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Combining case studies with empirical and theoretical game analysis, Mohamed Ismail Sabry presents four State-Business-Labor Relations (SBLR) modes for considering the power relationships at play in the interactions between government, business, and society.

This book examines how socioeconomic and institutional factors shaped the development of Socialism and its two contending variants of Social Democracy and Communism, investigating why each of these factions enjoyed varying levels of popularity in different societies between 1840 and 1945

AbstractDoes good governance matter for exporting to the highly competitive markets of developed countries, especially those committed to a developmental mission centered on promoting good governance? This paper is investigating this research question. The focus of the analysis is the case study of Arab exports to the German economy, where a comparatively poor performance in comparison to that of other regions of the world is witnessed, despite geographical proximity and preferential trade agreements. Using statistical data and the literature on the subject, the paper engages in a discussion on German trade flows from Arab countries and whether governance indicators provide a good explanatory framework. The research question is then investigated empirically by running several regressions using the two-stage least-squares and Poisson pseudo maximum likelihood models. Different indicators of German exports are used as dependent variables while the independent variables are various governance indicators together with the control variables suggested by the gravity model. The obtained empirical results suggest that good governance generally boosts Arab exports to Germany and relatively more than it does for non-Arab exporters to Germany. This is especially true for governance indicators that directly affect exporting activities, such as regulatory quality and government effectiveness. For some indicators that indirectly affect exporting, however, the results are mixed for both Arab and non-Arab countries, especially for the textile industry. This sheds doubts on Germany's developmental commitment to fostering good governance principles.

Purpose
Why are state business relations in Egypt characterized by widely acknowledged high levels of cronyism? The purpose of this paper is to investigate the institutional factors explaining this research question with a focus on pre-2011 Egypt.


Design/methodology/approach
Based on a general theoretical discussion, certain institutions were proposed as being responsible. A game theoretical model is then introduced. It explains why cronyism was the best strategy for various business players in contrast to aggregating and lobbying their efforts to obtain government available resources, whether these resources are energy subsidies, public banks' credit or regulations. Then pre-2011 Egypt is discussed as a case study. This discussion is enriched by the available literature and empirical data.


Findings
Choosing cronyism was attributed to the presence of a weak and dependent private sector, where businesspeople are unable to aggregate their power; a relatively stronger government; poor governance performance; higher levels of regime legitimization practices, such as providing generous consumer subsidies; and economic growth caused by an increase in resources rather than by governance institutional improvement. A discussion of the available literature and empirical data on pre-2011 Egypt, going over the various proposed institutional factors, helped to support these arguments.


Research limitations/implications
Further empirical evidence is needed to support and modify the suggestions of this paper. More detailed indicators would have further helped this research. Moreover, more case studies, other than the case of pre-2011 Egypt, are also needed. It is hoped that this paper would encourage further research endeavors that would cover these limitations.


Practical implications
Governance institutional reform is needed to minimize cronyism, especially institutions such as voice and accountability, rule of law, regulatory quality and control of corruption.


Social implications
This paper can explain why high levels of cronyism are witnessed in many countries of the world, including the countries of the Middle East and North Africa (MENA). The region shares many institutional factors with Egypt. Governments in the MENA region have various sources of power with regard to their dependent private sectors added to the general poor performance in various governance indicators in the region.


Originality/value
The deep analysis conducted in this paper for the causes of Cronyism in Egypt has not been done elsewhere. This is also true for the whole MENA region. The introduced theoretical model is the first trial of this sort and should be important for future works on this topic in the MENA region and developing countries.

Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to explore which socioeconomic and institutional factors are responsible for different societies' ideological choices, with reference to Marxist socialism. Which factors led to the rise of the popularity of socialism? And which factors made a socialist variant relatively more successful in one society but not the other, with social democracy and communism being the focus of the study?


Design/methodology/approach
Conducting a global theoretical and empirical study on the period between the late 1890s and 1945. The theoretical part discusses various perspectives presented in the literature, accounting for the works of major sociologists (e.g.: M. Mann, Lipset) and political theorists (e.g.: Marx, Engels, Lenin). The empirical part uses a number of OLS multivariate panel regressions using voting to various socialist movements as dependent variables, and socioeconomic and institutional factors as independent variables.


Findings
Some of the findings of the conducted empirical study are that: democracy, industrialization, high population growth rates, low linguistic or religious homogeneity, more years of schooling and less years since independence or creation increase the social democrat (SD) vote. The communist vote was affected positively by more urbanization; higher population growth; less years of schooling; more years since independence; recent experience of war; and the presence of insignificant religious minorities. Inequality seemed also to have been a strong significant factor for raising the popularity of various socialist parties, especially when countries were long-established or created. Countries which had a fresh experience with war devastation or which were highly urbanized while having higher levels of inequality witnessed an increasing vote share for the communists. More votes went to SD; however, when inequality existed in highly industrialized countries. High GDP growth, matched with higher inequalities, did not seem to have encouraged voting for various socialist parties, and even affected the communist vote negatively.


Research limitations/implications
There were data limitations on the available proxies.


Practical implications
This study suggests welfarism, public spending on education, social inclusion and democratization as remedies for radicalism, regardless of the ideological origins of such radicalism.


Originality/value
Its novelty is attributed to the deep analytical dimension for the issue done here, combining theory, an empirical study made possible by the newly available rich historical data.

Purpose
– The purpose of this paper is to explore theoretically and empirically which institutional factors (including good governance ones) help public-private partnerships (PPP) in providing better infrastructural services, which would then in their turn lead to attracting more private investment for the whole economy.


Design/methodology/approach
– On the theoretical level, while a focus is put on discussing the institutions that should be responsible for PPP success, reconciliation is being attempted between institutional economics from one side and the new public management and networks management perspectives from the other. Empirically, OLS multivariate panel regressions test the suggestions of the theoretical discussion with emphasis on interaction terms between PPP and the studied institutions.


Findings
– Evidence is found that good governance institutions, and specifically good regulatory quality, bureaucratic efficiency and independence, help PPP in performing well as evident from their positive effect on investment growth.


Research limitations/implications
– The limitations of this paper are mainly empirical. Further results with great policy implications could have been obtained if better proxies were developed for a number of variables. Certainly this is the case for the proxies used for cronyism and public-private dialogues (PPD).


Practical implications
– Tackling bureaucratic efficiency and independence and higher regulatory quality should be a top priority if the great positive externalities resulting from PPP in infrastructure are to be realized.


Originality/value
– The novelty of this research is attributed to constructing a proxy for PPP, as well as testing empirically the effect of the interactions of PPP with other institutional variables on the performance of infrastructural services (as evident from attracting more investment). The synthesis between the literature on PPP, new public management, networks, good governance, and institutional economics is another aspect of this work. The obtained results suggest important policy recommendations, and, the author hopes to, add to the literature on PPP.