A radically new interpretation, offering a unified explanation for the growth of Western Europe between 900 A. D. and 1700, provides a general theoretical framework for institutional change geared to the general reader.
North and Thomas seek to explain the "rise of the Western world" by illuminating the causal importance of an efficient economic organization that guarantees a wide latitude of property rights and both incentives and protection for economic growth. Although they pay homage to both Marxian and neoliberal theory, they take a theoretical middle ground that privileges the sociopolitical backdrop of economic affairs (as opposed to solely private or class-based activity) and in doing so identifies the roots of modernization as far back as the 10th Century. To justify the novelty and originality of this approach, they write that most analysts have misidentified the symptoms of modern economic growth (technological change, human capital, economies of scale) as the causes. In doing so, previous scholars have failed to answer the question "if all that is required for economic growth is investment and innovation, why have some societies missed this desirable outcome?" (2). Their answer is that some societies (England and the Netherlands) were better than others (France and Spain) at providing an efficient economic organization that could guarantee conditions favorable to per capita economic growth among a rapidly growing population.

Учебник по экономике сельскохозяйственного развития.

Producers in industrialized countries have been inundated with ideas and information about precision agriculture (PA) and how new site-specific management (SSM) technologies will revolutionize their farm operations. Conjuring up Star Wars-imagery, farmers and their computerized machinery communicate with satellites while speeding up and down the information highway. The farm press has hailed the advent of these technologies as a win-win situation with higher farm profits and improved environmental quality. Certainly the potential is there for greater economic returns and better environmental stewardship. But what exactly is precision agriculture, who is applying it, and where? Is the technology only relevant for developed countries and are there implications for markets? What is the likelihood that environmental benefits will be realized?

This paper addresses these questions by drawing on literature, data, and expert opinion to explore what technologies have been developed and which ones have been or are likely to be adopted, by whom, and where. It considers the environmental implications of this host of new information technologies.

Книга Дугласа Норта, лауреата Нобелевской премии по экономике 1993 года, выдержавшая как минимум 9 изданий на английском языке, является одной из основополагающих работ в области институционально-эволюционной теории. Здесь рассматривается роль институтов (законов, соглашений, кодексов поведения и т.п.) в социально-экономическом развитии. Особую ценность для российского читателя имеет анализ влияния четко определенных и защищенных прав собственности на эффективный экономический рост, а также зависимости развития экономики от исторически сложившейся институциональной системы. На русском языке публикуется впервые в переводе А. Н. Нестеренко под редакцией Б. З. Мильнера.

This contribution deals with opportunities to integrate ecological objectives into landscape modelling. We start with the behaviour of farmers. By depicting the behaviour of farmers with respect to land use we determine farm and field sizes, as been dependent on prices, natural conditions, and structural variables, such as farm technologies. Then we pursue the idea that a geometrical interpretation of land use can help us to define an interface between farming, landscape modelling, and ecological concerns. This interface goes along economic rationales for income of farmers and ecological rationales for a redesign of landscapes. Next, for integrating ecological oriented nature components into a landscape planning, as been based on economic incentives, a payment scheme has to be introduced. Such payment scheme becomes part of farmers’ objective functions in a non-linear model. Core decision variables are the longitudinal stretch of field sizes and the transversal stretch of farm sizes. Then, given various natural frames within an overarching subdivision of field parcels, farms and the landscape are optimised. The suggested approach can be sequentially solved taking into consideration natural conditions and behaviour. Furthermore, a central focus is on policy instruments: 1. We cater for impacts of price policies on landscape structure (farm size) and ecology (heterogeneity of fields). Note, in this context, that it is important to depict the growth of fields as being a consequence of imposed price pressure, modern technology application, and income aspirations. 2. The ecological impacts of this process, also from intensity of farming, are addressed and measured as a diversity index. 3. Policies can be selected that maintain farm income and correct for negative ecological effects of field size changes. For this reason we suggest a principal agent approach and offer objective functions.

The paper explores the question of diversity in agricultural practice as related to bio-diversity and landscape appearance. It starts with the observation that, in the past, diverse natural conditions have considerably impacted on adapted modes of agricultural production, more than today, and that previously performed farm practices were strongly affiliated with specific natural conditions. These practices positively contributed to a modified, diverse and man-made environment which is frequently considered a beautiful landscape. This has changed dramatically. Particularly, where the European countryside is regarded a natural heritage, today, the public seems to be worried about modern farm practices. After the adoption of modern techniques, farmers prefer to apply unified production technologies and tend to set-up uniform farm structures and product mixes as well as land cultivation practices based on purchased inputs. Farm operations equalise natural conditions and contribute to uniform land rents. However, a rising public concern for the preservation of bio-diversity is asking for change and new measures. Additional to regulations on farm practices governments seek to compensate farmers for nature preservation and production of bio-diversity. Presuming that high biodiversity is dependent on diversity in agricultural practice and landscape appearance due to preserved natural conditions, the paper develops a model that links payments to diversity in farm practice and natural conditions. The applied model is landscape-oriented and classifies farm behaviour according to agronomic conditions. A reference system for a unified technology is presented and implications for payments are discussed using a behavioural approach. This behavioural approach focuses on regional dynamics in natural condition as major determinants for bio-diversity and payments as determinants for farm practices. Payments are directed to re-establish diversity in farm practices, counteract current technology dominance, and assure a new exposure to nature, though only partly. Diversity becomes prevalent; notably according to an economic calculus of costs and benefits from taxpayers' point of view.

Это книга - шестое издание финансового бестселлера Эрика Наймана, где в легкой и доступной форме изложены основные понятия и приемы успешного трейдинга. Автор описывает основные методы фундаментального и технического анализа, рассказывает об индикаторах и опционах, знакомит со специфическими видами анализа, методикой управления рисками, основами психологии биржевой игры. Энциклопедия предназначена для частных инвесторов и специалистов, работающих на финансовых рынках, сотрудников инвестиционных компаний и банков, а также для тех, кто стремится найти пути приумножения своих средств. Книга может использоваться в качестве учебного пособия для студентов экономических специальностей.

This paper estimates a structural econometric model of household decisions regarding income strategies, participation in programs and organizations, crop choices, land management, and labor use, and their implications for agricultural production and land degradation; based upon a survey of over 450 households and their farm plots in Uganda. The results generally support the Boserupian model of population-induced agricultural intensification, but do not support the .more people-less erosion. hypothesis, with population pressure found to contribute to erosion in the densely populated highlands. Agricultural technical assistance programs have location-specific impacts on agricultural production and land degradation, contributing to higher value of crop production in the lowlands, but to soil erosion in the highlands. By contrast, NGO programs focusing on agriculture and environment are helping to reduce erosion, but have mixed impacts on production. We find little evidence of impact of access to markets, roads and credit, land tenure or title on agricultural intensification and crop production, though road access appears to contribute to land degradation in the highlands. Education increases household incomes, but also reduces crop production in the lowlands. We do not find evidence of a poverty-land degradation trap, while poverty has mixed impacts on agricultural production: smaller farms obtain higher crop production per hectare, while households with fewer livestock have crop production. These findings suggest that development of factor markets can improve agricultural efficiency. Several other factors that contribute to increased value of crop production, without significant impacts on land degradation, include specialized crop production, livestock and nonfarm income strategies, and irrigation. In general, the results imply that the strategies to increase agricultural production and reduce land degradation must be location-specific, and that there are few .win-win. opportunities to simultaneously increase production and reduce land degradation.

This study examines consumer willingness to pay for irradiated beef products. About 58 percent of the respondents are willing to pay a premium for irradiated beef. An ordered probit with sample selection model was estimated. Standard errors of the marginal effects of the ordered probit model were estimated using the bootstrap method. Our findings suggest that females and those who think that improper handling contributes to food poisoning are more likely to pay a premium of 50 cents per pound of irradiated beef than others. Those who trust the irradiation technology are also more likely to pay a premium of between 5 to 25 cents per pound for irradiated beef. Supply chain implications are discussed.

Сборник "Статистика предприятий" содержит научные материалы, освещающие все основные вопросы этой отрасли статистики. В нем дано обобщающее статистическое определение предприятия, рассматриваются проблемы составления национальных регистров предприятий, являющихся информационной основой проведения ежегодных обследований, и методические вопросы организации таких обследований. Особенно интересно, что в рецензируемом сборнике, представляющем собой вторую книгу серии "Статистические очерки", собраны статьи представителей двух различных, принятых в Европе статистических подходов к оценке границ сектора предприятий: национального, или французского, и секторального, или немецкого. Научная ценность сборника определяется также и подробным анализом методических подходов к интеграции статистической информации о предприятиях, полученной в указанных различных концепциях определения границ сектора предприятий. Проведение весной 2003 г. экономической переписи в России делает аннотируемый сборник особенно актуальным.

Одна из важнейших психологических работ последнего десятилетия. В ней рассматриваются основные теоретические идеи социальной психологии, анализируется драматический опыт практического решения социальных проблем. В центре внимания авторов — знаменитых социальных психологов — власть ситуации над поведением человека, ее психологические механизмы и прикладные следствия. Для студентов и преподавателей высших учебных заведений, для всех, кто интересуется социально-психологической теорией и ее применением на практике.

This volume serves as an introduction to the field of positive political economy and the economic and political processes with which it is concerned. This new research tradition is distinct from both normative and historical approaches to political economy. Grounded in the rational-actor methodology of microeconomics, positive political economy is the study of rational decisions in a context of political and economic institutions. More analytical than traditional approaches, it is concerned with the derivation of principles and propositions against which real-world experience may be compared. Its focus is on empirical regularities, and its goal is theoretical explanation.

The field has focused on three main areas of research: models of collective action, constraints on competitive market processes, and the analysis of transaction costs. Developments in all of these areas are covered in the book. The first part of the volume surveys the field, while the second part displays positive political economy at work, examining a variety of subjects. The final part contains essays by leading political economists on the theoretical foundations of the field.

This paper provides an overview of the European Union component of the recently developed ERS/Penn State WTO Model. The model is a multi-region, multi-commodity partial equilibrium trade model which allows the user to simulate the effects of reducing or eliminating tariffs and TRQs, export subsidies, and domestic support policies. The paper describes how the model captures the important agricultural policies of the EU, and presents results from model simulations of domestic support liberalization, export subsidy elimination, and tariff removal.

This is an intriguing book, which weaves together ideas from organization theory, strategic management and marketing to explore the implications of viewing the company as a knowledge processing system. In developing this perspective, the authors describe different types of knowledge and knowledge processes, using their classification to elucidate processes for value creation, organizing for knowledge, and the company as a knowledge system. They argue that much knowledge-and thus value-inheres and accumulates in the complex web of relationships between suppliers and customers. Such a view highlights the significance of durable relations in extended networks as an important route to value creation. The authors describe organizations as knowledge-producing systems and divide the concept of knowledge into categories of 1.information, 2.skill or know-how, 3.explanation, and 4.understanding. The knowledge-creating process is described in terms of: generative processes, creating new knowledge productive processes that form the basis for offerings and commitments to customers, and representative processes that transmit these offerings to customers, often in an interactive mode of joint value-creation. The message dovetails with Richard Normann's writings (with Rafael Ramirez) in the early 90s on the shift from value chains (Porter) to value constellations (value stars) and combines the concepts of competence, customer base, and offerings into an evolutionary model of business growth. The authors delineate a model of the interactive enterprise-an organization where interaction and the forming of relationships are core activities in developing markets, developing products, and shaping and stabilizing partnerships. The value constellation (Normann and Ramirez) is a good illustration of this perspective. Organizations combine their own and their partners' customer bases and competencies into offerings to customers. And customers are invited to share in the value-creation process. A well-functioning value constellation is indeed a learning organization. Central to the organizational learning process is the notion of the client-driven organization and the interactive process of value-creation with the customer. Also the other end of the organizational domain, the production system, is seen as a partnering system with the overriding goal to excel in value-creation. The authors describe the four elements of the industrial system; centralization, standardization, mechanization, and division of labor. They then continue to discuss how current developments change this formation and lead up to the four corresponding elements of information technology production, decentralization, multiplicity, information technology, and integration. The transition from one to the other is not an easy one. It is, however, necessary for those companies that want to survive in turbulent markets and in ever more complex economies. They simply have to exploit the potentials of information technology. They have to develop their core systems into knowledge-creating enterprises. The collapsed model combines the notion of value constellation which integrates partners in the production system and value constellations in the interaction with the final customer and places the three organizational knowledge-creating processes (generative, productive, and representative) as mediators between the two value centers. The value constellations thus serve as complex interfaces between the company and its supply and demand markets. On the one side is purchasing. On the other side is marketing, or perhaps rather market communication. And in between is the knowledge-creating company. The frame of reference pronounces evolutionary growth and the industrial setting and point of reference is first of all service-producing companies. The handling of discontinuities, turnarounds, and the acquisition of new customers, or new competencies, are not in the authors' focus.