Suchergebnisse

Fifteen years ago, Katzenstein convincingly emphasized the specific features of small European states to cope with their external environment: international liberalization, domestic compensation and flexible adjustment to fluctuations of international markets through democratic corporatist institutions. Thus, small countries should be expected to be less vulnerable to the current trend of economic globalization, as they have previously been exposed to international competition, at least in product markets. Like other small European countries, Switzerland also developed some kind of compensation policies, which were quite different from the policies of other small European states, and favored mainly economic sectors producing for domestic markets. In the 1990´s, the liberalization of domestic markets, in response to increasing external pressures, was one of the most important issues in Swiss politics. External pressures, and the changing political preferences of the export-oriented sectors, also triggered important changes in other social and economic policy domains. While much attention has been paid to the recent changes in Scandinavian countries, especially Sweden, the Swiss liberal-conservative model also faced important changes in the recent period. In the paper, I highlight in which ways the processes of globalization and europeanization affect social and economic policies, which can be considered compensation policies. I analyse three main fields (labor market regulations, social policies and domestic regulations favouring domestic economic sectors) where changes occurred in the recent period. ; Vor fünfzehn Jahren hat Katzenstein die spezifischen Anpassungsmerkmale kleiner europäischer Staaten an ihre internationale Umgebung überzeugend gezeigt: internationale Liberalisierung, innere Kompensation und flexible Anpassung an internationale Märkte durch korporatistische Institutionen. Dank ihrer frühen Integration in die Weltmärkte müßten kleine Staaten im jetzigen Globalisierungsprozess weniger verwundbar sein. Wie andere kleine europäische Staaten hat auch die Schweiz einige Kompensationspolitiken entwickelt. Diese unterschieden sich aber sehr von den Politiken anderer europäischer Staaten und konzentrierten sich haupsächlich auf den Schutz des Binnenmarkts. Während der 90er Jahre war die Liberalisierung des Binnenmarkts als Antwort auf steigenden internationalen Druck eines der wichtigsten Themen der schweizerischen Politik. Äusserer Druck und die Änderung der politischen Präferenzen der exportorientierten Sektoren haben auch wichtige Reformen in anderen Bereichen der Sozial- und Wirtschaftspolitik ausgelöst. Während viel über Reformen in den skandinavischen Länder, besonders in Schweden, geschrieben wurde, hat auch das schweizerische liberal-konservative" Modell viele Reformen erlebt. In dem Papier wird gezeigt, wie sich die Globalisierungs- und Europäisierungsprozesse auf die Sozial- und Wirtschaftspolitik, die man als Kompensationspolitiken bezeichnen kann, auswirken. Drei Bereiche, wo Reformen stattgefunden haben, wurden analysiert: Arbeitsmarktregulierungen, Sozialpolitik und protektionistische Regulierungen des Binnenmarkts.

RésuméPour les petits Etats européens, comme la Suisse, qui avaient réussi à concilier stabilité politique et flexibilité économique, les années 90 marquent un tournant important par l'ampleur des mesures de libéralisation réalisées ou en cours. L'"ajustement" à l'évolution de l'environnement international ne se limite plus aux secteurs déjà soumis à la concurrence internationale mais touche l'ensemble de l'économie: agriculture, entreprises publiques, marchés publics, marché du travail, réglementation de la main d'oeuvre étrangère ou encore promotion de la concurrence sur le marché intérieur. Alors que l'ancienne législation sur les cartels se caractérisait par sa permissivité et sa faible portée, la nouvelle loi s'apparente dans ses grandes lignes au droit européen de la concurrence. Après une présentation des particularités de l'ancienne loi, le texte analyse le processus de révision: les impulsions internes et externes, le rôle des acteurs impliqués et les coalitions qui ont permis l'aboutissement de cette révision. Pour terminer, nous revenons sur quelques considérations théoriques plus générales.

Analyzes the decision-making process that led to adoption at the end of 1995 of a revised Swiss cartel law that conforms to European Union regulations and represents a response to economic globalization. Summaries in German and English.

The book provides the first systematic overview of Swiss political economy in comparative perspective. It provides an analysis of major socio-economic institutions, economic actors, economic and social policies, and political institutions and their recent changes.

This research paper discusses the role of institutions in the rapid growth and successful international integration of Switzerland during the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. In analysing the emergence and consolidation of the institutions whose existence was crucial, the paper looks both at the political institutions that managed conflicts and promoted cooperation between private and public actors and the economic institutions that, on the one hand, compensated the groups that fell behind in the developmental process (e.g., agricultural subsidies, high tolerance for domestic cartels, tariffs for some industries, institutions for labour representation) and, on the other hand, enhanced productivity. In addition, the absence of some institutions such as a patent law and an independent central bank was also crucial in the Swiss case, even though these two institutions are regarded as pre-requisites of development by today's economic orthodoxy. The paper concludes by drawing lessons for today's developing countries.

AbstractSwitzerland has traditionally had a better employment performance than most other European countries. In the past, this could be explained with a specific foreign workers policy and to the buffer role women played in the labor market. In the late 1990s, however, foreigners and women occupy a considerably more stable position in the labor force than in the 1970s. Therefore, other factors must explain this good employment performance. International comparisons show that advanced economies tend to perform well in employment creation if, a) there are big wage inequalities (USA), or b) if there is a large public sector (Sweden). We show that Switzerland has none of these features, and that on the basis of prevailing theories of post‐industrial employment creation, it is difficult to account for the Swiss labor market performance in the late 1990s. We put forward and assess a number of possible explanations for this "new puzzle", and conclude that a successful research strategy in this area should combine elements of welfare regime analysis with a focus on labor market institutions.

Assesses a number of possible explanations for the current high level of employment in Switzerland, despite its having no large wage inequalities, as in the US, nor a large public sector, as in Sweden. Summaries in French and German.

AbstractCorporate interlocking at the national and transnational scale has received substantive scholarly attention. Less is known about companies' ties to the cities and regions in which they have their seats. In this paper, we conduct a long‐term analysis of the multilevel ties that companies maintain with the local and the national context they are embedded in. To do so, we adopt a positional approach and identify the directors of the major companies in the three largest Swiss cities (Basel, Geneva, and Zurich) and study company directors' ties to local and national organizations in seven benchmark years between 1890 and 2020. Our analysis documents the rise and fall of company directors' ties to national organizations over the course of the 20th century, and it highlights the continued persistence of companies' ties to the local level and their region until the new millennium, when companies' ties with national and local organizations vanish, coinciding with the transnationalization of company boards.