Open Access Orders Research Articles

Measuring open access orders

AbstractThis paper assesses how to quantitatively classify countries as conforming to the ideal of an ‘open access order’ in the spirit of Douglass North, John Joseph Wallis, and Barry Weingast's Violence and Social Orders. It does so by taking the harmonic mean of already existing measures of economic freedom, liberal democracy, and state capacity. Thirty-five countries out of 161 in 2020 were assessed to be open access orders. A main dataset is constructed for the years 1950 to present, and a supplementary dataset for select countries is constructed for years back to 1850. Switzerland has the highest index score for open access orders in 2020, is classified to be an open access order continuously since 1950, and is the first country to be classified as an open access order (in 1875).

The Collapse of the USSR in the Context of the Theory of Institutional Violence

The collapse of the USSR is explained from the point of view of a new approach – the theory of institutional violence by D. North, B. Weingast and D. Wallis. The application of this theory shows that by the 1980s the USSR had reached the stage of a mature “natural state”. The basis of the Soviet system consisted of long-term political and economic organizations run by the elite that ensured a high level of security and stability of official position due to effective control over the apparatus of state violence (KGB, the militia, the army). Thus, objective prerequisites for the transition to a new social order of “open access” based on economic and political competition developed in the Soviet Union. The leadership of the USSR, represented by M. S. Gorbachev and his supporters in the party, was confident that the introduction of openness and democracy would benefit the Soviet state. M. S. Gorbachev’s loss of control over the special services and the army in the summer of 1991 had a fatal significance for the fate of the USSR. Organized by the chairman of the KGB V. A. Kryuchkov, the putsch of the GKChP catastrophically discredited the union government. The leaders of the Soviet republics were convinced of the need for its complete elimination and achieved this in a short time. Thus, the perestroika and the collapse of the USSR can be considered as the beginning of the movement of the Soviet society toward the “open access order”. The initial conditions of this transition can be considered relatively successful. Despite a series of armed clashes in different regions of the USSR, the collapse of a huge militarized power occurred without much bloodshed and carnage between representatives of the political elite. The events of August 1991, thus, led to a political revolution, which marked the beginning of new sovereign states with a form of government close to the republican one.

Measuring mercantile concentration in eighteenth-century British America: Charleston, 1735–1775

In this article, the authors attempt to advance discussions of mercantile concentration in British North America in the eighteenth century by employing two measurement tools common in the field of industrial organization-concentration ratios and the Hirschman-Herfindahl Index (HHI)—to measure and analyze concentration levels in Charleston, South Carolina between 1735 and 1775. These tools allow for the creation of standardized measures, easing comparisons with other mercantile groups across space and time. The principal results suggest that mercantile concentration levels in Charleston were not high by modern standards, and that concentration may even have declined a bit over the course of this 41-year period. The authors draw on insights from the literature in industrial organization and the new institutional history to explain their findings. In so doing, they suggest that the relatively low levels of concentration were related to and reflected the “open-access order” characteristic of British North America, even in eighteenth-century South Carolina.

The Rise of Germany in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries and Sustaining Democracy

Abstract This article examines the rise of Germany from the nineteenth century to explain that it is open access in the economic sphere, as well as institutional building related to the protection of property rights, contract enforcement, financial markets, rule of law, and human resource accumulation that determine economic and human development. The case of Germany is not very consistent with the logic of the open access orders of North et al. or the theory of extractive political institutions of Acemoglu and Robinson along the line of contestation and inclusiveness. The case of Germany is, however, able to support the research of Przeworski and Limongi that economic development is more likely to sustain democracy. Germany is certainly not the only case in explaining that stable democracy is not the cause but rather the consequence or outcome of lengthy economic development. The historical evidence from South Korea and Taiwan similarly supports the position that democracy is the outcome of economic and political development. This article, however, does not examine whether western values of human equality and human freedom are essential in economic and human development. They are very likely to be so as human equality is the precondition of open access in the economic sphere and human freedom is closely integrated with the interconnected institutions examined in this article. Future research may investigate the roles of these values in different political systems regardless of whether a political system is under the rule of one party, by a dominant party, or through the utilization of a multiparty system.

Carolingians at the Doorstep? The Maturing Limited-Access Order of Early Medieval Europe

North et al. (2009) argue that accounting for different development outcomes requires understanding how different societies manage violence. Almost all societies have been limited-access orders where elites constrain violence to preserve their rents. Alternatively, in open-access orders, violence is constrained by a government characterized by widespread political participation. Open-access societies were the first cases of sustained economic development; almost all of them have been Western European or offshoots. Understanding why is important. North et al. elaborate on three necessary conditions for achieving open access: (1) rule of law for elites, (2) support for perpetually-lived organizations, and (3) centralization and consolidation of violence. These constitute the “doorstep” to an open-access order. I argue that significant progress towards this doorstep was affected by the Carolingians of the early medieval era. I emphasize their large-scale distributions of confiscated/conquered lands to vassals, cultivation of bonds with the Church, and regularization of assemblies. The Carolingians introduced governance innovations that impersonalized relationships between elites and encouraged their enforcement under the rule of law.

Towards open access social orders in Eastern Europe

ABSTRACT This article introduces a special issue that investigates the interplay between domestic socio-political orders and changing external influences – of the EU, Russia, Turkey and other external actors in the region. In this introduction, we lay the conceptual framework and propose theoretical mechanisms linking state capacity and the actions of external actors to the likelihood of transformations from limited to open access orders. Previewing the findings, we note a fundamental asymmetry: while external actors have many levers to undermine the establishment of an open access order, they are more limited in how they can support reforms towards liberal democracy and free-market economy.

Institutions, economy and politics: the debate between Commons and North

This article compares John R. Commons and Douglass C. North. Both scholars justify the role of institutions by referring to cognitive issues and emphasise power relations as a key concern. However, their perspectives are radically different. North focuses on the barriers to the emergence of “open-access orders” in developing countries. The existence of impersonal norms is supposed to eradicate violence in society. In contrast, Commons is a progressive preoccupied with the survival of capitalism. In his view, through the growth of inequalities, these norms renders the system unstable. The economy has to be bounded at the political level.

Correction to: Density and thermal expansion coefficients of liquid and austenite phase in lamellar cast iron

The article “Density and thermal expansion coefficients of liquid and austenite phase in lamellar cast iron”, written by Kristina Hellström, Vasile-Lucian Diaconu, Attila Diószegi, was originally published Online First without Open Access. After publication in volume 17, issue 2, page 127–136, the author decided to opt for Open Choice and to make the article an Open Access publication. Therefore, the copyright of the article has been changed to © The Author(s) [2020] and the article is forthwith distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits use, duplication, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made.The original version of this article was revised due to a retrospective Open Access order.

Multinational enterprises, political institutions, and violence: a case study from Mozambique

AbstractBased on the concept of limited and open access orders (LAO/OAO), this paper explains what appears to be a paradox: how was it possible that a former civil war country, Mozambique, which had been extremely successful in attracting foreign direct investment (FDI) and which the International Monetary Fund praised as a great Sub-Sahara African success story in 2007, only a few years later found itself on the brink of a new civil war? We argue that the destabilization of the country was the result of a toxic mix of domestic politics and a massive inflow of FDI. FDI provided rents to an increasingly dominant state party, FRELIMO, which could be appropriated one-sidedly. It then used these rents to oppress RENAMO, its previous civil war enemy and currently its main opposition party, to monopolize power. This strategy seemed to be successful until RENAMO, faced with the risk of being politically marginalized (and of losing its rents accordingly), returned to armed conflict in 2013. By analyzing the links between the macro-level of national politics and the micro-level of an enterprise and by embedding the interplay between polity and economy into an international context, the paper also makes a theoretical contribution to the LAO/OAO concept.

Post-War Germany’s Transition to “Open Access Orderˮ

The article explores the formation of a new political and economic system in post-war Germany. By using the concept of ‘open access order’ suggested by Douglas North, the authors analyze the factors that explain successful transition to this order and achievement of the ‘doorstep conditions’. The main task for both external and internal political actors in Germany after 1945 was to make commitments on the new country’s institutional setting credible and to avoid the monopoly of small elite groups on political and economic power. The article states that key factors of consolidation of the ‘open access order’ in Germany are: a) decentralization and strategic coalition formation that guaranteed the multiplicity of actors and their integration into the new political system; b) decartelization that broke up the economic monopoly of small interest groups; c) Germany’s integration as an equal partner into the emerging European supranational institutions. Moreover, the authors show how in the German case the doorstep condition of consolidated control over the military transformed into a contextual one, having a positive influence on the achievement of other conditions.

Prozorovsky A. “Catch-up” Development and Modernizing Authoritarianism in South Korea

In this article, the author, relying on the methodology of modernization theory and the concept of social development of D. North, J. Wallis and B. Weingast, analyzed the experience of "catching up" development of South Korea. Emphasis is placed on the role of the national political leader and the phenomenon of modernizing authoritarianism. The prerequisites for the formation and features of the “Korean model”, as well as the evolution of its institutions, which provided forced economic development and the formation of rents for elites, are studied. It is noted that by promoting modernization, authoritarianism, with the success of development, blurs the foundations of its own existence and creates prerequisites for political liberalization. At the same time, the existing system of relations between the state power and the elites allows avoiding political upheavals during the regime change and continuing the catch-up development and movement towards the open access order

Interaction of elites and evolution of rent distribution in Brazil.

The article deals with the evolution of the distribution of rents in the process of sócio-economic development of Brazil and it’s impact on the process of formation and interaction of national elites. Special attention is paid to “great transition” of year 1930, when traditional sources of rents were exhausted and new sources of rents were created in the process of forced industrialization. Separately discussed are prerequisites for transition to open access order, including some traditional institutions.

IT WAS PERSONAL: POLITICS AND MILITARY PROMOTIONS IN THE SECOND SPANISH REPUBLIC (1931–1936)

ABSTRACTOne key step in the process of development is the transition from the personalistic rules and privileges that characterise developing societies to open access orders and rational–legal bureaucracies sustaining impersonal rules. This article uses a micro-data set of Spanish officers to study the politicisation of the army during the Second Republic (1931–1939) taking Franco's Africanist faction as the case study. The military reforms during 1931–1933 increased the impersonality of rules determining the promotion of officers, but executive discretionary powers persisted. The results suggest that changes in the government affected the dynamics of the army. Under conservative governments (1934–1935), Africanists were promoted more rapidly. Centre-left governments during the period of 1931–1933 did not systematically promote Africanists differently, but the revision of promotions in 1933 slowed their careers. The politicisation of the army was one of the factors contributing to the military coup that started the Spanish Civil War.

A tale of two Italies: ‘access-orders’ and the Italian regional divide

ABSTRACTThis paper uses the ‘access orders’ paradigm developed by North, Wallis, and Weingast [(2009). Violence and social order: A conceptual framework for interpreting recorded human history. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press] to analyse the case of the Italian North–South economic divide. In line with their framework, we collect and discuss several social and political indicators over the long-run, at the regional level. Firstly we looked at data on the pre-conditions for the establishment of an open-access order, such as murders per capita (a proxy for control over violence), voting turnout and referendums participation (proxies for political legitimacy), and the impersonality of exchange. We then showed evidence of different access orders in the North and in the South, using the information on human capital formation, women participation in the labour market, and referendum results. On the basis of this evidence, we argue that, despite being part of the same State and subject to the same formal institutions, the North of the country progressively developed into an open-access order, while the South remained a form of limited access order.Institutional differences are linked to specific aspects of the economic performance of the two areas, thus the ‘access order’ paradigm appears to be an effective conceptual scheme to explain the North–South economic divide.

The economic consequences of the recent political changes in China: the new institutional economics perspective

Motivation: Over 30 years ago, Deng Xiaoping had the two-term limit on the presidency inscribed in the constitution of China. It was part of Deng’s plan to institutionalize leadership changes in China, to avoid a return to one-man rule. This solution has ensured political stability which undoubtedly had a positive impact on economic growth in the following decades. However, in March 2018, the National People’s Congress of China approved the removal of the two-term limit on the presidency. Moreover, president Xi Jinping consolidated his political power as the party voted to enshrine his name and political ideology in the party’s constitution — elevating his status to the level of its founder, Chairman Mao. Aim: The purpose of this article is to analyse the impact of recent changes in the political system of China on the Chinese economy as well as the chances for further development of this country. The paper applies the new institutional economics perspective, particularly, the limited and open access orders framework proposed by D.C. North, J.J Wallis, and B.R. Weingast. Results: The article will present arguments proving that recent political changes in China will negatively affect growth and economic development. The concentration of power in the hands of one man could be a symptom of regression of the limited access order, which, according to North, Wallis, and Weingast affects not only the economy but also could increase the risk of violence.

The development and evolution of predatory-state institutions and organizations: beliefs, violence, conquest, coercion, and rent seeking

The purposes of this presentation are to (1) provide a relatively short coherent picture of predatory states, (2) pull some of North, Wallis and Weingast’s important arguments, particularly from their discussion of “natural states”, into predatory state analysis, including their fundamental elements of “violence, organizations, institutions and beliefs”; and (3) criticize the kinds of assumptions public-interest views rely on by using NWW’s very public-interest and non-public-choice depiction of the “open access order” as a way to reveal some of those assumptions. Even if states provide public goods, the primary focus for politicians appears to be on transferring wealth to themselves and/or to elites and interest groups. Most states also have engaged in aggression to expand their jurisdictions. Predatory-state theories focuses on wealth transfers and aggression. These models explain states’ historical development and many observed state actions. Perhaps surprisingly, they even provide a theoretical explanation of public-good provision. The primary conclusion is that states, including the U.S., are predatory. Consideration of violence, organizations, institutions, and beliefs adds power to this contention. Observed state institutions and organization are consistent with an evolved predatory state. Examination of a number of explicit or implicit institutional and organizational assumptions supporting public-interest views of states further reinforces the contention. These assumptions either do not hold, or hold only in part.

Open Access in the Economic Sphere but Restricted Access in the Political Sphere: The Experience of Singapore

Abstract This article uses the case of Singapore to argue that the theory of open access order advocated by North and his colleagues provides one possible option only. Although their theory of open access order explains the West relatively well, it does not always apply to contemporary non-Western countries. Similar to the cases of India and Japan examined elsewhere, the case of Singapore shows that what is more important to economic and human development is the open access in the economic sphere and the interconnected institutions in the area of property rights protection and contract enforcement, financial market, rule of law, and human resource accumulation. In other words, countries without open access in the political sphere as practiced in Singapore may also be able to achieve a great deal of success in terms of economic and human development if they ensure open access in the economic sphere and devote adequate resources to establishing the necessary interconnected institutions examined in this article. Further research elsewhere on China will similarly demonstrate this insight.

Контрактный раздаток и солидаризм – новая веха российской матрицы

Ольга Эрнестовна Бессонова – доктор социологических наук, ведущий научный сотрудник, Институт экономики и организации промышленного производства СО РАН. Адрес: 630090, Новосибирск, просп. Лаврентьева, д. 17. E-mail: beol@ngs.ru
 Цитирование: Бессонова О.Э. (2019) Контрактный раздаток и солидаризм – новая веха российской матрицы // Мир России. Т. 28. № 1. С. 7–31. DOI: 10.17323/1811-038X-2019-28-1-7-31
 В статье раскрывается содержание интегрально-институциональной парадигмы, которая является новым теоретическим инструментом анализа социально-экономической эволюции. В новой парадигме происходит смена интеллектуальных координат: на глобальном уровне рынок и раздаток (нерыночные институты) рассматриваются как универсальные механизмы координации, а на локальном практическом уровне – как «равноценные руки» государства. Переосмыслена версия общемировой и российской эволюции в ракурсе цивилизационной, формационной и институциональной проекций. Обосновывается тезис, что социальное государство и демократия в развитых западных странах – результат инклюзивного синтеза рынка и раздатка. Вскрывается институциональная дилемма современности – не социализм (план) или капитализм (рынок), а квазирынок или контрактный раздаток. Главный практический результат новой парадигмы – это обоснование необходимости перехода России к демократическому порядку открытого доступа на базе институциональной матрицы контрактного раздатка и идейной платформы солидаризма с целью преодоления системного институционального кризиса квазирынка.

Carolingians at the Doorsteps? The Maturing Limited Access Order of Early Medieval Europe

North et al. (2009) argue that accounting for different development outcomes requires understanding how different societies manage violence. Almost all societies have been limited-access orders where elites constrain violence to preserve their rents. Alternatively, in open-access orders violence is constrained by a government characterized by widespread political participation. Open-access societies were the first cases of sustained economic development; almost all of them have been Western European or offshoots. Understanding why is important. North et al. elaborate on three necessary conditions for achieving open access: (1) rule of law for elites, (2) support for perpetually- lived organizations, and (3) centralization and consolidation of violence. These constitute the to an open-access order. I argue that significant progress towards this doorstep was affected by the Carolingians of the early medieval era. I emphasize their large-scale distributions of confiscated/conquered lands to vassals, cultivation of bonds with the Church, and regularization of assemblies. The Carolingians introduced governance innovations that impersonalized relationships between elites and encouraged their enforcement under the rule of law.

CIVILIZATIONAL AND INSTITUTIONAL ASPECTS OF NATIONAL SELF-IDENTIFICATION IN UKRAINE: PHILOSOPHICAL-ANTHROPOLOGICAL APPROACH

Purpose. This article clarifies the significance of the person’s social self-identification as a basis for civilization and institutional explanation of national self-identification in Ukraine. Theoretical basis. The authors found that the analysis of the cultural and anthropological principles of national self-identity reveals two main opposed concepts: the concept of "eastern" cultural and social self-identity of Ukraine, which correlates with the metaphor of the split between "East" and "West", and the concept of "western" projection of the European future of Ukraine, which correlates with the metaphor of the bridge between "East" and "West". These concepts reflect the options for the citizens of Ukraine to make a personal choice of the way in achieving social self-identity. Douglas North’s concept of "open-access order" states and "limited access order" states can be used as a basis for an alternative, pragmatic approach to choice the criteria of national self-identity. Originality. National self-identification is a result of the choice of the person’s self-identification: still the person takes into account the history of the nation, the ethnic diversity of the nation, its cultural and civilizational characteristics. The philosophical-anthropological approach contributes to the demystification of the grounds of social self-identification, revealing the decisive role of the personal choice in shaping the new institutional foundations of national self-identity. Harmonization of the social institutions of Ukraine with the institutions of the European Union and the international community institutions opens wide opportunities for Ukraine’s successful integration into the "open-access order" societies. The clarification of the value and symbolic aspects of national self-identity in Ukraine contributes to the successful functioning of these institutions. Multilingualism is an adequate response to the global challenge of the reconstruction of Ukraine’s national self-identity. The education system is a key area for introducing multilingualism. Conclusions. The development, justification and systematization of cultural and institutional criteria for choosing the best ways to strengthen of national self-identity in Ukraine are a prerequisite for the successful self-identification of Ukrainian citizens in a complex and ever-changing global world.