Re-thinking Argentina's labour and social security reform in the 1990s : agreement on competitive corporatism

This paper will analyze the Menem administration's social policy reforms during the 1990s. Neo-liberal reforms in Argentina are well-known both in the economy and in the social arena, but in the latter we can discern the presence of tripartite negotiations. The form of such negotiations, the type of agreements reached as a result, and the background to those agreements will be discussed. We also pay attention to the concept of competitive corporatism, which was established under the increase in market competition brought about by globalization.

Clothing Export from sub-Saharan Africa : Impact on Poverty and Potential for Growth

Increases in clothing exports after 2000 signaled the first incidence of large-scale manufacturing exports from sub-Saharan Africa. Using firm-level information, this paper explores the potential of clothing exports for poverty reduction and further growth as seen in other low income countries. It shows that the garment exporting industries in Kenya and Madagascar have contributed poverty reduction in the short term by providing mass employment for female and less educated workers with wages beyond the poverty line. However, the long-term impact is not certain. High production costs and limited development of local firms weaken potential for further growth in the competitive world market. Upgrading of the market and improvement of efficiency are required to remain competitive for African industries, and governmental support for local participation are needed to facilitate technology transfer.

Constitutions around the world : A View from Latin America

This paper gives a global summary of the number of constitutions and the number of　articles in each constitution for many representative countries around the world. Several　works have already been written comparing different legal systems and different　constitutional traditions around the world; the purpose of this paper is just to compare the　numbers of constitutions and articles in the diverse regions of the world, namely: North　America, Latin America, Europe, Oceania, Middle East, Asia and Africa. Around the world, on average, Latin America has had the most convoluted constitutional history. The Dominican Republic has had a total of 32 constitutions, the largest number of constitutions of any country, since its independence in 1844. Three other countries have also had 20 or more constitutions throughout their history, all of them in Latin America: Venezuela (26), Haiti (24) and Ecuador (20). On the other hand, there are economies and societies that do not even have codified constitutions, like the United Kingdom in Europe, Hong Kong in Asia and New Zealand in Oceania. The United States has had only one constitution, even if it has been amended several times. There are also the special cases of Israel and Saudi Arabia, both in the Middle East, that do not have official written constitutions for historical and religious reasons. Comparative constitutional numbers and history help explain several things about the stability of political systems, but not necessarily about their quality.

Indian IT software engineers in Japan : a preliminary analysis

In this study, the work and life of Indian IT engineers in Japan engaged in software development were examined through a questionnaire survey. Findings were further supported by comparative analyses with Chinese and Korean software engineers. While Indian IT software engineers appeared rather satisfied with their life overall in Japan, they seemed rather dissatisfied with their work conditions including such things as fringe benefits, the working-time management of the company, levels of salary and bonuses, and promotion opportunities. It was made clear that profiles and perceptions of Indian engineers and those of Chinese and Koreans in Japan were different.

The causal relationships in mean and variance between stock returns and foreign institutional investment in India

This paper examines the causalities in mean and variance between stock returns and Foreign Institutional Investment (FII) in India. The analysis in this paper applies the Cross Correlation Function approach from Cheung and Ng (1996), and uses daily data for the timeframe of January 1999 to March 2008 divided into two periods before and after May 2003. Empirical results showed that there are uni-directional causalities in mean and variance from stock returns to FII flows irrelevant of the sample periods, while the reverse causalities in mean and variance are only found in the period beginning with 2003. These results point to FII flows having exerted an impact on the movement of Indian stock prices during the more recent period.

Political conditions for fair elections

Democracy is not necessarily consolidated simply by the introduction of formal democratic institutions. It is often observed in new democracies that democratic institutions are neglected and eroded in actual practice. Particularly, electoral fraud committed by a ruler is one of the main problems in this regard. This paper deals with two questions, (1) under what conditions does a ruler have an incentive to hold fair elections (or to rig elections), and (2) what makes a ruler prefer to establish an independent election governing institution? Assuming that a ruler prefers to maintain her power, basically she has an incentive to rig elections in order to be victorious in the political competition. A ruler, however, faces the risk of losing power if the opposition stages successful protests on a sufficiently large scale. If opponents are able to pose a credible threat to a ruler, she will have an incentive to hold fair elections. The problem is that information on electoral fraud is not shared by every player in the game. For the opposition, imperfect information deepens their coordination problems. Imperfect information, on the other hand, in some cases causes a problem for a ruler. If the opposition is sufficiently cohesive and have little tolerance of cheating, even unverified suspicions of fraud may trigger menacing protests. In such a case, a ruler has an incentive to establish an independent election commission to avoid unnecessary collisions by revealing the nature of the elections.

Democratizing Indonesia: Reformasi Period in Historical Perspective

Introduction : Triggered by the Asian currency crisis, Indonesia plunged into the times of violent change. With the downfall of the long-standing Soeharto rule in May 1998, changes of　the state order started with great magnitude and rapidity under a new banner of　“reformasi” (reform). What changes have occurred in this reformasi period? What do　these changes signify? To answer these questions, it would be better to have a certain　yardstick to allow us comparison. One possibility is to use a yardstick of history. What　picture will emerge if we see the current array of changes in long-term historical　perspectives is a main question of this paper. This paper intends to provide a bird’s-eye picture illustrating where in the Indonesian history the current restructuring of the state order is located. Rather than focusing on a specific area, I here attempt to broaden our outlook on Indonesia’s political, economic and social arenas in order to identify what are happening in these arenas, how they are mutually related, and what those events signify in the Indonesia’s historical context.

Post-Crisis Economic Reform in Indonesia:Policy for Intervening in Ownership in Historical Perspective

Introduction : Economic reform in Indonesia after the Asian currency crisis is often discussed in parallel with Thailand and South Korea, which were alike hit by the crisis. It should however be noted that what happened in Indonesia was a change of political regime from authoritarianism to democracy, not just a change of government as seen in Thailand and South Korea. Indonesia’s post-crisis reform should be understood in the context of dismantling of the Soeharto regime to seek a new democratic state system. 　　　In the political sphere, dramatic institutional changes have occurred since the downfall of the Soeharto government in May 1998. In comparison, changes in the economic sphere are more complex than the political changes, as the former involve at least three aspects. The first is the continuity in the basic framework of capitalist system with policy orientation toward economic liberalization. In this framework, the policies to overcome the crisis are continued from the last period of the Soeharto rule, under the support system of IMF and CGI (Consultative Group on Indonesia). The second aspect is the impact of the political regime change on the economic structure. It is considered that the structure of economic vested interests of the Soeharto regime is being disintegrated as the regime breaks down. The third aspect is the impact of the political regime change on economic policy-making process. The process of formulating and implementing policies has changed drastically from the Soeharto time. With these three aspects simultaneously at work, it is not so easy to identify which of them is the main cause for a given specific economic phenomenon emerging in Indonesia today. 　　　Keeping this difficulty in mind, this paper attempts to situate the post-crisis economic reform in the broader context of the historical development of Indonesian economic policies and their achievements. We focus in particular on the reform policies for banking and corporate sectors and resulting structural changes in these sectors. This paper aims at understanding the significance of the changes in the economic ownership structure that are occurring in the post-Soeharto Indonesia. Economic policies here do not mean macro economic policies, such as fiscal, financial and trade policies, but refer to micro economic policies whereby the government intervenes in the economic ownership structure. In Section 1, we clarify why economic policies for intervening in the ownership structure are important in understanding Indonesia. Section 2 follows the historical development of Indonesia’s economic policies as specified above, throughout the four successive periods since Indonesia’s independence, namely, the parliamentary democracy period, the Guided Democracy period under Soekarno, the Soeharto-regime consolidation period, and the Soeharto-regime transfiguration period2. Then we observe what economic ownership structure was at work in the pre-crisis last days of the Soeharto rule as an outcome of the economic policies. In Section 3, we examine what structural changes have taken place in the banking and corporate sectors due to the reform policies in the post-crisis and post-Soeharto Indonesia. Lastly in Section 4, we interpret the current reorganization of the economic ownership in the context of the historical transition of the ownership structure, taking account of the changes in the policy-making processes under democratization.

Industrialization in Indonesia since the 1970s

Introduction: During the period from the latter half of the 1980s until just before the Asian currency crisis in 1997, Indonesia’s economic development had drawn expectations and attention from various quarters, along with Malaysia and Thailand within the same Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). In fact, the 1993 report by the World Bank, entitled “East Asian Miracle: Economic Growth and Public Policy,” recognized Indonesia as one of the East Asian economies with the strong economic performance, i.e. sustained economic growth (World Bank [1993]). And it was the manufacturing industry that had been the driving force behind Indonesia’s economic growth during that period. Since the 1997 outbreak of the Asian currency crisis, however, the manufacturing sector in Indonesia has been mired in a situation that rules out the kind of bright prospects it had emanated previously. The Indonesian economy is still in the developing stage, and in accordance with the history of industrial structural changes in other countries, Indonesia’s manufacturing industry can still be expected to serve as the engine of the country’s economic development. But is it really possible in an environment where economic liberalization and globalization are forging ahead? And, what sort of problems have to be dealt with to make it possible? To answer these questions, it is necessary to know the current conditions of Indonesia’s manufacturing sector, and to do that, it becomes important to think back on the history of the country’s industrialization. Thus, this paper is intended to retrace and unlock the track of Indonesia’s industrialization up until the establishment of the manufacturing sector in its present form, with the ultimate goal being to give answers to the above-mentioned questions. Subject to an analysis in this paper is the period from the installment of President Soeharto’s administration onward when industrialization of the modern industrial sector2 moved into high gear. 　　　The composition of this paper is outlined below. Section 1 first shows why it is important to examine import substitution and export orientation, both of which are used as the measures of the analysis in this paper, in tracking the history of the industrialization, and then discuss indicators of import substitution and export orientation as well as statistical data and resources needed to develop those indicators. Section 2 clarifies the status of the manufacturing industry among all industries by looking at the composition ratio of the manufacturing industry in terms of value added, imports and exports. Section 3 to 5 cover three periods between 1971 and 1995 and make an analysis of import substitution, export orientation and changes in the industrial structure for each period. Section 3 analyzes the period from 1971 through 1985, when Indonesia pursued the import substitution policy amid the oil boom. Section 4 covers the period from 1985 through 1990, when the packages of deregulatory measures were announced successively under structural adjustment policies made necessary by the fall in oil prices. Section 5 examines the period from 1990 through 1995, which saw the alternate shifts between the overheating of the economy by sharply rising investment by both domestic and foreign investors in the wake of the liberalization of investment, trade and financial services, and polices to cool down the economy. Section 6, which covers the 1995-1999 period straddling the economic crisis, is designed for an analysis of the changes in production trends before and after the economic crisis as well as the changes in the industrial structure. Section 7, after summing up the history of Indonesia’s industrialization examined in the previous sections, discusses problems found in respective sectors and attempts to present future prospects for the country’s manufacturing industry.