Institutions, Communication and Values

Institutions are man-made entities and their workings, as well as the changes they may undergo, is fundamentally imbued in language and communication. In analyzing the role of socio-cultural values, this book argues that communication and language is inseparable from both the economy and a meaningful understanding of insitutions.

WILFRED DOLFSMA is Professor of Innovation and Strategy at the University of Groningen School of Economics and Business, the Netherlands, and professorial fellow at Maastricht University (UNU-MERIT). He is both an economist and philosopher and holds a PhD in the former. He was 2005/6 research fellow at the Netherlands Institute for Advanced Studies (NIAS) and is corresponding editor for the Review of Social Economy. His research interests are the interrelations between economy, society and technology. He has published on various aspects of media industries, feminist economics as well as on globalisation, and the developments in and effects of IPR. In addition, as an institutional economist, Dolfsma does research in the history and methodology of economics, and consumption. He has co-edited Understanding the Dynamics of the Knowledge Economy (ed. with Luc Soete, 2006), Globalization, Social Capital and Inequality (ed. with Charlie Dannreuther, 2003), Knowledge Economies (Routledge, 2008), The Elgar Companion to Social Economics (ed. with John Davis; Edward Elgar, 2008), and published Institutional Economics and the Formation of Preferences (2004). The latter monograph won him the Gunnar Myrdal Prize (2006). His articles have featured in, a.o., the Journal of Economics Issues, the Journal of Evolutionary Economics, the Journal of Economic and Social Geography, the Journal of Business Ethics, The Information Society and Research Policy.

List of Tables, Figures, Boxes
Preface
Introduction
Economy &--Society (How do they relate?)
Institutions, Institutional Change and Language
Structure, Agency and the Role of Values in Processes of Institutional Change
Silent Trade
Knowledge Coordination and Development via Market, Hierarchy and Gift Exchange
Making Knowledge Work in Organizations
Path Dependence in Organization
Consumption of Symbolic Goods
Law &--Economics: bankruptcy law
Conclusion
References
Index