Institutions and Economics web site by Prof. F. Toboso, University of Valencia, Spain

Traditions under the Institutional Political Economy (IPE) ‘umbrella’

A FEW COMMENTS :

Because few requirements have been made in the previous section of this website (-what is IPE-), it is evident to me that several types of economic analyses may qualify to be IPE analyses, even if they may show many differences in approach and substance or serve to endorse different political stances.

Economic analyses elaborated under research programmes with an Institutional (New and Old), Constitutional, or Law&Economics orientation may qualify to be so (let aside relevant contributions made by non-economists).

Why not making a more restrictive set of criteria-requirements in order to keep the IPE term for referring to a single perspective only? For example to the original-old institutional economics perspective?. This could be done, and arguments in favor of such a decision exist, of course.

However, there are also some arguments for not being so restrictive. From an ‘explanatory’ point of view, the collective/political economic decisions several groups of people take, and their consequences, differ so much depending on multiple variables that several and methodologically different explanatory analyses may transmit differentiated pictures of a common and complex social phenomenon, and all may be relevant and instructive, even if they are all methodologically biased as said. Moreover, in the realm of normative social science analyses, normative pluralism is not compatible with technocratic stances since everyone in democratic societies has the right to be in favor or against any proposal for policy action or institutional reform that might come up to the political debate whatever its origin or the scientific status of its authors. Persuasion is a third piece/argument. Persuasion in academic arenas stands longer, I think, when it is based on comparative, well informed and open mind thinking than when it is based on restrictive and selective presentations.

SOME ARTICLES ON THESE ISSUES:

JOURNAL	TITLE	DOWNLOAD
In English :
Revista de Análisis Económico, vol. 2, Decmber, 2006 (Special Issue).	“Old Organizational Issues from a New Institutional Economics Perspetive. Some Introductory Remarks” F. Toboso	Paper
Cambridge Journal of Economics, vol. 25, 6, 2001 pp. 765-83.	“Institutional Individualism and Institutional Change: The Search For A Middle Way Mode Of Explanation” F. Toboso	Abstract Paper
European Journal of Law and Economics, vol. 2, 1, 1995, pp. 63-84.	“Explaining the Process of Change Taking Place in Legal Rules and Social Norms: the Cases of Institutional Economics and New Institutional” Economics. F. Toboso	Abstract Paper
*Journal of Interdisciplinary Economics,* vol. 5, 2, 1994, pp. 121-33.	“The Role the Static Maximization Approach Plays in Neoclassical Analyses” F. Toboso	Abstract Paper
In Spanish :
Cap. 1 del libro Toboso y Arias (Eds.) (2006): Organización de gobiernos y mercados. Análisis de casos desde la Nueva Economía Institucional. PUV, edición conjunta con la Universidad de Vigo.	Cap. 1: “En el ámbito público la clave también está en las instituciones” F. Toboso y X.C. Arias	Capitulo 1
Problemas del Desarrollo-Revista Latinoamericana de Economía, num. 37, 146, Jul. – Sept. 2006	“Descentralización Política y Resultados Económicos” F. Toboso	Paper
Revista Asturiana de Economía, num.32, Enero-Abril, pp. 43-66.	“Algunas claves organizativas del Estado español de las autonomías y sus consecuencias” F. Toboso	Paper
El Trimestre Económico, num. 280, oct.-Dic. 2003.	“Nuevas orientaciones en el ambito de la Nueva Economía Institucional. La incorporacisn de los aspectos distributivos” F. Toboso y R. Compés	Abstract Paper
Hacienda Pública Española, num. 143, 4, 1997, pp. 175-92.	“¿En qué se diferencian los enfoques de análisis de la vieja y la nueva economía institucional?” F. Toboso	Abstract Paper
Cuadernos de Economía, vol. 29,Sept.-Dic. 1996.	“Sobre el enfoque de la elección pública positiva y la economía política constitucional: potencialidades y limitaciones” F. Toboso	Paper

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ABSTRACT

F. TOBOSO,
"Explaining the Process of Change Taking Place in Legal Rules and Social Norms: the Cases of Institutional Economics and New Institutional Economics".
European Journal of Law and Economics, vol. 2, 1, 1995, pp. 63-84.

This paper deals with the phenomenon of institutional change and it has been conceived as an attempt to answer the following question: Can we retain the image of institutional change contained in a theory when we replace a methodological foundation upon which the theory was built by a different and alternative one? . For an answer to be developed, special attention is paid to the contributions made by institutional economists (IE) and to those others by transaction cost-new institutional economists (NIE). The question clearly shows that it is rather a paper on applied methodology than a survey on institutional change contributions. Because of that, its main purpose is not to increase our knowledge about the characteristics of real changes in legal rules and social norms, their causes, their processes, nor their effects, though several examples are given of those institutionalist and new institutionalist contributions that analyze those changes. Our purpose consists of investigating the way in which these two groups of economists approach the object of analysis already mentioned. Our conclusion will be that institutionalist and new institutionalist contributions are built upon two different and mutually exclusive approaches because their respective methods of analysis (holism versus methodological individualism) are different and, above all, because they build their respective analyses upon some concepts that are mutually exclusive (concepts showing power/non-voluntary influences versus concepts showing voluntary transactions). Their analyses contain different and mutually exclusive images of the changes taking place in legal rules-formal institutions and social norms-informal institutions. Some comments about the limitations of the holist method of analysis are made in the paper.

ABSTRACT

F. TOBOSO,
"En qué se diferencian los enfoques de análisis de la vieja y la nueva economía institucional?"
Hacienda Pública Española, n: 143, 4, 1997.

En uno de los pocos trabajos publicados en España sobre el particular, Barañano (1994) finaliza su evaluación de la obra de Th. Veblen, uno de los fundadores de la "Vieja" Economía Institucional, señalando varios temas que considera de interés pero que no ha podido abordar en su artículo, y entre ellos menciona tanto "la disputa existente entre el holismo y el individualismo metodológico" como las recientes aportaciones de la llamada "Nueva" Economía Institucional. El objetivo básico del presente trabajo consiste, precisamente, en realizar una presentación y evaluación comparada de los enfoques de análisis habitualmente utilizados por los "viejos" y los "nuevos" economistas institucionalistas en su tarea de elaboración de teorías y modelos sobre la organizacion institucional de nuestros asuntos económicos, sus consecuencias y sus procesos de cambio o reforma. Tras remarcar que se trata de teorías y modelos con un elevado grado de abstracción, dicha evaluación permite concluir que unas y otras aportaciones están elaboradas a partir de enfoques claramente diferenciados. Debido al método de explicación-análisis mayoritariamente utilizado en cada caso (análisis sistémicos frente a análisis metodológicamente individualistas), al supuesto sobre el modo de interacción (conceptualización del poder frente a la conceptualización del intercambio voluntario), y al énfasis puesto en destacar los aspectos distributivos en un caso y de eficiencia en el otro, los análisis elaborados en uno y otro campo transmiten muy diferentes imágenes sobre las realidades objeto de su investigación.

ABSTRACT

F. TOBOSO,
"Institutional Individualism and Institutional Change. The Search For a Middle Way Mode of Explanation"
Cambridge Journal of Economics, vol. 25, 6, 2001 pp. 765-83.

After showing the lack of enthusiasm that several well-known scholars such as B. Caldwell, R. Langlois, A. Field, M. Rutherford, M. Blaug, and others have concerning the adoption of both methodological holism and methodological individualism, as methods of analysis, the present article shows that institutional individualism is a different method from the said two, but also from the so-called popperian program of situational analysis. For presenting it, the author goes back to the contributions made by J. Agassi himself, but he also offers some arguments in order to show that such a middle way method of explanation may be consistently used in combination with many other methodological assumptions. The method allows for incorporating into the economic theories and models the many formal and informal institutional aspects surrounding all human interactions: those taking place under stable structures of institutional rules and those others that result in institutional changes or reforms. Finally, some institutional individualist analyses of institutional changes are pointed out.

ABSTRACT

F. TOBOSO and R. COMPÉS,
"Nuevas orientaciones en el ambito de la Nueva Economma Institucional. La incorporación de los aspectos distributivos."
El Trimestre Econsmico, num. 280, oct.-Dic. 2003.

El presente trabajo se ofrece una presentacisn global del enfoque de analisis que suele caracterizar a las aportaciones realizadas en el ambito de la Nueva Economma Institucional (NEI) a efectos de mostrar que un nuevo consenso parece estar abriindose paso entre los nuevos institucionalistas en la medida en que, como afirman los propios autores, los nuevos avances "parecen ir en la lmnea de construir un enfoque de economma polmtica mas comprehensivo y flexible" en el que resulte posible prestar atencisn tambiin tanto a las consecuencias distributivas derivadas de la existencia de unos u otros marcos institucionales como a los conflictos distributivos que subyacen en todo proceso de reforma institucional. Todavma siguen siendo mayoritarios, si embargo, los trabajos en los que estos economistas adoptan una perspectiva que busca znicamente destacar el mayor o menor grado de eficiencia a que cada marco institucional da lugar, ceteris paribus.

ABSTRACT

F. TOBOSO,
"The Role the Static Maximization Approach Plays in Neoclassical Analyses"
Journal of Interdisciplinary Economics, vol. 5, 2, 1994, pp. 121-33.

This is an article on the methodology of economic thought. The critical assessment of the neoclassical research programme contained here basically comes from the contributions of J.M. Buchanan, Nobel prize winner in Economics 1986. These comments are aimed at pointing out the role that the static maximization approach plays in neoclassical analyses since L. Robbins and P. Samuelson's influential contributions came about after World war II. Just to complement this basic purpose, I present in section 4 the alternative methodological foundations J.M. Buchanan proposes and uses to replace the static maximization approach when building public choice theory, and I sketch in section 5 several personal comments about some explanatory and prescriptive limitations both neoclassical and public choice analyses share. Except in rare and anomalous cases, neither neoclassical nor public choice analyses contain concepts making reference to the non-voluntary or power influences some individuals might exercise over others in their economic interactions.

IPE first page
what is IPE? || IPE traditions || IPE associations-journals
IPE centers-courses || ICAPE-pluralism
HOMEPAGE