Abstract
One of the great debates of the late twentieth century has been around the well-known study Varieties of Capitalism: The Institutional Foundations of Comparative Advantage (VoC) by Peter Hall and David Soskice, in which developed countries are characterized as either a Liberal Market Economy (LME) or a Coordinated Market Economy (CME), based on five interrelated criteria (spheres). Many scholars have applied the VoC approach since then — including economic historians — trying to reconcile the rather static nature of the approach with a historical, more dynamic analysis. Jeroen Touwen (lecturer in Economic and Social History at Leiden University, and the scientific director of the N.W. Posthumus Institute) adds to this line of research, by applying VoC to the case of the Netherlands after World War II in a careful, critical manner. This has resulted in an impressive and voluminous book of which the principal title, Coordination in Transition, neatly captures the key theme: How did a typical CME react to the structural changes as a result of ongoing globalization (influenced by trade liberalization and technological developments, foremost in information and communications technology), causing a shift to a market-based and knowledge-based economy? One of the new contributions of this book is that it also analyzes recent economic history of the Netherlands, in contrast with most other Dutch studies that only treat the twentieth century.
Original language | English |
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Publisher | EH.Net |
Edition | august |
Media of output | Online |
Publication status | Published - 17 Aug 2015 |
Keywords
- Economic planning
- Economic policy
- economic history
- VoC
- Netherlands