Posts filed under ‘– Foss –’
Framing and Incentives
| Nicolai Foss |
Here is one more cultural conservatism post, but one that relates to the economics themes that we often treat here at O&M.
I have just completed reading Theodore Dalrymple’s splendid Life at the Bottom: the Worldview that Makes the Underclass. This is confirming, challenging, and inspiring reading for somebody who subscribes, at least to some degree, to the economic worldview, i.e. notions that people respond (rather predictably) to incentives and in many ways react fairly rationally, that separating actions and consequences is often highly unfortunate, etc. (more…)
Call for Papers — DRUID 2007
| Nicolai Foss |
It is hard to believe, but DRUID — the Danish Research Unit of Industrial Dynamics — is now entering its 11th year. As one of the original founder-members of the DRUID, it is just great to observe the continuous improvements that have characterized the DRUID conference series from the rather humble (i.e., amateurish in the true sense of the word) beginnings in 1995. In fact, after last year’s very successful conference, I heard the Director of DRUID, Peter Maskell, worry — rather tongue-in-cheek — that perhaps DRUID is becoming “too Americanized.”
DRUID has never projected a distinct research program, but it has been able to become one of the leading platforms for research in innovation, industrial dynamics, etc. in the World. Its main activity is simply running two yearly conferences, one in January organized for PhD students and younger faculty, and one in June, much larger in scale and usually with good presenters indeed (e.g., Sid Winter, Steven Klepper, Anita McGahan, Alfonso Gambardella, Richard Nelson etc. etc.). In addition, DRUID maintains a very nicely organized website with lots of downloadable papers.
The full Call for Papers for the 2007 conference (not yet available on the DRUID website) is here:
Lachmann Paper
| Nicolai Foss |
Giampaolo Garzarelli (University of Witwatersrand) and I have just had our paper on Ludwig Lachmann, “Institutions as Knowledge Capital: Ludwig M. Lachmann’s Interpretive Institutionalism,” accepted by the Cambridge Journal of Economics. Mail me at njf.smg@cbs.dk if you want a copy. Here is the abstract:
This paper revisits the socioeconomic theory of the Austrian School economist Ludwig M. Lachmann. By showing that the common claim that Lachmann’s idiosyncratic (read: eclectic and multidisciplinary) approach to economics entails nihilism is unfounded, it reaches the following conclusions. (1) Lachmann held a sophisticated institutional position to economics that anticipated developments in contemporary new institutional economics. (2) Lachmann’s sociological and economic reading of institutions offers insights for the problem of coordination. (3) Lachmann indirectly extends contemporary new institutional theory without simultaneously denying the policy approach of comparative institutional analysis.
Scruton on Chomsky
| Nicolai Foss |
From yesterday’s WSJ.com, Roger Scruton taking on Noam Chomsky:
Prof. Chomsky is an intelligent man. Not everything he says by way of criticizing his country is wrong. However, he is not valued for his truths but for his rage, which stokes the rage of his admirers. He feeds the self-righteousness of America’s enemies, who feed the self-righteousness of Prof. Chomsky. And in the ensuing blaze everything is sacrificed, including the constructive criticism that America so much needs, and that America–unlike its enemies, Prof. Chomsky included–is prepared to listen to.
Enjoy!
Scruton
| Nicolai Foss |
The Mission Statement of O&M stipulates that we occassionally discuss cultural conservatism. We do so too rarely, so the following is an attempt to meet that stipulation.
I am admirer of the British conservative philosopher Roger Scruton (Scruton’s homepage is here; check out his hilarious cv). Although I have not bought fully into Scrutonian conservatism (I have problems with his excessive statism — plus I just don’t get his love for Wagner!), I find him to be an extremely profound and challenging writer. One of the very few contemporary conservative thinkers worth taking seriously (e.g., see this and this). And if you really want cultural conservatism, this is it!. (more…)
Call for Papers — Special Issue of Human Resource Management
| Nicolai Foss |
With my CBS colleague Dr. Dana Minbaeva and Professor Scott Snell from the School of Industrial and Labor Relations, Cornell University, I will be editing a special issue of the HRM field’s flagship journal, Human Resource Management (!), published by the UMichigan Business School. Here is the Call for Papers.
The subject of this special issue is “Human Resource Management and Knowledge Processes.” The aim is to build theory and conduct empirical work relating to how human resource management practices influence the sharing, building and integration of knowledge in firms. How “people” (and the organizational framework they interact in, including HRM practices) may contribute to the creation of competitive advantage is an increasingly important issue in strategic management. It is also a subject that transaction cost scholars should potentially be able to contribute significantly to. We hope to receive contributions from not only “traditional” HRM scholars but also from strategic management and other scholars with an interest in these issues.
To stimulate interest in the special issue, my Center organized a two-day workshop last week. The program and most of the papers are here.
Peter Kurrild-Klitgaard New Professor at Copenhagen University
| Nicolai Foss |
I suspect that quite a number of the readers of this blog will know Peter Kurrild-Klitgaard, or at least know his work. Peter is a Danish political scientist, who has spent a number of years in the US (mainly at Columbia), he is the European editor of Public Choice, a co-editor of Advances in Austrian Economics, and the author of numerous fine rational choice papers in political science and economic history. He is also an acknowledged expert on heraldry. In addition, Peter has been a libertarian/classical liberal activitist for many years, being one of the founders of the Danish Center for Political Studies. He is a columnist for one of the major Danish newspapers. In other words, Peter is possessed of a truly incredible energy.
Yesterday, Peter formally assumed a full professorship of political science at Copenhagen University, one of the most prestiguous chairs in Danish social science. (more…)
Simon on Hierarchy
| Nicolai Foss |
I have always been surprised and somewhat disturbed by the tendency in Herbert A Simon’s work to elevate hierarchy and organization over markets. Of course, Simon was a liberal democrat — but he was also a great scientist.
The most visible expression of this tendency is probably Simon’s heavily cited 1991 paper in the Journal of Economic Perspectives, “Organizations and Markets.” Another manifestation of the tendency is Simon’s even more (in fact, much more) famous 1962 paper, “The Architecture of Complexity,” in which hierarchical structure is seen as the master-principle for understanding “the architecture of complexity.”
In an interesting paper, “Hierarchy and History in Simon’s ‘Architecture of Complexity’,” UCLA professor Philip Agre argues that Simon’s paper arose as a critique of general systems theory and its attempt to elevate self-organization over any hierarchical principles. He furthermore sees Simon’s argument as very strongly reflecting the general tenor of the times, what may be called McNamaraism (tellingly, Chandler’s Strategy and Structure was also published in 1962); thus, “… the patterns that Simon discerned became visible within the larger context of the time.”
New Online Journal — COPE
| Nicolai Foss |
As we all know, acronyms are of the essence, and COPE — Critique of Political Economy — has cleverly chosen one that is very close to HOPE, History of Political Economy, and ROPE, Review of Political Economy. So, all you prospective authors, let it be known that “when there is no HOPE there is the ROPE unless you can COPE.” (more…)
Paper on Freedom and Entrepreneurship
| Nicolai Foss |
With Christian Bjørnskov I have written “Economic Freedom and Entrepreneurial Activity: Some Cross-Country Evidence. Here is the abstract:
While much attention has been devoted to analyzing how the institutional framework and entrepreneurship impact growth, how economic policy and institutional design affect entrepreneurship appears to be much less analyzed. We try to explain cross-country differences in the level of entrepreneurship by differences in economic policy and institutional design. Specifically, we use the measures of economic freedom to ask which elements of economic policy making and the institutional framework that are responsible for the supply of entrepreneurship (our data on entrepreneurship are derived from the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor). The combination of these two datasets is unique in the literature. We find that the size of government is negatively correlated with entrepreneurial activity but that sound money is positively correlated with entrepreneurial activity. Other measures of economic freedom are not significantly correlated with entrepreneurship.
Drop me a mail if you want a copy.
Is Selective Intervention Really “Impossible”?
| Nicolai Foss |
One of the most difficult notions in the theory of the firm is surely that of “selective intervention,” and particularly the associated notion of the “impossibility of selective intervention.” These terms were coined by Oliver Williamson to describe attenuation of incentives that accompanies integration (see this book, chapter 6). What Williamson calls “the fiction of selective intervention” refers to the thought experiment of one big firm replicating small firms for all activities “save those for which the expected net gains from intervention could be projected.” If this were possible, all economic activity, Williamson argues, would be organized in a single firm.
What then are the reasons why “selective intervention” thus defined is a “fiction”? (more…)
O&M Blocked
| Nicolai Foss |
I have just been informed by an avid O&M reader of Chinese nationality that upon his return to China a few days ago he found that O&M has been blocked by the Chinese authorities. Marginal Revolution, on the other hand, has not been blocked. Peter and I have long been wondering about the differences in the size of the readership of O&M and MR. We now have the explanation.
Are Economists Realists About Equilibrium?
| Nicolai Foss |
Economists are not always entirely forthcoming about how economic models connect to economic reality. My own perspective is that good economic models are simplified redescriptions of reality that capture those mechanisms that are essential for understanding a certain phenomenon. A crucial part of most economic models is that of equilibrium. Do economists think of equilibrium as a “simplified redescription of reality”? Or to put it somewhat differently, do they think that equilibrium is a possible (albeit perhaps highly unlikely) property of economic reality? Or is equilibrium a strictly analytical concept, and any association with economic reality a fallacy of conceptual realism? (more…)
Empirical Work on Modularity
| Nicolai Foss |
Modularity has now been on the agenda of strategic management, organizational theory, and technology studies scholars for more than a decade. One of the first (perhaps the first) discussions of modularity in strategic management is the 1996 Strategic Management Journal paper by Ron Sanchez and former O&M guest blogger Joe Mahoney (“Modularity, Flexibility, and Knowledge Management in Product Organization Design”). This paper was largely theoretical.
However, four years earlier another former O&M guest blogger, Dick Langlois, published a paper in Research Policy (“Networks and Innovation in a Modular System,” with Paul Robertson) that remains among the most downloaded RP papers ever. The empirical basis for this paper was case studies of the micro computer and stereo component industries.
Since these two pioneer contributions, much work has been done on modularity, and much of it with an empirical orientation. However, the kind of empirical approach that is dominant in management — quantitative, cross-sectional work — has been very slow in being applied to issues of modularity. (more…)
Tacky Editors
| Nicolai Foss |
Here is one more entry in another O&M feuilleton, namely our “Jerehmiads” on publication in management and related fields (e.g., here and here.) (The term was introduced by Omar at orgtheory.net, who despite being a brand-new assistant professor is also a specialist in the publication game; see his comments here.)
I recently had a paper rejected for one of the top-4 management journals. It is the third time I have been rejected from this particular journal. However, every time something a little weird has happened: 3-4 days after the rejection, the editor has approached me, asking whether I would like to review a paper. I can understand the rationale: Now that I have enjoyed the service of this journal, I need to pay back. But, isn’t it just a little bit tacky? Or am I too wimpy? (or too much like Jeremiah?). Anybody who has had similar experiences?
Structure and Agency: A Response to Felin and Foss
| Nicolai Foss |
In 2005 Strategic Organization published a paper by Teppo Felin and me, “Strategic Organization: A Field in Search of Micro-foundations.” The paper has caused quite a stir, and the editor of SO! told me at the recent Academy Meetings that he had been contacted by several authors and author teams who wanted to write responses. Our argument? The — apparently provocative — one that notions of capabilities, routines, etc. are collective-level constructs that do not have any clear (and clean) micro-foundations (as well as definitions, measures, etc.). (more…)
Youtube.com
| Nicolai Foss |
I became aware of youtube.com through Russ Coff who very effectively used a youtube video in one his presentations at the recent Academy of Management Meetings.
Youtube.com is a bonanza. I quickly found numerous videos with my favorite jazzers, e.g., Django Reinhardt, Tal Farlow, and others, but for you more serious folks, there are great videos of our favorite political economists. For example, here is the great Arnold Schwarzenegger introducing Uncle Milton’s Free to Choose series. And here is Milton himself. Here is one on Ludwig von Mises (produced by the Mises Institute). Of course, there is a clip of Ayn Rand praising the “new intellectual,” and condemning “the dark ages,” “superstitions”, etc. (unfortunately she doesn’t mention that “A is A”), all in less than a minute. Great stuff!!
What’s in a Name? Property Rights, Legal Rights, and Economic Rights
| Nicolai Foss |
I tend to find the property rights approach associated with such economists as Coase, Demsetz, Alchian, and perhaps particularly Yoram Barzel extremely useful, informative, and insightful. (I also find their approaches more generally useful than the more recent property rights approach associated with Oliver Hart and his colleagues and students; on the differences between the “old” and the “new” property rights approaches, see this paper). It spans multiple level of analysis, and its explanatory reach seems to me to be huge. Most of my papers over the last few years utilize property rights notions in one way or another.
However, I have found that there are some basic difficulties of communicating property rights economics. It is not so much a matter of too many people (still) arguing that the Coase theorem “doesn’t hold” (usually the same types who argue that PD games are “wrong”). (more…)
Leijonhufvud Papers
| Nicolai Foss |
Here is one more entry in the ongoing O&M Leijonhufvud feuilleton. Leijonhufvud is still alive and kicking, and has a couple of very nice downloadable working papers in the series of the Department of Economics, University of Trento (downloadable here).
In “The Uses of the Past,” a keynote speech to the European Association of the History of Economic Thought, Leijonhufvud takes issue with the
… misconception … that neoclassical economics was always about optimizing and equilibrium. Up at least through the 1950s, neoclassical economists always distinguished between static and dynamic theory. Dynamics referred, on the one hand, to the adaptation of individuals and, on the other, to the market process whereby they collectively groped towards equilibrium. Equilibria were understood as the point attractors of these processes. Static theory dealt with the property of these attractors … What is called dynamic theory today is just the generalization of the old static theory.
More on Leijonhufvud
| Nicolai Foss |
The great economist Axel Leijonhufvud has been the subject of earlier posts here on O&M (here and here). A recent issue of the Cambridge Journal of Economics features an article by Elisabetta de Antoni (a colleague of Leijonhufvud at the University of Trento) on “The Auctioneerless Economics of Axel Leijonhufvud: The “Dark Forces of Time and Ignorance” and the Coordination of Economic Activity.”
The article contains some strange claims — e.g., it claims that “Leijonhufvud has the unquestionable merit of having devised the metaphor of the auctioneer” (p. 2) and this auctioneer is the “personification of the (equally occult) ‘invisible hand’ of the market” (p.3) — but there are many interesting observations and points. Thus, it doesn’t over-concentrate on the 1968 book, and nicely tells the story of how Leijonhufvud became increasingly heterodox, as the econ profession since about the mid-1970s moved towards the intertemporal optimization approach that still holds sway. On the whole, the paper is a reliable and informative guide to the thinking of one of the most fascinating contemporary economists.
Organizations and Markets 
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