Stanford University
Office: Econ. Rm. 261.
Department of Economics
Office hours: Mon. 11:00 - 12:00 and by appointment 5-8936

228/294:  Institutions and Organizations in Historical Perspective
Avner Greif
Fall 1995

Topics

I.      The Neo-Classical Approach.

II.     Is Something Missing?

III.    Toward Integration: The Study of Economic Institutions 
through Economic History
        a. Institutions that Governed the Early Trade.
        b. The State: From Anarchy to the Leviathan and Back 
Again.
        c. Institutions that Governed the Late Trade.
        d. The Organization of Production.


Reading List

I.      Neo-Classical Economics and Institutions.

Institutions as responses to Market Failures:

Coase, R.H. 1960. The Problem of Social Cost. Journal of Law and 
Economics 3: 1-44.

* D. N. McCloskey. 1976. English Open Fields as Behavior Towards 
Risk. Research in Economics, 1: 124-170.


II.     New Institutional Economics

* Williamson, Oliver E. 1989.  Transaction Cost Economics.  In the 
Handbook of Industrial Organization, edited by Richard Schmalensee 
and Robert Willig. New York: North Holland. (chapter 3.)

* S. Fenoaltea. 1976. Risk, Transaction Costs, and the 
Organization of Medieval Agriculture.  Exploration in Economic 
History, 13: 129-51.

*  P. Fishback. 1992.  The Economics of Company Housing: 
Historical Perspectives from the Coal Fields. JLEO vol. 8 (no. 2).

* North, Douglass C. 1981. Structure and Change in Economic 
History. New York: Norton.  Selected chapters.

* S. Kantor. 1990. Razorback, Ticky Cows, and the Closing of the 
Georgia Open Range: The Dynamic of Institutional Change Uncovered. 
MS. California Institute of Technology.


IIa. (Optional): Rent-seeking and Collective Actions.

Olson, Mancur. 1971. The Logic of Collective Action. Cambridge, 
Mass.: Harvard University Press.

Jan De Vries. 1983.  Review of The Rise and Decline of Nations in 
Historical Perspective.  In International Studies Quarterly: 27: 
11-16.

Allen, Robert. 1982. The Efficiency and Distributional 
Consequences of Eighteenth Century Enclosures. Economic Journal, 
92: 937-53.

Ekelund, Robert B., and Robert D. Tollison. 1980. Mercantilism as 
a Rent-Seeking Society. In Toward a Theory of the Rent Seeking 
Society. Edited by James M. Buchanan, Robert D. Tollison and 
Gordon Tullock. College Station: Texas A&M University Press, pp. 
235-68.


II.     Is Something Missing?

* Sugden, Robert. 1989. Spontaneous Order. Journal of Economic 
Perspective, 3(4): 85-97

Hollander, Heinz. 1990. A Social Exchange Approach to Voluntary 
Cooperation. American Economic Review, 80(5): 1157-67.

* Dawes, R. M., and Thaler, R. H. 1988. Anomalies: Cooperation. 
Economic Perspectives 2:187-97.

Bowls, Samuel and Herbert Gintis. 1993. The Revenge of Homo 
Economicus: Contested Exchange and the Revival of Political 
Economy. Journal of Economic Perspectives 7 (no. 1, Winter): 83-
102.

III.  Toward Integration

* North, Douglass C., "Institutions," Journal of Economic 
Perspectives, 1991, 5, 97-112.

North, C. Douglass. 1990. Institutions, Institutional Change and 
Economic Performance.  CUP.

A. Institutions that Governed the Early Trade: Trade was at first 
a shapeless, chaotic mass with the spirits of many economists 
brooding over the water. (Exchange in the absences of Law.)

Background:

R. De Roover. 1965. The Organization of Trade. In Cambridge 
Economic History of Europe. Vol. III, pp. 42-118.

Analysis:

* Jeffrey M. Lacher and John A. Weinberg. 1989. Optimal Contracts 
Under Costly State Falsification. Journal of Political Economy 
97(6): 1345-63.

* Bruce L. Benson. 1989. The Spontaneous Evolution of Commercial 
Law. Southern Economic Journal 55(3): 644-61.

Kandori, Michihiro, "Social Norms and Community Enforcement," The 
Review of Economic Studies, 1992, 59, 63-80.

* P.R. Milgrom, D.C. North and B.R. Weingast. 1991. The Role of 
Institutions in the Revival of Trade: The Law Merchant, Private 
Judges, and the Chamagne Fairs. Economics & Politics 2(19): 1-23.

* Greif, A. Contract Enforceability and Economic Institutions in 
Early Trade:  The Maghribi Traders' Coalition.  American Economic 
Review, Vol. 83, No. 3 (June, 1993).

Greif, A. Cultural Beliefs and the Organization of Society: A 
Historical and Theoretical Reflection on Collectivist and 
Individualist Societies. 1994. The Journal of Political Economy 
vol. 102, No. 5 (October).


B.The B. State: From Anarchy to the Leviathan and Back Again:  
(The Creation of Law.)

* Greif, A., Paul Milgrom, and Barry Weingast. 1994. Coordination, 
Commitment and Enforcement: The Case of the Merchant Gild."  The 
Journal of Political Economy, vol. 102, No. 4 (August).

* Green, Edward J. 1993. On the Emergence of Parliamentary 
Government. The Role of Private Information. Quarterly Review: 
Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis. Winter: 2-16.

* North D.C., and B. R. Weingast. 1989. Constitutions and 
Commitment: Evolution of Institutions Governing Public Choice. 
Journal of Economic History XLIX (December) pp. 803-32.

* Szakaly, Kristin. 1992. The Political Economy of Government Debt 
in England (1693-1800). California Institute of Technology working 
paper no. 793.


C. Institutions that Governed the Late Trade  (Exchange in the 
Shadow of the Law.)

Background:

Coornaert, E.L.J. 1967. European Economic Institutions and the New 
World: the Chartered Companies. In Cambridge Economic History of 
Europe Vol. IV, pp. 221-74 

Analysis:

* Irwin, Douglas, A. 1991. Mercantilism as Strategic Trade Policy: 
The Anglo-Dutch Rivalry for the East India Trade. Journal of 
Political Economy, 99(6): 1296-1314.

* Anderson, Gary M., Robert E. McCormick, and Robert D. Tollison. 
1983.  The Economic Organization of the English East India 
Company. Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization 4: 221-38.

* Carlos, Ann M. and Stephen Nicholas. 1990.  Agency Problems in 
Early Chartered Companies: The Case of the Hudson's Bay Company. 
The Journal of Economic History. Vol. L. (no. 4, Dec.): 853-75.

R.L. Watts and Jerold L. Zimmerman. 1983. Agency problems, 
Auditing, and the Theory of the Firm: Some Evidence. Journal of 
Law and Economics October.

Adam Smith. 1937 ed. The Wealth of Nations pp. 690-716. (On the 
Public Works and Institutions which are necessary for facilitating 
particular Branches of Commerce).


D. The Organization of Production.

Background:

Mendels, F.F. 1972.  Proto-industrialization: The First Phase of 
the Industrialization Process. Journal of Economic History  32(4): 
241-61.

Analysis:

* Marglin. S. 1976. What Do Bosses Do? in AndrČ Gorz. ed. The 
Division of Labour: The Labour Process and the Class Struggle ... 
pp. 13-54.

* Williamson. O.S. 1980. The Organization of Work. Journal of 
Economic Behavior and Organization 1(1): 5-38.

* Jones. S.R.H. 1982. The Organization of Work. A Historical 
Dimension. Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization 3: 117-
37.

Rick Szostak .1989. The Organization of Work, The Emergence of the 
Factory
Revisited. Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization 11: 343-
58.

Landes. D.S. 1986. What Do Bosses Really Do? Journal of Economic 
History September.

Clark, Gregory. 1994. Factory Discipline. Journal of Economic 
History 54 (no. 1): 128-63