1st Edition

Socio-economics Toward a New Synthesis

By Amitai Etzioni, Paul R. Lawrence Copyright 1994
    376 Pages
    by Routledge

    376 Pages
    by Routledge

    This work is organized in seven sections around major themes of socio-economics. The first section outlines socio-economics in an historical perspective, drawing on the "Methodenstreit" in the German school of economics at the turn of the century. Four additional essays view economic behaviour from the perspective of psychology, sociology and values outside the realm of economics. The second section of the book explores the process of choice and goals made by the variety of economic factors, among them factors that influence choices, values and motivations outside economics. The next two sections, each containing three papers, examine executive leadership and entrepreneurship from the broader socio-economic perspective. Section five includes papers that deal with the role of institutions in the modern political economy. It develops an institutional theory of markets, firms, human values in economic behaviour and investment in ethnic goals and morality. Section six focuses on the modern corporate culture considering collective human capital. The final three papers examine the boundaries that embrace the processes and activities of firms. They consider the bonds and relationships that develop between firms and organizations in the modern political economy.

    I: Introduction; 1: Socio-Economics; 2: Socio-Economics; II: Socio-Economics—A General Approach; 3: “The Battle of the Methods”; 4: The Economic Person in Sociological Context; 5: Contemporary Liberals, Communitarians, and Individual Choices; 6: The Social Construction of Economic Institutions; III: Utility, Goals, and Values; 7: Rethinking Utility Theory; 8: The “Theory as Map” Analogy and Changes in Assumption Sets in Economics; 9: Values and Principles; IV: Socioeconomic Perspective on Executive Leadership and Entrepreneurship; 10: Stakeholders, Shareholders, Managers; 11: Entrepreneurship, Resource Cooptation, and Social Contracting; 12: A New Entrepreneurial Paradigm; V: The Role of Institutions; 13: Competition and Markets; 14: Human Values and Economic Behavior; VI: Corporate Culture; 15: Organizational Culture and “Collective” Human Capital; 16: Corporate Culture and Financial Performance; VIII: Boundaries; 17: The Boundaries of the Firm; 18: Interorganizational Bonds and Intraorganizational Behavior; VIII: The Next Steps; 19: Socio-Economics

    Biography

    Amitai Etzioni, Paul R. Lawrence