Markets, False Hierarchies and the Evolution of the Modern Corporation

Neil M. Kay
Additional contact information
Neil M. Kay: University of Strathclyde

Chapter 4 in The Boundaries of the Firm, 1999, pp 73-92 from Palgrave Macmillan

Abstract: Abstract Transaction-cost economics, or the markets and hierarchies framework, has emerged in recent years as an important new approach for dealing with a variety of problems in industrial organisation. Although Coase (1937) provided an early statement of the role of costs of using the market in encouraging firm organisation to replace market exchange in certain circumstances, the development of transaction-cost economics as a coherent and systematic industrial organisation framework did not take place until the 1970s. The rediscovery, development and refinement of transaction-costs as a possible analytical tool is due in large part to Oliver Williamson, whose outline of the framework is contained in three works. The initial statement, Markets and Hierarchies (1975; henceforth M&H) provided an integration and synthesis of some earlier applications of transaction-cost economics in areas such as internal labour markets, vertical integration, conglomerates and the economics of internal organisation. Recently, his Economic Institutions of Capitalism (1985; henceforth EIC) has further extended the boundaries of transaction-cost economics, remaining broadly consistent with M&H and integrating many of its earlier arguments in the text. In addition, Economic Organisation (1986; henceforth EO) is a selected set of essays, some in transaction-cost economics and some from an earlier period in Williamson’s work. For our purposes, EIC may be taken as a definitive and current statement of Williamson’s approach to economics though both of the other works extend the analysis in significant respects.

Keywords: Corporate Evolution; Multinational Enterprise; Asset Specificity; External Market; Internal Capital Market (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 1999
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

There are no downloads for this item, see the EconPapers FAQ for hints about obtaining it.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:pal:palchp:978-1-349-14645-1_4

Ordering information: This item can be ordered from
http://www.palgrave.com/9781349146451

DOI: 10.1007/978-1-349-14645-1_4

Access Statistics for this chapter

More chapters in Palgrave Macmillan Books from Palgrave Macmillan
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().