Economics and Finance

South Korea has been quietly growing into a major economic force that is even challenging some Japanese industries. This book examines South Korean economic growth as an example of “late industrialization,” a process in which a nation's industries learn from earlier innovator nations rather than innovate themselves. Discussing state intervention, shop‐floor management, and big business groups, the reasons are explored for South Korea's phenomenal growth, paying special attention to the principle of reciprocity in which the government imposes strict performance standards on those industries and companies that it aids. It is shown thereby how South Korea, Japan, and Taiwan were able to grow faster than other emerging nations such as Brazil, Turkey, India, and Mexico. The book is arranged in three main parts: Part 1 surveys South Korean history and the origins of state policies that led to the successes of its late industrialization; Part 2 examines the ways in which the South Korean management and workforce were transformed into major factors in the growth of its industry; and Part 3 discusses the creation of comparative advantage in several industries and the reasons why only one kept pace with expansion while the others drove it.

Two sharply contrasting views of China exist today. On the one hand a rising superpower predicted to have the largest economy in the world by mid century, on the other hand a brutal, anachronistic and authoritarian regime, a threat to geo-stability and to the economies of the industrial world. So which China is the real China? The author addresses this question by exploring China's economy, political and legal system, and most controversially, its record on civil, political, and personal rights in the context of the developing world. Avoiding polemic and relying on empirical evidence, he compares China's performance not with first world countries such as the US and UK, but with other middle income countries, and highlights the often hypocritical stance of an international community that demands standards from others that it does not match at home. He also critically evaluates the benefits of globalization and democratization, and the normative values of the West set against Beijing's determination to retain its cultural and political integrity. This book seeks to bridge the gap in understanding China and to create a firmer foundation for mutual trust, while recognizing that there are inevitable risks in a shift in global power of this magnitude that will require hard-headed pragmatism at times where interests collide.

The rise of Asia, and China specifically, is the single most important force reshaping the world economy at the beginning of the 21st century. From a low of 20% in 1950, Asia's share of global GDP has now risen to 33% and will exceed 40% within a generation if current forecasts are realized. Asia's growing weight in the world economy is elevating it to a central position in global economic and financial affairs. The potential global impact of this astonishing growth is far reaching, from oil markets and the environment to a reshaping of trade relations in the current multilateral system dominated by the WTO. This collection of chapters written by leading economists explores the likely impact of the rapid growth in the East Asian economies, and in particular China, on the world economy in the coming decades and the consequent challenges for the development of trade, macroeconomic, and environmental policy.

How has the Chinese economy managed to grow at such a remarkable rate — no less than ten per cent per annum — for over three decades? This book combines economic theory, empirical estimation, and institutional analysis to address one of the most important questions facing contemporary economists. A common thread that runs throughout the book is the underlying political economy: why China became a ‘developmental state’, and how it has maintained itself as a ‘developmental state’. The book examines the causal processes at work in the evolution of China's institutions and policies. It estimates cross-country and cross-province growth equations to shed light on the proximate, and some of the underlying, determinants of the growth rate. It explores important consequences of China's growth, posing a series of key questions, such as: Is the economy running out of unskilled labour? Why and how has inequality risen; has economic growth raised happiness? What are the social costs of the overriding priority accorded to growth objectives? Can China continue to grow rapidly, or will the maturing economy, or the macroeconomic imbalances, or financial crisis, or social instability, bring it to an end?

China's telecommunications industry has seen revolutionary transformation and growth over the past three decades. Chinese Internet users number more than 150 million, and the PRC expects to quickly pass the US in total numbers of connected citizens. The number of mobile and fixed-line telephone users soared from a mere 2 million in 1980 to a total of more than 800 million in 2007 — the country took the number one rank in the world in the number of telephones. China has been the most successful developing nation in history for spreading telecommunications access at an unparalleled rapid pace. This book tells how China conducted its remarkable ‘telecommunications revolution’. It examines both corporate and government policy to get citizens connected to both voice and data networks. It looks at the potential challenges to the one-party government when citizens get this access. And it considers the new opportunities for networking now offered the people of one of the world's fastest growing economies. The book is based on the author's fieldwork conducted in several Chinese cities, as well as extensive archival research. It focuses on key issues such as building and running the country's Internet, mobile phone company rivalry, foreign investment in the sector, and telecommunications in China's vibrant city of Shanghai. It also considers the country's internal ‘digital divide’, and questions how equitable the telecommunications revolution has been. Finally, it examines the ways the PRC's entry to the World Trade Organization will shape the future course of telecommunications growth.

This book chronicles how a controversial set of policy assumptions about the Japanese economy, known as revisionism, rose to become the basis of the trade policy approach of the Clinton administration. In the context of deep-rooted fears over Japan's increasing economic strength, revisionists argued that Japan represented a distinctive form of capitalism that was inherently closed to imports and that posed a threat to U.S. high-tech industries. Revisionists advocated a “managed trade” solution in which the Japanese government would be forced to set aside a share of the market for foreign goods. The author describes the role that various American academics, government officials, and business leaders played in developing revisionist thought. The revisionist drumbeat grew loudest just as the Clinton administration came into office. The author uses extensive interviews with policy makers to trace the internal discussions inside the Clinton White House, which culminated in the adoption of revisionist assumptions and then to demands for “results-oriented” trade agreements during the Framework negotiations. Japan, however, refused to accept these managed trade solutions, and fought to discredit revisionism and to rally global support against American unilateralism. Despite a history of caving in to U.S. pressures, this time the Japanese held firm even in the face of an historic failure of a bilateral summit in 1994 and the threat of sanctions against Japanese autos in 1995. In the end, it was the U.S. that folded; for the first time ever, Japan said “no,” and in the process beat back America's demands for managed trade once and for all.

This book analyses the role of communities and markets in economic development. It is divided into three parts. Part I presents four chapters on historical and theoretical perspectives on the community and market. Part II contains four chapters focusing on the role of the community in the process of market development in contemporary developing and transitional economics. Part III focuses on communal control over public goods.

This book uses comparative institutional analysis to explain differences in national economic performance. Countries have their own rules for corporate governance and they have different market arrangements; and these differences in rules and organization affect the way firms behave. Countries also tend to develop conventions of organizational architecture whether their hierarchies are functional, horizontal, or decentralized. This affects the way in which they process information, and information management is increasingly seen as being of crucial importance to a firm's performance. This book accords more importance to these factors than to the factors conventionally used in applying a neoclassical model of economic efficiency. It applies game theory, contract theory, and information theory. By describing the rules and norms in Japan, the USA, and the transitional economies, the book shows how firms can achieve competitive advantage in international markets if these conventions and rules are well suited to the industrial sector in which the firms operate. The book is particularly concerned with how Japan, with its main bank and lifelong employment systems, as well as information-sharing firm organizational structure, might reform its institutions to maintain competitive advantage in the world economy.

The global financial crisis of 2008/09 raised concerns that the world would move toward protectionism and isolationism. One fear was that tariffs and other barriers to international trade would increase, thereby reducing exports and imports of goods and services. Also restrictions on international financial flows might grow, thereby lowering cross-border asset holdings and amounts of foreign direct investment. Increases in trade and financial protectionism clearly pose threats to Asian economies, which rely heavily on external demand as an impetus to growth and are closely linked to global financial markets. To study these and related issues, this volume brings together eight chapters that deal with time patterns in trade barriers, volumes of trade, cross-border asset holdings and flows, foreign direct investment, currency regimes, and production structures between countries. The chapters emphasize developments in Asia since the early 1990s, but parts of the analysis relate to longer-term Asian history. The inclusion of the 1997/98 Asian financial crisis is particularly advantageous, although it was more localized than the 2008/09 crisis, the reactions observed within Asia in the late 1990s provide useful information about likely responses in Asia and elsewhere to the 2008/09 event.

This book examines East Asia’s economic development and integration following the Asian crisis of 1997-1998. The book is divided into six parts. Part 1 describes the development experiences of East Asia’s emerging economies, their characteristics and accomplishments, and then provides an overview of some of the critical failures of the East Asian development model. Part 2 examines the causes and consequences of the Asian crisis, together with a reassessment of the IMF reform program. Part 3 covers the topics of corporate and institutional sector reform, the role of government, and the need for improved social welfare and industrial relations policies. Part 4 assesses the progress in three key areas for the region: reform of the financial sector, the pros and cons of a floating exchange rate regime, and the degree and effect of capital account liberalization. Part 5 reviews the key sectors of trade and financial integration in East Asia, the prospects for continued economic cooperation and integration, and the need for policy coordination with regard to the record foreign currency reserves held by East Asian economies, which resulted in a Transpacific trade imbalance. Part 6 considers the road ahead for East Asia and outlines the characteristics of a new paradigm for development. It is argued that merely adopting liberal economic reform measures will not ensure successful development. This new and evolving development paradigm — distinct from the old system yet not an Anglo-American system — is the key to ensuring success in the region.