Overcoming the Impasse in Modern Economics

This document is the Accepted Manuscript version of the following article: Francesca Gagliardi, and David Gindis, 'Overcoming the Impasse in Modern Economics', Competition and Change, Vol. 15 (4): 336-42, November 2011, doi: 10.1179/102452911X13135903675732. Published by SAGE.Peer reviewe

The Political Economy of US Military Spending

The causes of the dramatic rise in military spending in the post-war era have been the subject of much political and academic controversy. No extant formulation seems to provide a compelling explanation of the dynamics involved in the levels of, and rates of change in, such spending. In light of this, the authors develop a new model, based mainly on a political-business cycle argument, to account for these dynamics. The basic proposition in this model is that variations in national defense spending arise from political considerations which are related to real and desired conditions within the national economy. Applying this model to the experience of the United States 1948-1976, the authors show that it has a large measure of empirical validity. If one removes the effects of war-time mobilization, it is clear that for the United States the principal driving forces in military spending dynamics were (1) the perceived utility of such spending in stabilizing aggregate demand, (2) the political or electoral value of the perceived economic effects arising out of such spending, and (3) the pressures of institutional-constituency demands.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/68958/2/10.1177_002234337901600202.pd

Why is management research irrelevant?

At least since 1980, there has been a practically continuous, but somewhat fragmented discussion on the relevance of management research. This discussion has addressed practically all fields of management; here, besides general management, operations management, project management and construction management are examined in more detail. Although many different proposals have been made to rectify the situation, no definitive resolution has been found. In this paper, it is argued that prior analyses have not reached the root causes of the irrelevance problem. By an analysis of the recent history of management research, the following novel findings are reached. First, the root cause of the irrelevance is argued to lie in the 1959 reports on American business education, written by Pierson and Gordon & Howell. Second, while the proposed direction in the 1959 reports was deficient in several ways, the rejection of production as an integral part of organizations and management has been perhaps the most damaging feature of those reports. Third, current research on management suffers from a variety of immediate causes for irrelevance, insufficiently recognized by the scholarly community. It is suggested that reaching the root causes for irrelevance will facilitate finding suitable cures

Understanding construction reform discourses

This is an Accepted Manuscript of an article published by Taylor & Francis in Construction Management and Economics on 8th May 2014, available online: http://wwww.tandfonline.com/10.1080/01446193.2014.909049Attempts to drive change and reform of the UK construction industry have been an ongoing concern for numerous stakeholders, both in government and across industry, for years. The issue is a seemingly perennially topical one which shows little sign of abating. Scholarly analyses of the reform agenda have tended to adopt a Critical Theory perspective. Such an approach, however, lacks a certain nuance and perhaps only reveals one layer of social reality. What is arguably lacking is a more fundamental exposition concerning the historical, social and cultural explanatory forces at play. While it is illuminating to expose vested interests, ideology and power, what has led to the development of various views? How have they come to achieve such high accord in discussions? Drawing on the works of Max Weber, Georg Simmel and Barbara Adam, this paper seeks to develop a broader theoretical lens. It considers the wider socio-cultural structures and forces that influence behaviour, shape and constrain these views. This approach will contribute to a much needed broader philosophical and theoretical debate within the construction management community (and beyond) on the need to better engage with, and understand, the sources influencing the issue of policy formulation and diffusion. © 2014 Taylor & Francis