Antitrust, Regulation and the Neutrality Trap: A plea for a smart, evidence-based internet policy. CEPS Special Report No. 104/April 2015

When they look at Internet policy, EU policymakers seem mesmerised, if not bewitched, by the word ‘neutrality’. Originally confined to the infrastructure layer, today the neutrality rhetoric is being expanded to multi-sided platforms such as search engines and more generally online intermediaries. Policies for search neutrality and platform neutrality are invoked to pursue a variety of policy objectives, encompassing competition, consumer protection, privacy and media pluralism. This paper analyses this emerging debate and comes to a number of conclusions. First, mandating net neutrality at the infrastructure layer might have some merit, but it certainly would not make the Internet neutral. Second, since most of the objectives initially associated with network neutrality cannot be realistically achieved by such a rule, the case for network neutrality legislation would have to stand on different grounds. Third, the fact that the Internet is not neutral is mostly a good thing for end users, who benefit from intermediaries that provide them with a selection of the over-abundant information available on the Web. Fourth, search neutrality and platform neutrality are fundamentally flawed principles that contradict the economics of the Internet. Fifth, neutrality is a very poor and ineffective recipe for media pluralism, and as such should not be invoked as the basis of future media policy. All these conclusions have important consequences for the debate on the future EU policy for the Digital Single Market.

Conciliation act, 1896, and Industrial courts act, 1919. Report on conciliation and arbitration including particulars of proceedings under the Conciliation act, 1896, the Coal mines (minimum wage) act, 1912, the Wages (temporary regulation) acts, 1918 and 1919, the Restoration of pre-war practices act, 1919, and the Industrial courts act, 1919 ... 1919[-1920] ...

Title varies slightly.

Industrial policy, FDI and employment:still a 'missing a strategy'

This paper contrasts the effects of trade, inward FDI and technological development upon the demand for skilled and unskilled workers in the UK. By focussing on industry level data panel data on smaller firms, the paper also contrasts these effects with those generated by large scale domestic investment. The analysis is placed within the broader context of shifts in British industrial policy, which has seen significant shifts from sectoral to horizontal measures and towards stressing the importance of SMEs, clusters and new technology, all delivered at the regional scale. This, however, is contrasted with continued elements of British and EU regional policy which have emphasised the attraction of inward investment in order to alleviate regional unemployment. The results suggest that such policies are not naturally compatible; that while both trade and FDI benefit skilled workers, they have adverse effects on the demand for unskilled labour in the UK. At the very least this suggests the need for a range of policies to tackle various targets (including in this case unemployment and social inclusion) and the need to integrate these into a coherent industrial strategy at various levels of governance, whether regional and/or national. This has important implications for the form of any 'new' industrial policy.

Industrial policy, FDI and employment:still a 'missing a strategy'

This paper contrasts the effects of trade, inward FDI and technological development upon the demand for skilled and unskilled workers in the UK. By focussing on industry level data panel data on smaller firms, the paper also contrasts these effects with those generated by large scale domestic investment. The analysis is placed within the broader context of shifts in British industrial policy, which has seen significant shifts from sectoral to horizontal measures and towards stressing the importance of SMEs, clusters and new technology, all delivered at the regional scale. This, however, is contrasted with continued elements of British and EU regional policy which have emphasised the attraction of inward investment in order to alleviate regional unemployment. The results suggest that such policies are not naturally compatible; that while both trade and FDI benefit skilled workers, they have adverse effects on the demand for unskilled labour in the UK. At the very least this suggests the need for a range of policies to tackle various targets (including in this case unemployment and social inclusion) and the need to integrate these into a coherent industrial strategy at various levels of governance, whether regional and/or national. This has important implications for the form of any ‘new’ industrial policy.

Industrial policy, FDI and employment:Still 'missing a strategy'

This paper contrasts the effects of trade, inward FDI and technological development upon the demand for skilled and unskilled workers in the UK. By focussing on industry level data panel data on smaller firms, the paper also contrasts these effects with those generated by large scale domestic investment. The analysis is placed within the broader context of shifts in British industrial policy, which has seen significant shifts from sectoral to horizontal measures and towards stressing the importance of SMEs, clusters and new technology, all delivered at the regional scale. This, however, is contrasted with continued elements of British and EU regional policy which have emphasised the attraction of inward investment in order to alleviate regional unemployment. The results suggest that such policies are not naturally compatible; that while both trade and FDI benefit skilled workers, they have adverse effects on the demand for unskilled labour in the UK. At the very least this suggests the need for a range of policies to tackle various targets (including in this case unemployment and social inclusion) and the need to integrate these into a coherent industrial strategy at various levels of governance, whether regional and/or national. This has important implications for the form of any 'new' industrial policy.

China in Global Value Chains: Implications for Industrial Policy and Development

Rapid technological advances and liberal trade regimes permit functional reintegration of dispersed activities into new border-spanning business networks variously referred to as global value chains (GVCs). Given that the gains of a country from GVCs depend on the activities taking place in its jurisdiction and their linkages to global markets, this study starts by providing a descriptive overview of China’s economic structure and trade profile. The first two chapters of this paper demonstrate what significant role GVCs have played in China’s economic growth, evident in enhanced productivity, diversification, and sophistication of China’s exports, and how these economic benefits have propelled China’s emergence as the world’s manufacturing hub in the past two decades. However, benefits from GVC participation – in particular technological learning, knowledge building, and industrial upgrading – are not automatic. What strategies would help Chinese industries engage with GVCs in ways that are deemed sustainable in the long run? What challenges and related opportunities China would face throughout the implementation process? The last two chapters of this paper focus on implications of GVCs for China’s industrial policy and development. Chapter Three examines how China is reorienting its manufacturing sector toward the production of higher value-added goods and expanding its service sector, both domestically and internationally; while Chapter Four provides illustrative policy recommendations on dealing with the positive and negative outcomes triggered by GVCs, within China and beyond the country’s borders. To the end, this study also hopes to shed some light on the lessons and complexities that arise from GVC participation for other developing countries.

The political economy of industrial policy in Peru and Ecuador: 1980-2010

This dissertation focuses on industrial policy in two developing countries: Peru and Ecuador. Informed by comparative historical analysis, it explains how the Import-Substitution Industrialization policies promoted during the 1970s by military administration unravelled in the following 30 years under the guidance of Washington Consensus policies. Positioning political economy in time, the research objectives were two-fold: understanding long-term policy reform patterns, including the variables that conditioned cyclical versus path-dependent dynamics of change and; secondly, investigating the direction and leverage of state institutions supporting the manufacturing sector at the dawn, peak and consolidation of neoliberal discourse in both countries. Three interconnected causal mechanisms explain the divergence of trajectories: institutional legacies, coordination among actors and economic distribution of power. Peru’s long tradition of a minimal state contrasts with the embedded character of Ecuador long tradition of legal protectionism dating back to the Liberal Revolution. Peru’s close policy coordination among stakeholders –state technocrats and business elites- differs from Ecuador’s “winners-take-all” approach for policy-making. Peru’s economic dynamism concentrated in Lima sharply departs from Ecuador’s competitive regional economic leaderships. This dissertation paid particular attention to methodology to understand the intersection between structure and agency in policy change. Tracing primary and secondary sources, as well as key pieces of legislation, became critical to understand key turning points and long-term patterns of change. Open-ended interviews (N=58) with two stakeholder groups (business elites and bureaucrats) compounded the effort to knit motives, discourses, and interests behind this long transition. In order to understand this amount of data, this research build an index of policy intervention as a methodological contribution to assess long patterns of policy change. These findings contribute to the current literature on State-market relations and varieties of capitalism, institutional change, and policy reform.

Soft Budget Constraints and Regional Industrial Policy: Reinterpreting the Rise and fall of De Lorean

The rise and fall of De Lorean Motor Cars Limited (DMCL) has been traditionally interpreted as either the result either of John De Lorean’s psychological flaws or as confirming the supposed limitations of activist industrial policy. However, when the episode is examined in greater historical detail, neither of these interpretations are compelling. The reinterpretation outlined here draws on institutional analysis as well as a range of archival sources, much of it previously unreleased. The inefficiencies within the original contractual agreement are highlighted. The lack of credibility associated with this agreement was in turn traceable to the institutional environment (with its associated risk-reward implications) under which industrial policy operated. This environment had a political element - it had been distorted by the Troubles and the resulting fears policymakers had of a cumulative causation relationship between violence and unemployment. Officials in Belfast, against Treasury opposition, advocated state-led entrepreneurship as a policy response.

Commercial and Industrial Network Improvement and Programming Policy, Summary, 1991

The Commercial and Industrial Network improvement and programming policy reflected in this summary report was adopted for use in future highway programming by the Transportation Commission on November 5, 1991. The Iowa Department of Transportation, as directed by the Legislature, has established a 2,331-mile network of commercial and industrial highways and is directing a significant amount of primary construction funding resources toward improvements to this network. This summary outlines the technical needs assessment for improvements on the Commercial and Industrial Network for the next 20-year period. The portions of the network which require four-lane capacity, as well as major improvements to the two-lane sections, are graphically displayed. Detailed improvement needs and costs are listed in tabular form for the first two five-year periods (1992-1996 and 1997-2001). It is essential to note that these improvement needs are the result of a technical assessment and do not imply any funding commitment.