The Palgrave Handbook of Comparative Economics

"A book full of insights on economic systems and how to transit from one to another. A good Reference Manual for academics and policy-oriented researchers, with many useful tools to understand our changing world."

Claudia Senik, Full Professor at Sorbonne University and Paris School of Economics.

"An invaluable guide to the post-communist economic transition and to the research it inspired, by a range of the leading experts from academia and policy circles."

Daniel Treisman, Professor of Political Science, University of California, Los Angeles.

"This volume is another proof, if you needed one, that the comparative perspective enormously enriches the social sciences. The volume thankfully brings together scholars with very different approaches allowing the reader to make up his or her own mind about their usefulness in explaining observations and helping us improve the world."

Professor Erik Berglof, Director, Institute of Global Affairs, LSE School of Public Policy.

This book aims to define comparative economics and to illustrate the breadth and depth of its contribution. It starts with an historiography of the field, arguing for a continued legacy of comparative economic systems, which compared socialism and capitalism, a field which some argued should have been replaced by institutional economics after the fall of the Berlin Wall. The process of transition to market capitalism is reviewed, and itself exemplifies a new combination of comparative analysis with a focus on institutional development. Going beyond, chapters broadening the application of comparative analysis and applying it to new issues and approaches, including the role and definition of institutions, subjective wellbeing, inequality, populism, demography, and novel methodologies. Overall, comparative economics has evolved in the past 30 years, and remains a powerful approach for analyzing important issues.

Auteur

Oleh Havrylyshyn, Adjunct Research Professor at Carleton University, Canada, has a diverse career including Academia; Government (Deputy Minister of Finance, Ukraine); IMF senior official, advisor in many countries. His numerous writings on transition have been widely cited; the most recent Present at the Transition reflects personal insights on thirty years of post-communism.

Elodie Douarin is Lecturer in Economics at the School of Slavonic and East European Studies at UCL. She was the director of the Centre for Comparative Studies of Emerging Economies from 2016 to 2019. She holds a PhD in Economics from Wye College (Imperial College), University of London, UK.

Résumé
This book aims to define comparative economics and to illustrate the breadth and depth of its contribution. It starts with an historiography of the field, arguing for a continued legacy of comparative economic systems, which compared socialism and capitalism, a field which some argued should have been replaced by institutional economics after the fall of the Berlin Wall. The process of transition to market capitalism is reviewed, and itself exemplifies a new combination of comparative analysis with a focus on institutional development. Going beyond, chapters broadening the application of comparative analysis and applying it to new issues and approaches, including the role and definition of institutions, subjective wellbeing, inequality, populism, demography, and novel methodologies. Overall, comparative economics has evolved in the past 30 years, and remains a powerful approach for analyzing important issues.

Contenu

1 Introduction to the Palgrave Handbook of Comparative

Economics

Elodie Douarin and Oleh Havrylyshyn

Part I Evolution of the Field of Comparative

Economics Systems

2 A Historiography of Comparative Economics

Josef Brada

3 The Soviet Economic System: An Archival Re-evaluation

Paul R. Gregory

4 Institutions, Institutional Systems and Their Dynamics

Leszek Balcerowicz

5 The New Comparative Economics: A Critical Review

Bruno Dallago and Sara Casagrande

Part II Comparative Economic Systems in Economic History

6 Comparative Economic History

Gerard Roland

7 The World's First Meritocracy Through the Lens of

Institutions and Cultural Persistence

James Kai-Sing Kung

8 Institutions Matter: But So Does HistoryA Comparison

of Mediaeval Dubrovnik with Other Dalmatian Cities

Oleh Havrylyshyn

9 Long-Run Inequality in Communist Countries: Before,

During and After

Filip Novokmet

10 Effect of Historical Forces on Liberalization and

Democratization in Transition

Simeon Djankov

Part III Post-Communist Transition

11 Thirty Years of Transition: Eleven Stylised Facts

Oleh Havrylyshyn

12 The Importance of Domestic Commitment

Anders Åslund

13 Political Economy of Transition Reforms

Sergei Guriev

14 The EU Anchor Thesis: Transition from Socialism,

Institutional Vacuum and Membership

in the European Union

Nauro F. Campos

15 Some Reflections on Transition: Its Roots, Complexity

of the Process, and Role of the IMF and Other

Organizations

Vito Tanzi

16 Are the Transition Economies Still in Transition?

Paul Wachtel

17 Institutional Change in Transition: An Evolving Research Agenda

Elodie Douarin

Part IV New Comparative Economics: Growth and Formal

Institutions in a Globalised World

18 Institutions, Human Capital and Economic Growth

Luca J. Uberti and Carl Henrik Knutsen

19 Reform Design Matters: The Role of Structural Policy

Complementarities

Joaquim Oliveira-Martins and Bruno T. da Rocha

20 Democracy as a Driver of Post-Communist Economic

Development

Jan Fidrmuc

21 Economic Development, Transition, and New Structural

Economics

Justin Yifu Lin

Part V The New New Comparative Economics:

Broadening the Goals

22 Rethinking Development: Broadening the Goals **and Alter...