The Political Economy of Property Rights
Institutional Change and Credibility in the Reform of Centrally Planned Economies

A 1997 investigation of the transformation of property rights in post-communist countries and China.

David L. Weimer (Edited by)

9780521180702, Cambridge University Press

Paperback, published 17 February 2011

384 pages
22.9 x 15.2 x 2.2 cm, 0.56 kg

"This volume examines why the countries have followed the policy courses that they did. Weimer describes the basic principles of property rights, in particular, security against appropriation by others, emphasizes the close connection between private property and democracy, and then summarizes the other contributions. ...a major step toward developing such a full model, as it confronts the modesl with many empirical cases. We can then see what data and techiniques are most successful in testin the theory." Kenneth Koford, Journal of Comparative Economics

Originally published in 1997, The Political Economy of Property Rights reports on comparative research into the transformation of property rights in post-communist countries and China. Two important theoretical questions unify the contributions: what aspects of political systems give credibility to systems of property rights? What can be learned from the transformation of property rights in post-communist countries about the large-scale change of economic institutions? The contributors consider the credibility of property rights as arising from the strategic interaction of political and economic actors, and they apply this perspective and test its implications using a variety of qualitative and quantitative methods. Overall, the volume demonstrates the value of coordinated cross-national research by area specialists sharing a common focus on questions of political economy.

1. The political economy of property rights David L. Weimer
2. Credible commitment and property rights: the role of strategic interaction between political and economic actors Daniel Diermeier, Joel Ericson, Timothy Frye, and Steven Lewis
3. The political commitment to markets and marketization: comment on 'Credible commmitment and property rights' Barry R. Weingast
4. Political determinants of the success of economic transition Nikolai Mikhailov
5. Comment on 'Political determinants of the success of economic transition' Adam Przeworski
6. Russian privatization and the problem of credible commitment Timothy Frye
7. Three issues of credible commitment and Russian privatization John M. Litwack
8. Legislative politics and the political economy of property rights in post-Communist Russia Brendan Kiernan and Francis X. Bell
9. Commitment, coordination, and the demise of the post-Communist parliament in Russia Steven S. Smith
10. Private firms, city governments, and arbitration: enforcing economic legality in St. Petersburg Jole Meyer Ericson
11. Comment on 'Private firms, city governments, and arbitration: enforcing economic legality in St. Petersburg' Anthony Jones
12. Property rights and institutional change in the Czech and Slovac Republics Mariusz Mark Dobek
13. Comment on 'Property rights and institutional change in the Czech and Slovac Republics' Sharon Wolchik
14. Institutional structures, labor interests, and evolving privatization bargains in Poland Lorene Allio
15. Comment on 'Institutional structures, labor interests, and evolving privatization bargains in Poland' Bartlomeij Kaminski
16. Privatization as institutional change in Hungary László Urbán
17. Comment on 'Privatization as institutional change in Hungary' Kálmán Mizsei
18. Marketization and government credibility in Shanghai: federalist and local corporatist explanations Steven Lewis
19. Federalist and corporatist theories: a comment on an empirical test Victor Nee
20. Learning about the economy: property rights and the collapse of the East German industrial economy Hannes Wittig
21. Misinformation, insecure property rights, and the collapse of the East German economy Susanne Lohmann
22. Post-Communist privatization as a test of theories of institutional change Lorene Allio, Mariusz Mark Dobek, Nikolia Mikhailov, and David L. Weimer
23. Explaining the complexity of institutional change Jack Knight and Douglass C. North.

Subject Areas: Political economy [KCP]