IZA Compact March 2013
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'Keynes Was an Extremely Political Person and We Should Be Too, Shouldn't
European Journal of Economics and Economic Policies: Intervention, Vol. 16 No. 1, 2019, pp. 1–7 ‘Keynes was an extremely political person and we should be too, shouldn’t we?’ Interview with Jan Priewe Jan Priewe is a retired Professor of Economics. He is a Senior Research Fellow of the Macroeconomic Policy Institute (IMK) and a Fellow and member of the coordination group of the Forum for Macroeconomics and Macroeconomic Policies (FMM). His research areas include macroeconomics, economic policies and development economics. He has authored, co-authored or co-edited 16 books and numerous articles. Jan received his PhD in economics at the University of Bremen, Germany, in 1982 and has been a professor since then, first at the University of Applied Sciences Darmstadt, Germany, and from 1993 onwards at the HTW Berlin, Germany, before he retired in 2014. Soon after the student movements of 1968 you started your academic life, right? I started in Konstanz, Germany, and after the first semester I moved to Marburg in 1970 where my friends from high school lived. There I faced an extremely conservative faculty and at that time it did not provide a good education. In a way I regret that I switched from the University of Konstanz to Marburg. However, there was a very active student life, including radical movements and especially Marxists of all kinds. I learned more from the post-1968 student activities and self-studies, including immense amounts of reading in social science and economics, than in the lecture rooms. We felt that something was wrong with standard economics textbooks but we had hardly any academic ‘masters’ in West Germany, so we had to teach ourselves. -
Xpenditures to More Socially Productive Uses
DOCUMENT RESUME ED 322 068 SO 030 105 AUTHOR Renner, Michael TITLE Swords into Plowshares: Converting to a Peace Economy. Worldwatch Paper 96. INSTITUTION Worldwatch Inst., Washington, D.C. REPORT NO ISBN-0-916468-97-6 PUB DATE Jun 90 NOTE 90p. AVAILABLE FROMWorldwatch Institute, 1776 Massachusetts Avenue, NW, Washington, DC 20036 ($4.00). PUB TYPE Reports - Descriptive (141) EDRS PRICE MF01 Plus Postage. PC Not Available from EDRS. DESCRIPTORS Disarmament; *Economics; Foreign Countries; Futures (of Society); Global Approach; *International Relations; *National Defense; *Peace; Social Change; World Problems IDENTIFIERS China; *Economic Conversion; Europe (East); USSR ABSTRACT Recent world developments have created an opportune time for nations to vigorously pursue a policy of converting the huge portion of their economies that traditionally have been devoted to military expenditures to more socially productive uses. This paper outlines a strategy for such a conversion, and discusses the issues that must be confronted in such a process. Specific aspects of conversion include: (1) misconceptions about lessening military spending; (2) building a conversion coalition; (3) the paths forged by China and the Soviet Union; (4) upheaval in Eastern Europe; and (5) grassroots initiatives in the West. It is concluded that the gathering pressLre for disarmament suggests that conversion will bea topic gaining importance during the 1990's. A number of statistical tables, chalts, and maps appear throughout this paper, and 127 endnotes are provided. (DB) -
Restructuring the US Military Bases in Germany Scope, Impacts, and Opportunities
B.I.C.C BONN INTERNATIONAL CENTER FOR CONVERSION . INTERNATIONALES KONVERSIONSZENTRUM BONN report4 Restructuring the US Military Bases in Germany Scope, Impacts, and Opportunities june 95 Introduction 4 In 1996 the United States will complete its dramatic post-Cold US Forces in Germany 8 War military restructuring in ● Military Infrastructure in Germany: From Occupation to Cooperation 10 Germany. The results are stag- ● Sharing the Burden of Defense: gering. In a six-year period the A Survey of the US Bases in United States will have closed or Germany During the Cold War 12 reduced almost 90 percent of its ● After the Cold War: bases, withdrawn more than contents Restructuring the US Presence 150,000 US military personnel, in Germany 17 and returned enough combined ● Map: US Base-Closures land to create a new federal state. 1990-1996 19 ● Endstate: The Emerging US The withdrawal will have a serious Base Structure in Germany 23 affect on many of the communi- ties that hosted US bases. The US Impact on the German Economy 26 military’syearly demand for goods and services in Germany has fal- ● The Economic Impact 28 len by more than US $3 billion, ● Impact on the Real Estate and more than 70,000 Germans Market 36 have lost their jobs through direct and indirect effects. Closing, Returning, and Converting US Bases 42 Local officials’ ability to replace those jobs by converting closed ● The Decision Process 44 bases will depend on several key ● Post-Closure US-German factors. The condition, location, Negotiations 45 and type of facility will frequently ● The German Base Disposal dictate the possible conversion Process 47 options. -
Send to Mike H
More Shock than Therapy: Why there has been no miracle in eastern Germany?, Socialism and Democracy (Summer). Draft Over the last few years a change of mood has affected German politics with regard to the country‘s ‗eastern problem‘.1 Until recently it was generally addressed by politicians with bluff confidence, expressing a sanguine faith that the combination of marketisation and state subsidies would rapidly modernise the region. But to an increasingly sceptical eastern electorate, such affirmations of a swift and sure revival are beginning to sound as empty as the promissory slogans of a previous era. Some politicians now feel obliged to adopt a more cautious tone. Dissenting voices are becoming more outspoken. Perhaps the most notable of the latter is that of Wolfgang Thierse, deputy leader of the Social Democratic Party (SPD) and president of the German parliament, who created a furore last year with the publication of critical theses, followed by a book, on economic and social conditions in the East.2 ‗Any honest appraisal‘, Thierse warned (Die Zeit No. 2 2001), ‗must establish that Eastern Germany‘s social and economic situation is approaching the brink.‘ The theses were indeed alarming; they drew attention to the decline in the economically active population, which had fallen below five million for the first time; to the unemployment rate, which had soared from 1.8 times that of the West in 1998 to 2.3 times in 2000; and to soaring levels of youth emigration and unemployment. ‗The longer the catch-up process stagnates,‘ Thierse warned, ‗the more quickly and clearly tendencies to decline will develop, even to the point of endangering what has, often at great cost, already been achieved.‘ The conclusion was sombre: ‗East Germany is, in this light, no longer a region in transition but second rate in perpetuity.‘ The contrast between such serious consideration of perpetual backwardness and the hopes and predictions of earlier phases of the ‗catch-up process‘ could hardly be sharper. -
Wirtschaftstheorie in Zwei Gesellschaftssystemen Deutschlands Wirtschaftstheorie
Texte Günter Krause Christa Luft Klaus Steinitz (Hrsg.) Wirtschaftstheorie in zwei Gesellschaftssystemen Deutschlands Wirtschaftstheorie 1 74 74 Rosa-Luxemburg-Stiftung Texte 74 Rosa-Luxemburg-Stiftung Günter Krause / Christa Luft / Klaus Steinitz (Hrsg.) Wirtschaftstheorie in zwei Gesellschaftssystemen Deutschlands Erfahrungen – Defizite – Herausforderungen Karl Dietz Verlag Berlin Günter Krause/Christa Luft/Klaus Steinitz (Hrsg.): Wirtschaftstheorie in zwei Gesellschaftssystemen Deutschlands Erfahrungen – Defizite – Herausforderungen (Reihe: Texte/Rosa-Luxemburg-Stiftung; Bd. 74) Berlin: Karl Dietz Verlag 2012 ISBN 978-3-320-002279-2 © Karl Dietz Verlag Berlin GmbH 2011 Einband: MediaService GmbH; Fotomontage, v. l. n. r.: John Maynard Keynes, Wladimir Iljitsch Lenin, Alfred Marshall, Walter Eucken und Karl Marx Druck- und Bindearbeit: MediaService GmbH Druck und Kommunikation Printed in Germany Inhalt Günter Krause / Christa Luft / Klaus Steinitz Vorwort 7 Günter Krause Wirtschaftstheorie in der DDR – eine Frage und vier Thesen 12 Klaus Steinitz Das Spannungsfeld von ökonomischer Forschung und Politik in der DDR und ein Vergleich mit der Bundesrepublik 33 Harry Nick Drei Fragen zu Unterschieden zwischen ökonomischen Theorien in der DDR und in der Bundesrepublik 63 Reinhold Kowalski Die Kapitalismusforschung in der DDR – Ent- und Abwicklung 73 Walter Kupferschmidt 41 Jahre Hochschule für Ökonomie Berlin – eine Bilanz 84 Klaus Peter Kisker Das Elend bundesdeutscher ökonomischer Lehre und Forschung 109 Klaus Müller Wirtschaftsstudium in der Bundesrepublik und der DDR – Ähnlichkeiten und Unterschiede 120 Peter Thal Reflexionen zu Lehre und Studium der Wirtschaftswissenschaften an der Martin-Luther-Universität Halle-Wittenberg 1951 – 1991 133 Norbert Peche Wirtschaftswissenschaftliche Lehre und Forschung zwischen Ost und West. Ein persönliches Statement 20 Jahre »danach« 139 Heinz-J. Bontrup Menschliche Arbeit in der Ökonomik. -
Power and Influence of Economists; Contributions to the Social
Power and Influence of Economists Economists occupy leading positions in many different sectors, including central and private banks, multinational corporations, the state and the media, as well as serve as policy consultants on everything from health to the environment and security. Power and Influence of Economists explores the interconnected relationship between power, knowledge and influence which has led economics to be both a source and beneficiary of widespread power and influence. The contributors to this book explore the complex and diverse methods and channels that economists have used to exert and expand their influence from different disciplinary and national perspectives. Four different analytical views on the role of power and economics are taken: first, the role of economic expert discourses as power devices for the formation of influential expertise; second, the logics and modalities of governmentality that produce power/knowledge apparatuses between science and society; third, economists as involved in networks between academia, politics and the media; and fourth, economics considered as a social field, including questions of legitimacy and unequal relations between economists based on the accumulation of various capitals. The volume includes case studies on a variety of national configurations of economics, such as the US, Germany, Italy, Switzerland, Greece, Mexico and Brazil, as well as international spaces and organisations such as the IMF. This book provides innovative research perspectives for students and scholars of heterodox economics, cultural political economy, sociology of professions, network studies and the social studies of power, discourse and knowledge. Jens Maesse is Assistant Professor at the Department of Sociology at the University of Giessen, Germany. -
Mbrie Left Politics in Germany
Michael Brie Sailing against the wind Alliances for left politics “To be dialectic means to have the wind of history in one’s sails. The sails are the notions. However, it is not suffi- cient to have the sails. The art to set them that is the decisive thing.” Walter Benjamin 1 I. Alternative majorities are possible There are five factors which in their sum can generate sudden political changes – economic collapses, diminishing trust in social institutions, the solidarity of various social groups against the rulers, an ideology that effectively challenges the rulers, and finally, the division among the ruling classes themselves. 2 Due to the crisis of neoliberalism, a number of condi- tions for such a political change have emerged in Germany. There is deep pessimism con- cerning their personal prospects among large parts of the populations, a strong alienation toward the institutions of the Federal Republic seen mainly as instruments of power of the privileged classes. In the end of the year 2006, two thirds of the population had the opinion that things turned unjust in the Federal Republic; a third saw themselves on the losers’ side. For the first time, more citizens were dissatisfied with the functioning of democracy in Germany than were sat- isfied. 3 The economic recovery reached mainly the well-off. Almost everybody feels directly or indirectly threatened by the common insecurity. The ideology of neoliberalism has gotten into disrepute, even among the rulers. A turn of policy becomes possible. However, the con- ditions necessary for that yet have to be created. The Hartz reforms 4 were what brought the break. -
The Rise of the European Consolidation State Wolfgang Streeck
MPIfG Discussion Paper 15/1 The Rise of the European Consolidation State Wolfgang Streeck MPIfG Discussion Paper MPIfG Discussion Paper Wolfgang Streeck The Rise of the European Consolidation State MPIfG Discussion Paper 15/1 Max-Planck-Institut für Gesellschaftsforschung, Köln Max Planck Institute for the Study of Societies, Cologne February 2015 MPIfG Discussion Paper ISSN 0944-2073 (Print) ISSN 1864-4325 (Internet) © 2015 by the author Wolfgang Streeck is Emeritus Director at the Max Planck Institute for the Study of Societies, Cologne. [email protected] Downloads www.mpifg.de Go to Publications / Discussion Papers Max-Planck-Institut für Gesellschaftsforschung Max Planck Institute for the Study of Societies Paulstr. 3 | 50676 Cologne | Germany Tel. +49 221 2767-0 Fax +49 221 2767-555 www.mpifg.de [email protected] Streeck: The Rise of the European Consolidation State iii Abstract The rise of the consolidation state follows the displacement of the classical tax state, or Steuerstaat, by what I have called the debt state, a process that began in the 1980s in all rich capitalist democracies. Consolidation is the contemporary response to the “fiscal crisis of the state” envisaged as early as the late 1960s, when postwar growth had come to an end. Both the long-term increase in public debt and the current global attempts to bring it under control were intertwined with the “financialization” of advanced capital- ism and its complex functions and dysfunctions. The ongoing shift towards a consoli- dation state involves a deep rebuilding of the political institutions of postwar demo- cratic capitalism and its international order. This is the case in particular in Europe where consolidation coincides with an unprecedented increase in the scale of political rule under European Monetary Union and with the transformation of the latter into an asymmetric fiscal stabilization regime. -
Capitalisation of the Media Industry from a Political Economy Perspective
tripleC 19 (2): 325-342, 2021 http://www.triple-c.at Capitalisation of the Media Industry From a Political Economy Perspective Manfred Knoche Paris-Lodron-University of Salzburg, Salzburg, Austria, [email protected] http://www.medienoekonomie.at https://kowi.uni-salzburg.at/ma/knoche-manfred/ @Medoek https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manfred_Knoche Translation from German: Christian Fuchs Abstract Approaches to the critique of the political economy of communication in society belong to the “forgotten theories” in media and communication studies. But in view of the unmistakable structural change of a media industry “unleashed” by deregulation, privatisation, digitalisation, concentration, globalisation, etc., it seems from an academic perspective necessary to analyse the development of the media industry in close connection with the equally unmistakable general development of an “unleashed” capitalism. This article therefore shows that the analysis of the development processes of capitalism as the undoubtedly globally dominant economic and social system from a political economy perspective makes it possible to analyse, explain, and partly forecast the economisation or commercialisation process in the media industry in an academically appropriate way with regard to its causes, forms, consequences, and further development. Theoretical explanations are offered by the further developments of the analysis and critique of contemporary capitalism based on Marx’s critique of the political economy as a historical-materialist analysis of society. In doing so, the permanent fundamental characteristics, modes of functioning and “regularities” of the capitalist mode of production and the capitalist formation of society are analysed in connection with the particularities of the current capitalisation process in the media industry. -
German Labour Experiences Since World War Two: a Suggested Interpretation Ingo Schmidt
PRESENTATION / PRÉSENTATION German Labour Experiences Since World War Two: A Suggested Interpretation Ingo Schmidt Introduction About a century ago Werner Sombart, who then considered himself a socialist, published his book Why is there No Socialism in the United States?1 He argued that capitalist advancement in the us would trigger the develop- ment of a socialist movement in the same way this had occurred in Europe. If, for whatever reasons, this did not happen, Sombart argued that the absence of an American branch of international socialism would impede the socialist movements in other countries. About two decades ago, just after the Berlin Wall had fallen and the Soviet Union had imploded, Francis Fukuyama, who was never considered a socialist, triumphantly pronounced the superiority of the American variety of liberal democracy and capitalism.2 Every other form of political and economic orga- nization that had been tried in the 20th century, i.e., Western European welfare capitalism, Eastern European state socialism and developmental states in the Global South had, according to Fukuyama, failed. Therefore, he concluded, in order to survive in the global market place all countries had to turn to the capitalist road, which was represented by the us. However, Sombart’s original idea that there is at least some sort of socialism in Europe but no such thing in America has regained unexpected promi- nence since the 1990s, partly as a response to the American triumphalism 1. Werner Sombart, Warum gibt es in den Vereinigten Staaten keinen Sozialismus? (Tübingen 1906). 2. Francis Fukuyama, The End of History (New York 1992). -
The East German Revolution of 1989
The East German Revolution of 1989 A thesis submitted to the University of Manchester for the degree of Ph.D. in the Faculty of Economic and Social Studies. Gareth Dale, Department of Government, September 1999. Contents List of Tables 3 Declaration and Copyright 5 Abstract 6 Abbreviations, Acronyms, Glossary and ‘Who’s Who’ 8 Preface 12 1. Introduction 18 2. Capitalism and the States-system 21 (i) Competition and Exploitation 22 (ii) Capitalism and States 28 (iii) The Modern World 42 (iv) Political Crisis and Conflict 61 3. Expansion and Crisis of the Soviet-type Economies 71 4. East Germany: 1945 to 1975 110 5. 1975 to June 1989: Cracks Beneath the Surface 147 (i) Profitability Decline 147 (ii) Between a Rock and a Hard Place 159 (iii) Crisis of Confidence 177 (iv) Terminal Crisis: 1987-9 190 6. Scenting Opportunity, Mobilizing Protest 215 7. The Wende and the Fall of the Wall 272 8. Conclusion 313 Bibliography 322 2 List of Tables Table 2.1 Government spending as percentage of GDP; DMEs 50 Table 3.1 Consumer goods branches, USSR 75 Table 3.2 Producer and consumer goods sectors, GDR 75 Table 3.3 World industrial and trade growth 91 Table 3.4 Trade in manufactures as proportion of world output 91 Table 3.5 Foreign trade growth of USSR and six European STEs 99 Table 3.6 Joint ventures 99 Table 3.7 Net debt of USSR and six European STEs 100 Table 4.1 Crises, GDR, 1949-88 127 Table 4.2 Economic crisis, 1960-2 130 Table 4.3 East Germans’ faith in socialism 140 Table 4.4 Trade with DMEs 143 Table 5.1 Rate of accumulation 148 Table 5.2 National -
Eine Netzwerkanalyse Von Ökonomen Und Wissenschaftlern Anderer Disziplinen Auf Basis Eines Surveys Unter Abgeordneten Und Ministerialbeamten
Nr 100 Eine Netzwerkanalyse von Ökonomen und Wissenschaftlern anderer Disziplinen auf Basis eines Surveys unter Abgeordneten und Ministerialbeamten Wolfgang Schwarzbauer, Tobias Thomas, Gert G. Wagner April 2019 IMPRESSUM DICE ORDNUNGSPOLITISCHE PERSPEKTIVEN Veröffentlicht durch: düsseldorf university press (dup) im Auftrag der Heinrich‐Heine‐Universität Düsseldorf, Wirtschaftswissenschaftliche Fakultät, Düsseldorf Institute for Competition Economics (DICE), Universitätsstraße 1, 40225 Düsseldorf, Deutschland www.dice.hhu.de Herausgeber: Prof. Dr. Justus Haucap Düsseldorfer Institut für Wettbewerbsökonomie (DICE) Tel: +49(0) 211‐81‐15125, E‐Mail: [email protected] DICE ORDNUNGSPOLITISCHE PERSPEKTIVEN Alle Rechte vorbehalten. Düsseldorf 2019 ISSN 2190‐992X (online) ‐ ISBN 978‐3‐86304‐700‐9 Eine Netzwerkanalyse von Ökonomen und Wissenschaftlern anderer Disziplinen auf Basis eines Surveys a unter Abgeordneten und Ministerialbeamten Wolfgang Schwarzbauerb, Tobias Thomasc und Gert G. Wagnerd April 2019 Zusammenfassung Offen ausgetragenen Lagerdebatten zwischen Ökonomen sind in Deutschland eher selten. Was hingegen öfters in Diskussionen oder in der Berichterstattung über Ökonomen mitschwingt, ist eine Zuordnung in weltanschauliche Lager, etwa nach Schemata wie arbeitgeber- arbeitnehmernah oder auch gelegentlich links-marktliberal. Da diese Zuordnung für die nicht an der Spitze der öffentlichen Bekanntheit stehenden Ökonomen eher selten explizit ausgespro- chen wird, ist eine empirische Untersuchung der Lager-Theorie auf Basis der Medienberichter-