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Leading industrial economists focus on the processes by which governments in market economies take actions to influence economic activity in firms and industries. They examine the basis of regulation, assessing the cases commonly made for and against regulation. Having established a coherent framework for analysis it explores key currnet issues, including mergers and the role of regulation within the European Community

Offers a perspective on the state of the global economy. This book explores the possibility of an institutional dynamism that impacts not only on the characteristics of localities and their place in a hierarchical and ordered system of relationships, but on the nature of the system itself

peer-reviewed ; INTRODUCTION: In early 2006 the Irish Government announced a Pilot Initiative for Collaborative Projects from Industry-Led Networks, the latest in a series of policies on 'business networking' that date back to the mid-1980s. The purpose of this chapter is to describe and comment on those policies by reviewing the previous literature (both academic and policy documents). What we stress is that over the years and across different policies, the precise focus has varied, in terms of networking aims and objectives and networking forms.1 We appreciate that there is considerable confusion in the wider discussions as to the meaning of 'networks' and 'networking' in a business context, and indeed this has been recognized before in analysis of Irish policy (for example, in Forfás (2004)). However, our approach is to avoid much of that confusion by simply centring discussion on those (inter-related and overlapping) areas of policy that the literature on Ireland consistently addresses when considering 'business networking', namely: 'linkages' between 'local' firms and transnational/multinational corporation (TNCs); training networks; research and development (R&D) networks; inter-firm cooperation processes more widely. These four topics are respectively the prime focus of successive Sections in this Chapter. Our discussion culminates in a consideration of the prospects for the successful impact of the 2006 Pilot. We welcome the initiative as seeming to represent a welcome seed-change in policy, and offer preliminary insights into how it might be evaluated. In doing so we introduce the notion of 'public interest evaluation' (PIE), intended to assess the extent to which public interests are served by a particular policy. Part of the idea is that whilst the Pilot is focused on (to some extent) measurable benefits to participating enterprises from networking projects, it might also be desirable to consider other effects on wider publics. ; ACCEPTED ; Peer reviewed

SummaryThis paper presents a novel analysis about the capabilities of academic researchers and academic poverty. Adopting the capability approach, which Amartya Sen developed to address concerns such as poverty, inequality and development, we shift the focus of analysis and discussion around evaluating academic research and academics in the social sciences from measures of so‐called 'quality', 'impact' or 'excellence' to the capabilities of academics. For us, the conceptualization and evaluation of academic research is a question about what academics have reasons to value, and about their ability to achieve valuable beings and doings. It is also about determining what might constitute academic poverty, and what academics are required to do in order to avoid that poverty.Relating our analysis to debates around universities, in particular about quasi‐market pressures, we identify the possibility of basic capabilities in academic research, namely: the capabilities that are necessary to fulfill basic academic needs. Our proposition is that there is academic poverty when an academic researcher is not capable of fulfilling basic academic needs, such as: adhering to standards of coherence, robustness and rigour; searching for and disseminating the spirit of the truth. Moreover, if the academic has the capabilities to fulfill those basic academic needs and yet chooses not to do so, she renders herself in a state akin to academic poverty.

Following Coase's fundamental concern with planning, in this paper we highlight strategic decision‐making as important for distinguishing the essence of the modern large corporation. It is consistent with industrial organization analysis of industries yet provides a novel starting point for the theory of the firm. We suggest different boundaries to the organization compared with those identified elsewhere, and whereas others peering into the black box of Walrasian theory merely see more of what is on the outside, we see transactions within and without the firm as fundamentally different. The analysis recognizes Pareto inefficiencies but concludes with an optimistic vision for economic policy.