• Journal of the Economic Geographical Society of Korea
• /
• v.16 no.3
• /
• pp.408-422
• /
• 2013

This paper builds on recent scholarly endeavours to establish a body of knowledge on Varieties of Asian Capitalism/Asian Business Systems. The forthcoming Oxford handbook of Asian business systems systematically compares institutional capitalist arrangements across Asia including Laos, yet there is no chapter on Cambodia. The objective of this paper is to compare the Lao and Cambodian varieties of Asian capitalism, with special reference to the role of the state and the economic geography of both countries. Accordingly, it seeks answers to the questions as to how territory has become a key arena for re-organising economic power and how the Lao and Cambodian state themselves are being transformed through state capitalism and the Beijing-Seoul-Tokyo Consensus. A comparative analysis reveals a difference between state-coordinated frontier capitalism in Laos versus patrimonial oligarchy in Cambodia. Interdependencies between the market and the state in Laos display the state as active and interventionist. In some provinces the central government leaves decision making to provincial elites contributing to the emergence of other distinctive regional varieties of capitalism. The rising spatially less selective oligarchs in Cambodia focus relatively more on markets, but are certainly not seeking free markets with equal entry opportunities. The findings offer interesting possibilities for further research on the spaces of Asian capitalism, both from an empirical and theoretical perspective. More work should be done to accommodate the role of small and medium enterprises and theories need to better integrate oligarchic, personal and familial capitalism. Finally, comparative corridor studies in Laos could lead to better insights into the nature of regional varieties of capitalism.

• Journal of the Korean Geographical Society
• /
• v.50 no.1
• /
• pp.73-90
• /
• 2015

This article focuses on geo-institutional differentiation and a multi-scalar analysis of emerging capitalist development in Laos. It discusses the impact of the Greater Mekong Subregion on new institutional economic and economic geographical arrangements. It demonstrates the usefulness of the varieties of Asian capitalism approach. The rubber industry was chosen to unravel emerging but various sub-national institutional arrangements linked to higher scale levels. Rubber is a growing agribusiness industry throughout the country, led by the insatiable demand from China. Overall, this study shows that the capitalist development of the rubber industry features much geo-institutional differentiation, due to the different strategies of Chinese, Thai and Vietnamese investors. Since Laos is still in transition from a state-led economy to something else, it is impossible at this to identify the exact number capitalisms. Yet, the evidence on rubber clearly lays bare the presence of multiple institutional arrangements. Without more inclusiveness, however, the implications for regional development are worrying. Exclusive arrangements will most likely lead to more uneven regional development and higher regional inequality. To refine theories on sub-national varieties of capitalism in developing countries it is instructive to consider more explicitly the notion of regional personal capitalisms and the complex interplay between national and regional states and relationships between capital accumulation and livelihood analyses.

• Korean Journal of Social Welfare Studies
• /
• v.48 no.3
• /
• pp.145-169
• /
• 2017

Female plays an important role in new welfare policies as emerging new social risks including care needs resulted from increasing female employment participation and changes in family structures. Whereas the effects of work and life reconciliation policies on female employment are well established, less is known for the role of production regime as an important institution on gender wage gap. This study examines the questions in what way and to what extent production regimes and work and family reconciliation policies influence gender wage gap in advanced capitalism countries using the Luxembourg Income Study (LIS). The coordinated market economies (CMEs), presented as higher firm-specific skills, are associated with lower income rank for female workers than male workers, hence larger degree of gender wage gap. Longer parental leave weeks and higher childcare expenditures are associated with less degree of gender wage gap. This research highlights the importance of production regimes in understanding gender wage gap and potential interaction between production regimes and work and life reconciliation policies on gender wage gap.

• Korean Journal of Social Welfare
• /
• v.57 no.2
• /
• pp.205-230
• /
• 2005

This study empirically examines if there is a certain linkage between the production regimes and welfare systems; and if linked, how they are linked. It also investigates what the different regimes performed in terms of economic growth and redistribution. As a matter of fact, we have a series of studies that explores structural diversity of production and welfare. However, the existing studies are limited in that they consider only specific facets of the structure, although the structure of welfare capitalism should be studied as a comprehensive whole. This is the gap which this study tries to overcome. The study is composed of two major parts. The first one is the cluster analysis that examines if Esping-Andersen's notion about three different welfare regime and the thesis of diversity of capitalism can be dealt within a single research framework. The second is the ANOVA analysis investigating if variables of production and welfare are to be statistically different in the trichotomy framework. According to the result of the analyses, we can find at least two important evidences about institutional complementaries of production and welfare. First, Esping-Andersen's framework is useful to comprehensively deal with production as well as welfare. Secondly, there are statistically different regimes of production and welfare in the context of political economic and social policy variables. What is the most striking conclusion of the study is that there is no difference among the regimes in terms of the level of economic efficiency; while we can find a huge differences in terms of the level of welfare effectiveness. In conclusion, there is no substantive evidence to argue that welfare is innately antithesis of economic growth.

• Journal of Science and Technology Studies
• /
• v.8 no.2
• /
• pp.83-108
• /
• 2008

A analytical framework is suggested to explain how different standardization each country makes with incorporation of institutional elements such as the state's intervention and inter-firm relations which are considered to have a significant effect on it. Application to mobile telecommunication industry of the framework shows that different innovation system has its own technological standardization. In isolated inter-firm relation system, standardization is achieved through market but in cooperative one, through coordinating activities between participant firms. The state, however, intervenes more deeply in standardization and inter-firm relations are shorter in state-led and isolated firm relation system than in state-led and cooperative firm relation system.

• Journal of the Economic Geographical Society of Korea
• /
• v.11 no.3
• /
• pp.302-318
• /
• 2008

As socio-economic paradigms have been moving towards the knowledge-based capitalism from the industrial capitalism, it is obvious that research on industrial agglomeration and regional innovation has been explosively increased. However, there is a contradictory tendency that the terms and concepts, which are related to industrial agglomeration, have became less clear and more fuzzy. In this sense, this paper attempts to tackle and reconsider the concept, typology and theories of agglomeration and (or) cluster in economic geography. The main claims are as follows. Firstly, the terms and concepts related to industrial agglomeration and cluster need to be clear. It seems to be that cluster is received as an umbrella concept of agglomerations all-embracing the varieties of a geographical concentration of industry. However, the authors claim that the cluster concept should be part of the diverse types of industrial agglomeration. Secondly, the tendency of a less clear definition on agglomeration and cluster could make it difficult to identify the types of agglomeration being in the forms of diversity. Such a tendency would result in a misguided understanding and interpretation of a typology of agglomeration. Finally and most importantly, as perspectives or theories that are associated with industrial agglomeration and cluster show increasingly a propensity of convergence, it is problematic that related theories and perspectives lose their own identity and distinctiveness.