Economic Networks (economic + network)

Distribution by Scientific Domains


Selected Abstracts


FROM EXOGENOUS TO ENDOGENOUS ECONOMIC NETWORKS: INTERNET APPLICATIONS

JOURNAL OF ECONOMIC SURVEYS, Issue 5 2006
Alessio D'Ignazio
Abstract Economic agents' behaviour is affected by their position in a network, either exogenous or endogenous, in which they interact with a sub-set of neighbours only. The network's links, which may be generated by vertical and/or horizontal relations, or by more complex morphologies, may explain the transition between dynamic equilibria and the instability of economic aggregates. Moreover, networks shape strategic interaction among agents by determining their strategies; the problem of access and interconnection, particularly relevant in the Internet, is perhaps the best example. A two-way feedback between strategies and network structures arises instead when links are endogenous: those features are clearly shown in the mechanism underlying the formation of peering links and R & D networks. [source]


The Commonwealth as an Economic Network

AUSTRALIAN ECONOMIC HISTORY REVIEW, Issue 3 2001
Paul L. Robertson
Research on the economics and sociology of business networks also sheds light on the development of networks of countries. The British Commonwealth was an important global network, or group of networks, in the mid-twentieth century. Commonwealth members, including Australia and New Zealand, cooperated in the management of the Sterling Area and the Commonwealth Preference Area. Yet Commonwealth members also had links to other networks and other sources of influence including the USA, continental Europe and Japan. During the 1950s and 1960s, there was a gradual change in the network relations of Australia and New Zealand, involving a diminution in the importance of bilateral ties with Britain. [source]


Explaining Trade Flows of Singapore

ASIAN ECONOMIC JOURNAL, Issue 1 2004
Hans C. Blomqvist
The objective of this paper is twofold. First, the development of the trade patterns of Singapore and particularly between Singapore and its South-East Asian partners will be outlined and interpreted against a backdrop of relevant trade policy measures, for example in the context of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). Second, a simple model of the gravity type is applied in order to establish and quantify the role of various trade determinants. Despite the fact that Singapore has strived at being a ,global city', it remains rather heavily biased towards East Asia as far as foreign trade is concerned. The role of ASEAN in particular is strong, even if the role of entrepôt trade tends to exaggerate the degree of integration between the economies of Singapore and ASEAN. It also seems clear that the latter, as an organization, has not contributed much to the development of trade relations between its members. Rather the closeness and the liberalization of these economies during the last 15 years or so appear to have been decisive. It is interesting to note that the newer members of ASEAN seem to have been integrated quickly in Singapore's economic network. [source]


An Economic Model of Friendship: Homophily, Minorities, and Segregation

ECONOMETRICA, Issue 4 2009
Sergio Currarini
We develop a model of friendship formation that sheds light on segregation patterns observed in social and economic networks. Individuals have types and see type-dependent benefits from friendships. We examine the properties of a steady-state equilibrium of a matching process of friendship formation. We use the model to understand three empirical patterns of friendship formation: (i) larger groups tend to form more same-type ties and fewer other-type ties than small groups, (ii) larger groups form more ties per capita, and (iii) all groups are biased towards same-type relative to demographics, with the most extreme bias coming from middle-sized groups. We show how these empirical observations can be generated by biases in preferences and biases in meetings. We also illustrate some welfare implications of the model. [source]


Safe Harbors or Free Frontiers?

JOURNAL OF SOCIAL ISSUES, Issue 2 2003
Privacy, Transborder Data Flows
This article explores the issues surrounding the harmonization of privacy or data protection during the last 30 years. It begins with a history of the conflict over transborder data flows and then proceeds to analyze current national and regional policy debates about the feasibility of policy solutions to address problems that are integral to global communications and economic networks. Ongoing discussions between the European Union and the United States over Safe Harbor Principles provide data for exploring these issues. The article concludes with an analysis of whether harmonization of privacy and data protection policies is likely to evolve through existing processes and institutions. [source]


South Africa's Current Transition in Temporal and Spatial Context

ANTIPODE, Issue 2 2000
Alan Leater
This article analyses South Africa's current postapartheid transition in the light of earlier transformations of its social and economic order. The first of these prior transformations is the abolition of slavery and the shift to liberal capitalism, which took place in the early nineteenth century. The second is the rapid industrialization of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Each of these transformations, as well as the current transition, is explained as being partly the outcome of a broad shift in capitalist practice, innovated in the metropoles of the global economy. Due to South Africa's situation within global economic networks, each of these shifts, at different times, raised the threat of a dislocation in South Africa's prevailing social order. However, each prior transformation and, it will be argued, the current transition, has been ,managed' by established elites so as to ensure minimal change to the overall distribution of privilege. This conservative ,management' of shifts in capitalist practice, it is suggested, has been facilitated through South African elites' historic engagement with cultural discourses circulating across a global terrain. In this article then, contemporary South Africa is located within both material and discursive networks which have historically influenced the country's distribution of privilege. [source]