Implementation Of Market Reforms Research Articles

Fuwuyuan on Film: Cinema, Socialist Education, and Service Labor from the Great Leap Forward to Reform and Opening Up

As industrial and agricultural production kicked into overdrive during the Great Leap Forward, so too did cinematic production. Factories and agricultural collectives promoted labor models, and the film industry created new cinematic models of heroic production workers. At the same time, valorization of production labor heightened the alienation of workers in the “nonproductive” service sector. To address this situation, service sector work units nominated their own model workers, and the film industry brought tales of service workers to audiences nationwide. Through a close reading of three such films— Fuwuyuan 服务员 (1958), produced during the Great Leap Forward; Manyi bu manyi 满意不满意 (1963), produced just after the Great Leap Forward; and Duan panzi de guniang 端盘子的姑娘 (1981), produced shortly after the implementation of market reforms—this article charts the evolution of cinematic discourse on the value of service work in the economy and society of socialist and early post-socialist China.

THE VOICE OF THE MIDDLE CLASS AND ECONOMIC DEMOCRACY IN UKRAINE

The purpose of the article is to determine the role of the middle class in political democracy and economic democracy in Ukraine. The role of the Ukrainian middle class in the revolutionary events of 2004 and 2013-2014 – the Ukrainian Maidans, the influence of the middle class on the results of the parliamentary elections in Ukraine and its presentation in the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine are noted. The pendulum-like oscillation of self-identification of the middle class between "service to the oligarchs" and "resistance to democracy," the basis of civil society, is noted. The emphasis is placed on the fact that democracy is the rule of the middle class, and the principle of equal freedom is at the core of economic democracy. The compromise between capitalism and democracy is the need to distribute the public good under the supervision of political democracy in the interests of the middle class. Methodology. The theory of economic democracy was used to study the essence and characteristics of the middle class in Ukraine. By means of sociological methods of empirical research middle class identification by indicators of income, education, labor (employment), consumer behavior is given. Differences of "European" middle class from Ukrainian middle class are marked. In connection with the fact that the level of income of the Ukrainian middle class does not correspond to the indicators of EU countries, the necessity of application of subjective indicators to determine self-identification of middle class representatives in Ukraine is substantiated. The definition of the middle class from the opposite, i.e., what the middle class is not (not the oligarchs, not the authorities, not the working class, etc.) is also applied. Results. The trajectories of the middle class in Ukraine have been defined – from active participation in the Ukrainian revolutions to the role of a servant of the oligarchic regime. The middle class is well positioned to establish a regime of political democracy and to oppose the oligarchic-lumpen alliance. What hinders this is the insufficient activity of the middle class during election campaigns and especially after them. The oligarchs' established monopoly in the economy and media space allows for effective election campaigns in the mass media and the financing of political parties. This nullifies attempts of the middle class to establish political democracy in Ukraine. The growing role of the new middle class – intellectuals and representatives of the creative industries – has been noted. The self-identification factors of the middle class include a sense of justice, responsibility for the future and the practice of democratic values. According to sociological research, representatives of the Ukrainian middle class strive for democratic changes, overcoming corruption, deconstruction of the oligarchic regime, and implementation of market reforms. They have higher education, are interested in art, go to restaurants, and can sometimes afford vacations abroad. The political parties that declared support for the middle class and defined it as a target group in the elections included the "Team of Winter Generation," "Veche," "Self Reliance", and "Voice". The first two were perceived as oligarchic projects, while the last two parties made it to parliament, respectively, in the eighth and ninth convocations. Separately, the 2019 elections, in which the voice of the middle class became truly powerful, are examined separately. The "old faces," representatives of the post-Soviet oligarchy, and bureaucrats lost in the majoritarian districts. The middle class refused to support those politicians and parties that had become "servants of the oligarchs" in parliament, taking an important step in building not only a political democracy, but also an economic democracy. Practical implications. The results of the study can be used in the process of European integration of Ukraine, the implementation of reforms to develop political democracy as the rule of the middle class and economic democracy as a democratic system of redistribution of public resources. Value/originality. This study of the middle class and economic democracy allows us to understand the economic factors that influence politics, the role of the middle class and its characteristics in the process of establishing political democracy and economic democracy in Ukraine.

SOCIO-CULTURAL TRANSFORMATION IN POST-SOVIET UKRAINE

The relevance of the research problem is that the understanding of socio-cultural transformation allows us to identify social processes that affect the functioning of post-Soviet Ukrainian society. The research subject is the social processes that determine the content and nature of socio-cultural transformation of post-Soviet Ukrainian society. The purpose of the article is to comprehend the impact of socio-cultural changes on the functioning of post-Soviet Ukrainian society. The methodology of the socio-cultural transformation research is based on the use of systematic, logical, historical, dialectical and socio-cultural approaches and methods. The results of scientific research. In post-Soviet Ukraine, the general context of socio-cultural change is due to the implementation of market reforms that have led to privatization, deindustrialization, mass marginalization, transition to a liberal state and depopulation. These processes have led to socio-cultural changes in the lives of Ukrainian citizens. There were important changes in the social sphere, the social structure of the population, the distribution of national wealth, which changed the direction of its movement from the dominance of social development to the predominance of social degradation. There was a change in the social matrix of society’s reproduction: there was a transition from the dominance of the middle classes’ culture to the spread of the culture of the poor, the main feature of which is the struggle for survival. The essence of the socio-cultural transformation of post-Soviet Ukrainian society is the transition from the absolutism of the state to the absolutism of the market, which means the transformation of everything possible into a commodity, and the dominance of commodity-money relations in all spheres of public life. This transition was accompanied by a change in the historical and cultural type of human personality, commercialization, deprofessionalization, as well as the primitivization of public administration. Changes in the culture’s state have complicated the reproduction of society as a whole. The Soviet way of life has been dismantled, and the failure of the social matrix indicates that a new way of life in post-Soviet Ukraine has not yet been formed, and therefore socio-cultural transformation must be aimed at its formation. The practical value of the results lies in substantiating the content of socio-cultural transformation in post-Soviet Ukraine and its impact on the functioning of society.

The current state of Ukrainian stock market

The stock market as a component of the financial market is traditionally considered to be a security element of the entire financial system of the state. The development of a civilized investment process in the economy of Ukraine, the further implementation of market reforms are impossible without the creation of an efficiently functioning stock market, which should ensure the realization of Ukraine’s national interests and help strengthen its economic sovereignty. The stock market in Ukraine is gradually evolving, as evidenced by the positive tendencies of increasing the volume of exchange contracts on trade organizers. But still capitalization of the Ukrainian stock market is very low compared to the world. Today, the stock market of Ukraine is at the stage of its formation and is far behind in the development of the stock markets of industrialized countries. Given this, the study of modern conditions, features and trends in the development of stock exchange trading and the infrastructure of Ukraine is becoming extremely important for the national economy. This article is devoted to the analysis of the problem of identifying the features of functioning and problems of development of the Ukrainian stock market, as well as the rationale for ways to increase its liquidity and efficiency. The main trends of the stock market development are analyzed. The current changes in the process of trading in the stock market of Ukraine are noted. The attention is focused on the existing problems in the development of the Ukrainian stock market that hinder its effective functioning, in particular the limited number of liquid and investment-attractive financial instruments, the high fragmentation of stock and depository infrastructure, insufficient legislative regulation of stock exchange activities.

The business of the NHS: The rise and rise of consumer culture and commodification in the provision of healthcare services

The implementation of market reforms has transformed the National Health Service (NHS) from a single national healthcare provider to a complex conglomeration of national and private organisations providing healthcare under the umbrella of the NHS brand. Private and state-run organisations compete to provide services to increasingly knowledgeable and entrepreneurial healthcare consumers. As a result, the NHS has become more and more business-like and is subject to the same consumer drivers that can be identified elsewhere in society. Healthcare consumers are not typical ‘customers’, however, since most consume NHS services out of necessity and the state funds the care they receive. Yet it is this ‘necessity’ of consumption that makes contracts to provide services on behalf of the NHS such a valuable commercial opportunity for private providers. This paper examines how consumer culture has influenced attitudes towards health and dying and is contributing to the creeping commodification of healthcare consumers themselves.

Firm Networking and Bribery in China: Assessing Some Potential Negative Consequences of Firm Openness

Economic openness, both in terms of increased international trade exposure and enhanced inter-firm networking, has been a key element of China’s economic emergence since the implementation of market reforms and the “opening-up policy” over 30 years ago. Unfortunately, these changes have also coincided with the increased incidence of bribery and corruption. Both in general, and in the specific context of China, research on the relationship between a firm’s tendency toward openness and its propensity to engage in bribery is scarce. This study seeks to fill this gap based on empirical evidence provided by a large sample of Chinese firms. The findings of the study reveal that firms’ increased networking and openness tend to occur contemporaneously with greater bribery and corruption. We suggest that this may be due to the misuse of guanxi-based networks that coincide with the presence of firms’ open network strategies, heightened by the potential loss of resource and capability heterogeneity (and hence reduced competitive advantages) in the context of openness. We further find that firms paying bribes do so as an attempt to overcome unnecessary bureaucratic processes and ineffective institutional support that might tend to hinder their development.

Empresariado, estado y políticas públicas en Brasil: nuevas tendencias en el umbral del nuevo milenio

El artículo evalúa el alcance y la profundidad de las transformaciones desencadenadas en Brasil a partir de la década de los años 80, cuando la instauración de la democracia y la ejecución de las reformas orientadas al mercado asumen el primer plano de la agenda pública. Mediante un contraste entre las décadas de los 80 y 90, este trabajo enfatiza los cambios en el orden económico y en la organización social del país, destancando las modificaciones de naturaleza política e institucional. Y para ello analiza particularmente el estilo de gestión pública, la naturaleza del proceso de toma de decisiones, las formas de articulación entre Estado y sociedad, así como los canales de acceso a los centros de decisión. Por último, se abordan las transformaciones en el peso relativo y en el papel de los actores estratégicos del nuevo orden capitalista en construcción.

Policies and socio-economic conditions of private enterprise development in transitionary economies

Implementation of market reforms has been a lengthy process in the countries of Central and Eastern Europe (CEE). Differences exist between individual countries in the scale of the reform process and the type of socio-economic development for entrepreneurial ventures. Hungary has been in the forefront of the transition from a centrally planned economy to a market economy. This paper evaluates policies and socio-economic conditions of private enterprise development in the transitional Hungarian economy. On-site surveys and personal interviews were conducted among small business owners to analyse perceptions of five selected factors of socio-economic conditions and ratings of satisfaction with seven policy items crucial in supporting entrepreneurial activities. An integrated model of entrepreneurial venture creation was used to analyse policy implications to assist private enterprise development in Hungary and other countries of the region.

The Effects of Market Reforms on Structural Change: Implications for Energy Use and Carbon Emissions in China

This paper assesses the role played by market reforms in shaping the future level and composition of production, energy use, and carbon emissions in China. Arguments have been made that reducing distortions in China’s economy through market reforms will lead to energy efficiency improvements and lower carbon emissions in China. However, these arguments are based on partial and not general equilibrium analyses, and therefore overlook the effects of market reforms on economic growth and structural change. The results suggest that further implementation of market reforms could result in a structural shift to less carbonintensive production and thus lower carbon emissions per unit GDP. However, this fall in carbon intensity is not enough to compensate for the greater use of energy as a result of market reforms due to higher economic growth and changes in the composition of production. Therefore, China’s transition to a market economy could result in significantly higher economic growth, energy use, and carbon emissions. These results could have implications for other countries considering or undergoing market transition.

Privatization South American Style. By Luigi Manzetti. New York: Oxford University Press, 2000. 373p. $74.00.

Luigi Manzetti fills an important gap in the literature on market reforms in Latin America by providing a comparative analysis of privatization in Argentina, Brazil, and Peru. He engages the literature on economic reform in developing countries by focusing on the implementation of this single policy and complements a burgeoning scholarship on the economics of privatization in the region. The main contribu- tion lies in underlining the relevance of political factors for explaining the success of privatization policies. The "South American" style, he suggests, reinforces the view of those who, like John Williamson and Stephen Haggard ("The Political Conditions of Economic Reform," in Williamson, ed. The Political Economy of Reform, 1994) and Guillermo O'Donnell ("Delegative Democracy," Journal of Democracy 5 [January 1994]: 53­69), associate the rapid implementation of market reforms with the concentration of executive au- thority at the expense of the checks and balances of liberal democracies.

Fertilizer retailing in the Kenyan Highlands

Local retailers of agricultural supplies in developing countries occupy an important link in the dissemination of agricultural technologies but little is documented on their business activities in the Highlands of Kenya. Kenya's fertilizer markets were liberalized in 1990 and since then a steady increase in the proportion of fertilizers imported through commercial channels has occurred. A short, formal survey was conducted among 139 retailers in 74 market centres located in six Provinces of Kenya. Business operators were asked about the formulations and prices of fertilizers sold, product repackaging, sources and dissemination of product information, sales trends and the availability and extension of credit. Retailers were found to market a total of 17 different fertilizers, with each retailer marketing an average of 4.5 types. Retailers provided specific recommendations concerning their products to farmers with 81% considering this an important part of their business ac tivities. Many retailers' recommendations are based upon written information and testing on family farms but others were unable to justify the basis of their recommendations. More than twice as many retailers extended credit to customers (31%) than was extended to them by their suppliers (14%). Two important national indicators of fertilizer marketing, total supply and consumption, do not significantly differ when the seven years before and after onset of market reforms started in 1990 are compared but other, more subtle national indicators suggest that successful fertilizer marketing reforms are in progress. There is a significant decrease in the proportion of annual ‘carry-over’ of fertilizer stocks (p = 0.04) resulting from a shift from distribution by parastatal to privatized operations and a significant positive trend in commercial fertilizer imports over time since the implementation of market reforms (r = 0.97).

Mexico and Argentina: Economic reform and technocratic decision making

This article examines the Mexican and Argentine cases of market reform and argues that despite important differences in regime type and in recent economic and political trajectories, the decision-making process in the two countries came to display important common features. In both cases, economic crises and debt negotiations played key roles in propelling technocratic reformers into positions of policy predominance; both exhibited exclusionary technocratic decision-making styles in which small technocratic elites insulated themselves from both extra and intra state pressures. While policy isolation was no doubt necessary for the successful implementation of market reforms, this style may be counter-productive to political stability over the long term.

The New Zealand State and Educational Reforms: ‘competing’ interests

The starting point of this paper is the remarkable success of a relatively coherent, and strongly transnational, set of ideologies in securing a process of market-oriented educational reform in a number of nations; not the least in Britain, the United States and New Zealand. In order to explain this success, it is necessary to understand the relationship of this set of ideologies to two factors. First, market educational reforms are the corollary of the more general shift from Keynesian to neo-liberal forms of national economic management, with implications not just for education but for the state as a whole. Secondly, the shift to neoliberal forms of economic management was itself predicated on the failure of Keynesian policies to solve the economic and political crises of many nations which began in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Thus the basis on which market educational reforms can be understood as transnational, if not global, is as part of a solution to a common set of economic circumstances, including the falling rate of profit, the growth in multinational corporations, increasing national debt, rising unemployment, high levels of inflation and spiralling welfare costs, to name just a few. However, the relationship between economic' problems and political 'solutions' is far from direct and clear. In claiming a common economic basis, rooted in a global crisis of capitalism, for the ideologies of neo-liberalism, I would not wish to argue that political responses have been the same in every country. Whilst similar themes can be identified in the literature, major differences are also evident. These differences can be explained by those element of states that are nation-specific. Examples of such factors include the previous political settlements (CCCS, 1981), broad historical forces, the institutional arrangements of state agencies and governments and the nature of social expectations within civil society. It is the particular mixture of national specificities and transnational trends that allows for national comparisons to be made about the implementation of market reforms in education (as well as in many other aspects of the state). A central issue is what kind of education system pre-existed the move to market reforms. Bruce Cooper (1990) lists a number of differences between the education systems of Britain and the United States, a key issue being the level of decentralisation of control over education preceding the reform processes (p. 133). He notes that the high level of decentralisation of education in the United States has impeded the implementation of market reforms. In contrast, the relatively centralised British system allowed for a much more direct implementation of new policies. New Zealand's education system has been for many years one of the most centralised in the world. Whilst Britain's system relied heavily on the intermediary role of the Local Education Authorities, New Zealand had only a minimal regional level of organisation,