A Framework of Socioeconomic Organisation: Redefining Original Institutional Economics Along Critical Realist Philosophical Lines

The paper develops a theoretical framework of socioeconomic organisation to enrich understanding of the complex interrelation between economy and institutional environment. To achieve this, key elements from both new and old institutional economics are combined and integrated under the philosophical platform of critical realism. Institutionalist research can be, and has been, informed by a range of philosophical positions and analytical standpoints. Critical realism, in turn, has certain advantages, over the other philosophical perspectives, in discussing the institutional organisation of urban socioeconomy. These mainly stem from its ontological arguments that allow the dissociation of institutional structure from human agency, and acknowledge the separate identity and causal powers of institutions without undermining their agent-dependent nature. This is important because it enables a neat identification and analysis of the institutional qualities, mechanisms, causal powers and relations that characterise the socioeconomic fabric. Moreover, the fact that the realist ontology is compatible with a variety of economic theories renders its fusion with institutionalism on the whole both valid and feasible. The paper starts delineating the philosophical tenets of critical realism, which provide the basis for the development of a stratified ontological framework discussing the institutional organisation of the urban socioeconomy. In particular, a three-layer, interlocked reality is identified describing the complexity, multidimensionality, and dynamic character of the socioeconomic world. It is argued that deeper tendencies, capacities, ‘instincts’ and qualities of the human essence (understood as ‘creativity’, ‘emulation’ and ‘culture’) condition the institutional environment (differentiated in economic, political, legal, and social terms), which in turn constitutes the terrain upon which organisational arrangements are manifested and socioeconomic events are actualised. In these terms, institutions are defined as ingrained regularities or established rules of human life that mould and determine agents’ perception, expectations and behaviour, providing order, stability and certainty in social interaction and economic organisation. The paper closes summarising the epistemological and methodological position espoused to establish a generic analytical framework that can be used to investigate the institutional texture of the urban/regional socioeconomic environment.

Property Market Purpose Efficiency: An Exploratory Analysis From an Institutional Economics Perspective

Over the last years the issue of property market efficiency has attracted increasing attention in both academic and professional research. Yet, the concept of property market efficiency is poorly developed and inadequately theorised. The conventional approaches (i.e. ‘allocative efficiency’ and ‘efficient market hypothesis’) provide flawed and ambiguous judgements as they assess efficiency with reference to idealised benchmarks, they do not take into account the intrinsic characteristics and dynamic process of the property market and they are artificially dissociated from important operational issues. In turn, institutionalist attempts to articulate more refined and pragmatic conceptualisations of property market efficiency, while they have provided useful insights, remain methodologically underdeveloped and incomplete. Building on the latter approaches the current paper explores a possible way to evaluate the effectiveness of the property market in delivering a combination of outcomes that will generate and/or sustain urban economic development. This provides the basis for the development of the idea of a ‘purpose efficient property market’. To achieve this, two theoretical devices are developed: ‘institutional uncertainty’ and ‘institutionalised variety’. Institutional uncertainty assesses the quality of the wider (urban) institutional arrangements and reflects how effectively the urban socioeconomy adapts to pressures and provides a secure economic environment. Institutionalised variety evaluates particular institutions, in this case the property market, in terms of diversity in institutions, organisations, and products provided. Such a micro-level variety is deemed necessary both for the system to reproduce itself through time and for macro dynamics to be successfully sustained. In that sense, macroeconomic order and relative stability are reinforced alongside, and arise upon, variety and diversity at the micro-level. Putting the arguments together, the property market purpose efficiency is understood with reference to the market’s ability to match ‘institutionalised variety’ to the level of ‘institutional uncertainty’ that the wider urban institutional environment exhibits. In that sense, a purpose efficient property market allocates optimal resources to institutionalised variety, given the level of uncertainty the wider institutional environment carries, and thereby delivers the property products that the economy requires at the prevailing price.

METROPOLITAN DEVELOPMENT AND COOPERATION IN SOUTH-EASTERN EUROPE

This paper explores the role and importance of the four, closelocated, metropolises of south-eastern Europe (Skopje, Sofia, Thessaloniki and Tirana) and proposes a strategy that promotes metropolitan growth and development, maximizes spread effects to national hinterlands, and advances cross-country cooperation between cities in the area. These metropolitan centres play a significant role within both their respective countries and the whole region, because of their function as political/administrative centres and economic/growth poles and their dominance over the other national urban centres. In addition, their relative proximity permits the development of networks of cooperation and the gradual formation of a polycentric regional structure in south-eastern Europe, which will progressively embrace all the important cities, to increasing regional integration and enhancing economic development.METROPOLITAN DEVELOPMENT, STRATEGY, URBAN CENTRES, SOUTHEASTERN EUROPE

Characteristics of Dynamic Regions in the World Economy: Defining Knowledge-Driven Economic Dynamism

DYNREG

Determinants of economic growth: the experts’ view

DYNREG

Theoretical and Methodological Study on Dynamic Growth Regions and Factors Explaining their Growth Performance

DYNREG

Explaining Knowledge-Based Economic Dynamism in a Global Scale

This paper uses the concept of knowledge-based economic dynamism to overcome the simplified perspective on economic performance implied by the economic growth variable. Knowledge-based economic dynamism refers to the potential an area has for generating and maintaining high rates of economic performance. Furthermore, this study develops econometric models to detect the determinants of knowledge-based economic dynamism at the international level. The analysis covers the period 1990-2002. Econometric models provide critical insight relative to the factors driving dynamism with important implications for theory and policy.DYNREG