Institutions and the environment: the case for a historical political economy

This paper provides a critical review of the ‘state of the art’ of institutional analysis applied essentially by social-ecological economists in the environmental domain. It highlights both areas of strength and issues where there is still room for improvement in analytical terms, by construing these approaches in the context of a general taxonomy of institutionalisms – widely used in politics and applied here in the economic realm. This provides the rationale for re-construing a number of related issues drawn from the core insights of a historical institutionalist approach to human-nature.Ecological economics, institutional analysis, socio-economy, regulation

Institutions and the environment: the case for a historical political economy

This paper provides a critical review of the ‘state of the art’ of institutional analysis applied essentially by social-ecological economists in the environmental domain. It highlights both areas of strength and issues where there is still room for improvement in analytical terms, by construing these approaches in the context of a general taxonomy of institutionalisms – widely used in politics and applied here in the economic realm. This provides the rationale for re-construing a number of related issues drawn from the core insights of a historical institutionalist approach to human-natureEcological economics, institutional analysis, socio-economy, regulation

Towards a cultural international political economy of financialisation : the transformation of private pension provision in the United Kingdom

In the last two decades especially, the scale, depth and intensity of competitive changes in the financial services marketplace have progressed to new heights. Financialisation, as it has become known, is creating new opportunities and constraints for nations, businesses and 'people', as the circuits of production have become more closely bound up with the innovative dynamics and institutions of the capital market. In an attempt to define, measure and explain the financialisation of the economy, this thesis draws upon a unique theoretical framework to explore the transformations in private pension provision. Using the work of Karl Polanyi as our guide, and particularly of those ideas found in his seminal book The Great Transformation, we posit that financialisation has gone through two different stages that we call disembedding and re-embedding. To articulate this proposition and to examine it beyond conventional economic accounts, we draw upon a wide variety of cultural (political) economic scholars, such as Veblen, Foucault, Bourdieu, Giddens, Callon and Thrift, whose ideas collectively help us to understand the cultural processes, strategies, conflicts, interactions and performances underpinning the ongoing evolution of financialisation in society. Applying this framework, we find that the collective pensions that were once part of a unified post-war political economy have come under threat from the new idea that welfare should be linked to the vagaries and anonymous circuits of the stock market. Disembedding has taken its form through the financialisation of pension provision, encouraging an explicit change from collective welfare to individual responsibility. While the individual has become precariously embedded as a financial consumer inside commercial market relations, it is doubtful whether this model is sustainable and practical as a means of delivering social inclusion and political enrichment.EThOS - Electronic Theses Online ServiceEconomic and Social Research CouncilGBUnited Kingdo

Governance und Public Policy

Gegenstand dieser kumulativen Habilitationsschrift sind teils publizierte, teils zur Publikation vorgesehen Beiträge zur wirtschafts- und sozialwissenschaftlichen Theoriebildung im Bereich Governance und Public Policy. Die Beiträge befassen sich insgesamt mit theoretischen Grundfragen der Evolution von Staatlichkeit und den institutionellen Bedingungen der Steuerung politisch-ökonomischer Prozesse. Hierbei wird ein theoretisches Feld abgedeckt, dass von der ökonomischen Theorie der Wirtschaftspolitik über die politikwissenschaftliche Theorie des Wohlfahrtsstaates bis hin zur politischen Ökonomie der europäischen Integration reicht. Gemeinsam ist all diesen theoretischen Perspektiven die Zugehörigkeit zum Diskussionszusammenhang des neuen Institutionalismus in den Wirtschafts- und Sozialwissenschaften. Er wird in der vorliegenden Arbeit vor allem hinsichtlich seiner Erklärungskraft für volkswirtschaftliche und politologische Fragestellungen zu Rate gezogen. Mit den Bezügen zur den Konzepten der Governance und der Public Policy lässt sich die Arbeit daher insgesamt als Beitrag zur aktuellen staats- und steuerungstheoretischen Debatte im ökonomischen und politikwissenschaftlichen Institutionalismus werten. Beide Bereiche sind dann als Pfeiler eines gemeinsamen staatswissenschaftlichen Paradigmas zu verstehen. Die Arbeit setzt sich aus zehn Einzeltexten zusammen. Sieben liegen in englischer Sprache vor, drei in deutscher Sprache. In der vorliegenden kumulativen Habilitationsschrift sind diese Einzelbeiträge systematisch in fünf Teilen mit jeweils zwei Kapiteln angeordnet

Voice or chatter? Making ICTs work for transformative engagement

What are the conditions in democratic governance that make information and communication technology (ICT)-mediated citizen engagement transformative? While substantial scholarship exists on the role of the Internet and digital technologies in triggering moments of political disruption and cascading upheavals, academic interest in the sort of deep change that transforms institutional cultures of democratic governance, occurring in ‘slow time’, has been relatively muted. This study attempts to fill this gap. It is inspired by the idea of participation in everyday democracy and seeks to explore how ICT-mediated citizen engagement can promote democratic governance and amplify citizen voice. The study involved empirical explorations of citizen engagement initiatives in eight sites – two in Asia (India and Philippines), one in Africa (South Africa), three in South America (Brazil, Colombia, Uruguay) and two in Europe (Netherlands and Spain).DFIDUSAIDSidaOmidyar Networ

The demise of the bank branch manager : the depersonalisation and disembedding of modern British banking

This thesis looked at the development of the role of the bank branch manager since the 1960s with the purpose of shedding light on the nature, drivers and impact of the transformation of British branch banking in this period. The analysis was based on interviews with former branch managers and revealed that the role of the branch manager as a skilled, authoritative and autonomous craftsman balancing the needs of customers, staff and the bank was increasingly coming under threat from the late 1970s onwards. The branch manager lost a great deal of authority and responsibility for customer outcomes through the introduction of credit scoring and through the removal of business lending from branches. Further, the introduction and intensification of targets reduced his or her discretion and autonomy.Although it is implicit in much of the literature, the original contribution of this thesis lies in its conceptualisation of the depersonalisation, the move from case-to-case judgements to rule-bound impersonal decisions, and the disembedding of banking, the detachment of service provision from social networks, by drawing on Weber, Granovetter, Giddens and Luhmann. Importantly, the agency of branch managers as gatekeepers, which lies at the intersection of skill, authority and autonomy, is central in making services embedded and personalised.It is argued that the progressive liberalisation of financial markets had a dual impact on banking and the role of the bank branch manager. First, it led to the depersonalisation of banking and the disembedding of the bank branch from local communities and customers. Second, financial liberalisation deskilled and disempowered the bank branch manager. The demise of the traditional bank branch manager through these dynamics changed the role of branches from originators of financial services to retail outlets for centrally branded, designed and controlled products

G2014: The security legacy

Mega-events such as the Olympics or Commonwealth Games are truly global events. Yet, the way in which these are utilised as a form of events led regeneration, gives these an increasingly local dimension; not only are Games taking place amidst the existing urban setting, but so too are their associate exceptional security features. Mega-events can also be considered representative of a new (in)security situation in which experts have been reactivated to operate on behalf of citizens; associations of invisible and omnipresent risks such as terrorism, have given executive authority to state agencies to define risks and develop responses, a situation which contradicts the last decades drive towards more community focused policing and empowerment. The cumulative and contradictory situation is that as global risks and security have become more embedded at the local level, there is an increasing of social distance between security expert and lay citizens. In short, local residents who encounter security within the context of their everyday environment are stripped of any contextual basis on which to understand associated risks and make sense of the attentive security measures. This situation places a greater emphasis on how risk and security is symbolically 'communicated' between experts and citizens, and how aspects of reassurance and deterrence are balanced amidst this backdrop. Existing literature in mega-events has tended to focus on security in a 'wide and shallow' sense: 'wide' in that they outline a whole range of security features and governance arrangements, but 'shallow' in the way that they do not take into account how these features are perceived at a deeper, local level. In this way, there is no real legacy to the security legacies. This thesis aims to address this issue by drawing on Glasgow's hosting of the 2014 Commonwealth Games. Qualitative interviews were used to gain the perspectives of both security experts from key stakeholder organisations responsible for delivering a safe and secure Games, and lay citizen’s perceptions and experiences of these arrangements. Using a semiotic theoretical lens, which includes key concepts from the work of Giddens, Baudrillard, Eco and Goffman, the analysis considers 1) How particular security related narratives are 'framed' by experts during the mega-event and how these were understood by residents in relation to local contexts, biographies and experiences. 2) The totalising and globalising claims of late modernity and mediated forms of risk are identified in relation to local understandings of place. In particular, why it is that certain events or places, legitimise the use of exceptional security and continue to licence executive state authority. 3) The sending and receiving of different forms of security as 'control signals' is analysed in relation to how overt displays of security are experienced; how they influence one’s position of reassurance, safety and ontological (in)security, and how they may enhance or defray trust in the institutions responsible for providing security. It is discovered that instances of miscommunication between state and citizen are rife, a situation exacerbated by the social distance created through existing governance arrangements and an overreliance on symbolic security. The thesis concludes by arguing that the governance of security at mega-events is not the best way of doing things and that the appropriation of issues of risk and security by experts creates new sources of insecurity among citizens. It calls for the enlisting of communities into the governance of security as a way of overcoming such limitations

Governance and Business Models for Sustainable Capitalism

Governance and Business Models for Sustainable Capitalism touches upon many of the central themes of today’s debate on business and society. In particular, it brings attention to a recurrent tension between efficiency, innovation, and productivity on the one hand, and fairness, equity, and sustainability on the other. The book argues that we need radical rethinking of business models and economic governance, beyond the classical doctrine, which sees social and ecological responsibility as lying with public-policy regulation of purely profit-seeking firms. In spite of the popular CSR agenda, business – as we know it today – is both too transient and too limited in its motivation to carry the regulatory burden. We need to adopt a much wider concept of 'partnered governance', where advanced states and pioneering companies work together to raise the social and environmental bar. The book suggests that civil engagements based on moral rather than formal rights, and amplified through the media, may provide a healthy challenge both to autocratic planning and to solely profit-centered commercialization. The book also proposes a triple cycle theory of innovation for sustainability: a novel framing of the efficacy of green and prosocial entrepreneurship as intertwined with political visions and supportive institutions. In addition, the book offers reflections on the ways in which further digital robotizaton may enable transition to an ‘Agora Economy’ where productive efficiency is combined with expanded civic freedoms. Aimed primarily at researchers, academics, and students in the fields of political economy, business and society, corporate governance, business ethics, corporate social responsibility, and sustainability, the book will additionally be of value to practitioners, supplying them with information regarding the challenges associated with the shaping of sustainable or ‘civilised’ market capitalism for a better world