7 and 8 . Curiously, Smith’s Wealth of Nations commenced exactly with such an example of workshop or Manufaktur . Smith didn’t develop the argument to full potential, for instance by explaining modern or Schumpeterian growth: in Smith’s model, manufacturing was the source of the wealth of nations chiefly because of the efficiencies gained by the principle of division of labour (Smithian growth); but very often manufactories represented much more than that. Entailing the productive transformation of matter, the creation of value using one’s (or someone
impending threats. This is learning-by-scanning. Learning-by- 31 Dynamics and innovation doing raises questions as to the capacity of organisations to adapt to, and exploit, new technologies and production processes, in order to gain competitive advantage. However, their separate treatment within the economics literature may reflect the quest for tractability in terms of modelling, rather than any assumption that only one of them is operative. Dynamism as endogenous growth The rise of the new economy has prompted the development of a neo-Schumpeterian growth theory
development. 25 Such lines of reasoning became important later on, especially for transformative processes known as ‘Schumpeterian growth’ based on creative destruction and technology-intensive modes of production. 26 As Mokyr has shown, useful knowledge and Schumpeterian lines of thought mattered fundamentally in shaping economic development in early modern Europe. 27 The British community of Enlightenment philosophers were not isolated but part of a larger network of savants and discourses across early modern Europe. 28 Societies such as the Royal Society, founded in
Schumpeterian growth or the enhancement of the competitiveness of national economies, and contrast it with the competition (and innovation) stifling nature of post-war social protection. Others see the post-war welfare state as possessing a highly decommodifying orientation that is now lost. While both views are partly correct, they also misread the nature of the change. First, some of the most highly thought of and redistributive welfare states of the post-war period were already Schumpeterian by Jessop’s criteria. The golden age Swedish welfare state made strenuous use
years scholars interested in the role of the state have moved focus from the degree of state interference to the question of directionality of economic change: were the areas targeted by preindustrial economic governance useful for raising productivity, incomes and employment in a sustained way? 27 Some deploy a concept of ‘Renaissance economics’ or ‘Schumpeterian growth’, positing innovation-based development as the ‘true’ source for the wealth of nations, while traditionally historians’ interpretations have more commonly grounded upon ‘Smithian’ growth
