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Transaction costs, responsive housing supply, rent controls, tenant protection, and access to credit affect residential mobility – these different parts of housing policy are included in what has been defined as housing regimes, which embrace regulations, laws, norms, and ideology as well as economic factors. In this chapter, we investigate how these regimes change by using institutional theories of path dependence. We use Sweden as an example and study three Swedish housing market reforms during the past decades that may have affected residential mobility, each related to one of the main institutional pillars of housing provision: tenure legislation, taxation, and finance. More precisely, we study the development of the rental regulation since the late 1960s, the tax reform in 1991, and the new reforms on mortgages since 2010. What caused these reforms? What were the main mechanisms behind them, and why did they occur at the time they did? We argue, besides affecting residential mobility, these reforms have the common feature of including interesting elements of path dependence and forming critical junctures that have led the development on to a new path. Institutions of tenure legislation, housing finance, and taxation are often claimed to have effects on residential mobility. Although they are seldom designed with the explicit aim of supporting (or counteracting) residential mobility, they may sometimes do so as more or less unintended consequences.

The purpose of this paper is to measure the effects of WTO accession on the economic growth of China, and the paths of those effects.

This article carries out a theoretical and empirical analysis on the effect on China's economic growth from WTO accession. First is about the theoretical analysis of the paths of those effects which WTO accession has on China's economic growth. Next is to make empirical test about the effects through dummy variable regression and cross variable analysis.

WTO accession has a remarkable and a positive effect on China's economic growth through the following specific paths, i.e. foreign trade path, economic system reform path and FDI path. But so far entry into WTO has not positively influenced China's economic growth through technological innovation.

Based on the theoretical and empirical analysis, this article puts forward relative policies and suggestions on what China should do in the future.

This study aims to analyze reform path for waste management policy implementation. With reference to the Bayesian theory, this study provides a dynamic policy conversion method through various context settings. Furthermore, this study attempts to present an empirical research paradigm.

Matland’s “ambiguity-conflict model” is applied to explain the problems and reform paths of China’s waste management policy implementation. Integrating structure discovery and bibliometrics into qualitative analysis, this study used search data from literature search engine with specific themes to achieve structure learning of Bayesian network with key factors refined in waste management policy.

The results show that China’s waste management policy implementation belongs to symbolic implementation with high ambiguity and high conflict. Four basic conversion paths for the waste management policy are proposed, which are classified by length and stability. Then, it is possible to locate the factors, paths and types of policy implementation through involvement analysis with features of each path and each district of policy implementation. Public education holds direct but unstable impact on waste management. Economic incentives hold continuous but gradually diminishing impact. Perceived policy effectiveness plays the crucial role like a central bridge. Resident conditions have a positive impact, which could be enhanced through economic development of China. The impact of subjective norm on waste management is not significant. But subjective norm has the potential breakthrough for solving stagnation of waste classification policy. However, the impacts from each factor may change along with economy growth and technology innovation.

This study uses the “ambiguity-conflict model” to position China’s waste classification policy and suggests that structure discovery methods help understand feasible reform paths for reform policy. The integration of theoretical analysis and quantitative simulation can achieve a comprehensive analysis of problems and solutions in waste management policy implementation of China. Promotion and education, economic incentives, perceived value, behavior control, subjective norm, perceived policy effectiveness, informal waste recycling system and residential conditions are explored as key factors for waste classification policy implementation as a representative in waste management policy. The role of each key factor and features of each conversion paths are integrated to position reform paths in the ambiguity-conflict model. This work helps to explain the stagnation of waste management policy implementation from the perspective of dynamic structure evolution, and some specific suggestions to get out of stagnation are proposed.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the changes in initial public offering (IPO) underpricing and short‐run performance following a regulatory reform (No. 54 [2002] China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC)) of the method of allocating IPO shares in China.

On 20 May 2002, the CSRC announced that IPO subscription and allotment would be based on the market value of investors' tradable shareholdings. Before the regulatory change, this was determined by the amount of funds used for subscription. The reform was intended to increase participation by both smaller and institutional investors. Based on a sample of 209 IPOs in the Shanghai A‐share market during the period 2001‐2003, the paper employs an event study methodology to examine the impact of this IPO regulatory reform.

The paper finds that the overall (pre‐ and post‐reform) average abnormal initial return of 116.94 per cent is lower than in earlier studies of Chinese IPOs but higher than in other markets. Post‐reform underpricing decreases by 42.27 per cent compared to pre‐reform levels. In the post‐listing aftermarket a pre‐reform upward trend of cumulative abnormal returns was reversed to become downward post‐reform. The results suggest that the regulatory change has encouraged well‐informed investors, consistent with Information Cascades and Bandwagon hypotheses. It also appears that the reform improved market efficiency and secondary market liquidity.

The findings shed light on the relationship between IPO costs, IPO pricing, market liquidity and market microstructure. They also have important implications for issuers, underwriters and in particular for policy markers.

Purpose – This chapter addresses a range of questions about public management reform in ‘Napoleonic’ administrative systems. It starts by addressing the descriptive question about what trajectories of reform occurred, and then explores what has been the fundamental stance toward new public management (NPM) (rejected, imported and implemented, or filtered and translated). I also discuss how reforms have changed the relative power base and role interpretation of the main actors in public management reform, and analyze the strategic approaches employed toward the reform of public management in these countries. Finally, I assess some key strategic alternatives for policy-makers as regards the reform of public management in the face of the long-term effects of the fiscal crisis that has struck these countries since 2010.

Design/Methodology/Approach – This chapter is based on a combination of literature reviews and opinions from the experts in the field who are surveyed – selected experts are all renowned scholars or leading practitioners, knowledgeable of public sector reform in the countries subject to investigation.

Findings – The chapter concludes that NPM-inspired reforms have to some extent been attempted; particularly, the role of tenured officials seems to have changed substantially, especially in their relationship with elected officials. However, NPM doctrines have been mainly filtered and translated into the local politico-administrative dynamics and codes of interpretation, and quite often they have been hollowed out. Particularly, the role of tenured officials seems to have changed substantially, especially in their relationship with elected officials. In terms of strategic approaches, there seems to have been much “maintaining” and some “modernizing,” although with important differences between countries (Italy being an especially difficult case to classify). The fiscal crisis and the changes in European governance might lead to a profoundly different state of affairs in which the interconnection between changes in European Union (EU) governance and public sector reform might become more closely interconnected than they used to be.

Research limitations/Implications – The contribution is mainly speculative, and urges for empirical research to be undertaken, particularly on the issue of the interconnection between changes in EU governance and public sector reform.

Originality/Value – The contribution provides a distinctive and critical perspective on public sector reform in an underinvestigated cluster of countries.

This paper is an attempt to sketch the influence of the German Historical School on the development of Russian economic thought at the boundary of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries and, particularly, on the forming of its socio‐ethical trend with an alternative approach in solving the “social question”.

The paper is designed as a brief outlook of the history of the Russian economic thought at the pre‐revolutionary time and of the main theoretical debates on the paths of Russia's economic development.

It can be seen that at the turn of the century a new socio‐ethical trend of political economy in the Russian economic science was being shaped under the influence of the German Historical School's ideas and their creative re‐evaluation. Representatives of this trend – Bulgakov, Miklashevsky, Tugan‐Baranovsky and others – addressed the problems of “social ideal”, “social policy” and ethical principle in political economy. They were promoting the social reforms as the path to social compromise.

The reconstructuring of Russia's political and economic system in the last decade of the twentieth century and transition to a market‐oriented economy gave rise to a modern wave of debates over the fundamentals of economic theory. The present paper focuses on the importance of the humanistic approach in the theory of social economy that involves historical, philosophical, legal and others points of view on the economic life of society.

This paper discusses whether in view of the accumulated contextual pressures the evolving new German employee relations model will resemble a more flexible version of the current one or whether it will emerge as an Anglo‐Saxonised German model. It ascertains that despite the current contestation of the German model, erosion tendencies, though not negligible, are not as widespread as is often assumed and that far‐reaching reforms along neo‐liberal lines are not desirable in the German context. It is suggested that a large proportion of German employers have a vested interest in maintaining the fundamentals of the current system. A path‐dependent reform trajectory internal to the system is proposed. This paper shows that the series of reforms carried out so far has been accomplished within the parameters of the existing system, taking the form of regulated flexibility and centrally co‐ordinated decentralisation. It ascertains that the German model is more adaptable and more flexible than its reputation suggests, allowing companies to operate with more flexible collective employee relations’ responses. Yet, evidence suggests that firms are already under‐utilising the broadened framework. Nevertheless, the author predicts a continuation of the reform process and an emerging new flexible German employee relations model that remains essentially a collective one.

Sets out to present current dynamics of public management reform in Austria, a country that is characterized by institutional governance features (federal structure, legalistic Rechtsstaat tradition) often described as an obstacle to management‐oriented reforms. The paper's focus lies in the reception of management ideas and concepts by public sector executives within this special national context and in differences between federal and state administration.

Presents results of a recent questionnaire‐based executive survey (sample size: 385). Apart from non‐parametric correlation analyses, investigates level differences (federal vs state) by using an independent samples Mann‐Whitney U rank sum test.

Highlights the importance of the national institutional background for understanding public management changes. Finds considerable support for reform initiatives despite some scepticism and resistance towards management knowledge and instruments. Results confirm that executives in a legalistic Rechtsstaat system are not per se opposed to management‐driven reforms. Regarding the reception of public management reforms, at various government levels, differences between federal and state level are less pronounced than expected.

Addresses the lack of empirical research regarding the reception of management ideas in legalistic Rechtsstaat systems by presenting data from a country which has hardly been covered by international public management literature so far. This study also compares the reception at federal and state administration to look for level variations of management reform dynamics.