First published in 2000. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

A symbiosis has developed between the new institutionalists and business historians, which stems from synergies in the interests of both groups. The central questions posed by Coase and Williamson, of why firms exist and grow, have found echoes in the historical work of Chandler on the forces leading to the rise of big business first in the United States and then in Europe. Conversely Williamson used Chandler's historical evidence to give foundation to his development of transaction cost economics.

A symbiosis has developed between the new institutionalists and business historians, which stems from synergies in the interests of both groups. The central questions posed by Coase and Williamson, of why firms exist and grow, have found echoes in the historical work of Chandler on the forces leading to the rise of big business first in the United States and then in Europe. Conversely Williamson used Chandler's historical evidence to give foundation to his development of transaction cost economics.

The key writings by the authors on the future of the multinational enterprise published over the last thirty years. It contains seminal pieces with a new introduction and conclusion to tie these pieces together in a comprehensive overview of the theory of the multinational enterprise.

This work offers a vision of the economy as a system of structured information flow. The structuring is effected by institutions, and in particular by firms, which specialize in processing the information needed to allocate resources properly. Firms are the institutional embodiment of the visions of individual entrepreneurs who believe that they have found a better way of allocating resources. Entrepreneurial vision is only a partial vision, however, in the sense that it does not encompass the entire economy, but only a subset of it. Free market economies encourage the exploitation of such...

Multinational enterprises have played a crucial role in postwar international economic integration. They have promoted intra-firm trade, technology transfer and internal movements of capital and human resources. This important book provides wide-ranging new evidence on their role in globalising the service sector - especially financial services - in establishing international networks of R & D and in developing trade and investment linkages in Asia. Particular attention is given to the participation of multinationls in management contracts and joint ventures, and the significance of this for...

Entrepreneurship has always been a key factor in economic growth, innovation, and the development of firms and businesses. More recently, new technologies, the waning of the "old economy," globalization, changing cultures and popular attitudes, and new policy stances have further highlighted the importance of entrepreneurship and enterprise.
Entrepreneurship is now a dynamic and expanding area of research, teaching, and debate, but there has been no standard reference work which is suitable for both established scholars and new researchers. This book fills that gap. All the major aspects...

The British railway network was a monument to Victorian private enterprise. Its masterpieces of civil engineering were emulated around the world. But its performance was controversial: praised for promoting a high density of lines, it was also criticised for wasteful duplication of routes.

Challenging the long-held belief that economics is a discipline that can be adequately pursued in isolation from the other social sciences, this book develops a new theoretical approach to entrepreneurship in the firm. Casson argues that the productivity of economic units--whether families, firms, or nation states--is affected by the degree of cooperation between the members of these units, which cannot be fully understood unless one considers cultural dynamics. The book combines economic and cultural determinants of performance into a single analytical framework, applying theory to a wide...

First published in 1986, this work reports the results of the Leverhulme project on mulitnationals and intermediate product trade based at the University of Reading during the academic year 1982/3.