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The advent of neo-corporatism has been a rare occurrence among advanced capitalist liberal democracies—and virtually unheard of elsewhere. Of the twenty or so original members of that club of rich countries, the OECD, only about one-third have managed to practice it for any length of time, despite the demonstrable benefits that this mode of interest intermediation has had for many aspects of macroeconomic performance from the end of the Second World War until the end of the 1970s. The most pervasive reason for this has been the opposition of organized business interests. Only under exceptional conditions of a “balance of class forces” between capital and labor has it emerged and persisted at the national level.

Although it is conventional in political science to distinguish between political parties and interest groups, in practice the distinction is less clear. The conventional definitions suggest that political parties seek to capture power; interest groups aspire to influence public policy. Even the names of political parties make it obvious, however, that in practice this distinction is not absolute. The linkage in the UK between Labour parties and unions is usually clear. In the United States, the Minnesota branch of the Democratic Party is still called the Democratic Farm Labor Party. Farmers' parties used to be fairly common although as in the Swedish case they have generally adopted labels that are more encompassing such as, to continue the Swedish example, the Center Party. Parties do not call themselves “The Business Party” but are often described as such. What does this mean? On what basis is it reasonable to identify a party as the business party? There are a number of different indicators that can be used.

Several broad generalizations about the nature of business representation in Washington would command general agreement. First, business representation is organizationally fragmented and competitive. Second, there is no hierarchical relationship between business organizations. Third, peak and trade organizations are not the only source of business representation in Washington. Large corporations increasingly have their own “in-house” lobbyists in a governmental affairs unit; although, this trend varies by industry and firm size, there was a marked increase between 1991 and 2001 across industries in the emphasis firms placed upon hiring in-house lobbyists. Fourth, business groups are often part of short-lived coalitions that can link businesses with other types of organizations or pit one group of businesses against another.

This article is about corporate social responsibility (CSR) and aims to distinguish different types of CSR–government relationship and to understand these in the context of broader state roles and government–business relations. It investigates these relationships comparatively, historically, and in terms of new institutionalism. It does so comparatively by investigating CSR and government in four types of political system on the assumption that CSR reflects features of respective national business systems, or varieties of capitalism, in which government roles are critical. Thus it considers CSR in the USA, in Europe, in the transitional economies of East Asia, Eastern Europe, and South Africa, and globally. The article's special focus on the USA is justified because, although business responsibilities have long existed throughout the world, in America the concept of CSR emerged as a basis for reflection on its relation to the wider purpose of the firm in the context of institutions of governance.

In making the claim for a unique European business–government relationship this article sets out in the first part of the issue, which is about why firms located to Brussels and how they and EU institutions learned to play a specific lobbying game. In so doing the article describes how the creation of the single market and the concurrent increases in regulatory competencies of the Commission and the increasing fiscal and monetary convergence of member states reduced the ties to home capital lobbying and incentives for individual lobbying of the EU. Having identified what motivated lobbying of the EU and the creation of government affairs offices in Brussels, the first section attempts to explain how best practice and lobbying norms emerged over time—especially as interest group overloading created a more competitive political environment and pressure on EU institutions to manage interest group representation via the creation of an elite pluralist process of fora and consultations. The second part assesses how large firms have organized their political affairs functions and developed increasingly sophisticated government and EU affairs offices in Brussels.

Formally, the interaction between domestic policy and international business runs in two directions. States erect policies that affect firms' ability to trade and invest across borders; and the actions of trading and investing firms affect the political climate of the states in which they do business. The relationship, of course, is interactive and changes over time: states influence firms, and firms influence states, and both operate simultaneously in a number of domestic and international arenas. This article concentrates on just one piece of this complex arrangement. Arguing that international business is essentially, incontrovertibly political, it describes the range of state policies that can shape and constrain the behaviour of firms. Specifically, it examines five different kinds of domestic policy: trade policy, foreign direct investment, capital controls, regulation, and competition policy.

Public accountability is the hallmark of modern democratic governance. Democracy remains a paper procedure if those in power cannot be held accountable in public for their acts and omissions, for their decisions, their policies, and their expenditures. Public accountability, as an institution, therefore, is the complement of public management. As a concept, however, “public accountability” is rather elusive. It is one of those evocative political words that can be used to patch up a rambling argument, to evoke an image of trustworthiness, fidelity, and justice, or to hold critics at bay. Historically, the concept of accountability is closely related to accounting. In fact, it literally comes from bookkeeping. Nowadays, accountability has moved far beyond its bookkeeping origins and has become a symbol for good governance, both in the public and in the private sector.

Contemporary public management includes initiatives that pursue reforms. Reforms centered on producing more and better public services include those that aim to tighten and streamline the management of public bureaucracies, those that increase competition in order to offer citizens more choices, and those that center on increasing citizen participation in political and administrative processes. Other reforms attempt to empower workers in the hope of making them more creative and productive. Superficially, it may seem paradoxical that each vision of how to improve public management claims that it preserves and enhances democracy and improves governmental effectiveness. This article discusses three very different answers to the question of how public management can be both effective and democratic. Next, the research literature on several mechanisms for making public management more democratic is reviewed. And finally, a separate discussion briefly treats the question of how to make the internal workings of public organizations more democratic.

This chapter provides an introduction to Public-Private Partnerships (PPPs) in health care. It provides contextual background to the worldwide growth of PPPs and discusses the various meanings attached to the term as well as key controversies surrounding their adoption into the public service landscape. It then introduces key developments in PPPs within the field of health care, outlining different types of PPP that have been established across the globe in light of distinct national contexts for the provision of health care and health challenges. Drawing on the authors’ own research into UK Independent Sector Treatment Centres as well as wider literature, the chapter then outlines key areas of deliberation for management and organization within PPPs. This covers issues of governance and accountability, managing innovation, managing culture and values, and managing employment.

The relationship between the American regulatory state and the business enterprise is strikingly distinctive, viewed comparatively. The simplest, but perhaps the most important, indicator of distinction is that this is a relationship with deep historical roots. The pre-industrial American economy was one where the state was closely involved directly in the conduct of economic life, for instance in the chartering of corporations. But the relationship with business took a special turn in the closing decades of the nineteenth century. That special turn was a reaction to a great economic revolution which spanned the generation following the end of the Civil War.

One of the most clearly established generalizations in comparative social science is that economic development rests on the back of services provided by the state. The main task of this article is to reverse the picture, by considering the conditions under which states do and do not provide the institutional basis upon which economic activity can be built. A successful state is one that provides order, belonging, and affluence to the society that controls it. The sociological factors involved in the creation of states of this sort can be specified immediately, albeit later discussion of the absence of these factors elsewhere highlights their character. Almost everything follows from one simple consideration, namely that these states were created in a Darwinian world, which mandated fiscal extraction. In consequence, bureaucracies were created to penetrate and organize social life.

This article discusses key approaches to the state's role in the contemporary economy. It discusses three perspectives on the state–economy relationship. These range from a priori claims that view states as impediments to markets, to hypotheses which pose a world of neoliberal states restricted to creating the best environment for transnational capital, to arguments that seek to conceptualize actually existing states as solutions to the problem of development. First, the discussion begins with a brief sketch of the state's role in neoliberal theory. Next, it examines how the theory is believed to play out in practice as a result of globalization and the rise of neoliberalism. Third, the discussion considers the debate on the rise of governed market economies, and their challenge to the free-market paradigm. Finally, it revisits the proposition that the global economy valorizes a minimalist state.

The first section of this article discusses why training and skill formation are considered to be central to economic competitiveness and company performance and the ways in which business interests may be involved in social institutions and policy-making in this arena. The second section explores the political economy of training and skill formation, identifying the strengths and limitations of different approaches and typologies. The third section extends the analysis of business and social institutions by examining the emerging supranational level for economic and employment policy. Here, the principal focus is on the European Union as a regional bloc in which training policy has played a significant role as an arena of social dialogue between organized interest groups at the European level. The fourth section examines the training and human resource management practices of multinational companies, exploring the extent to which they intersect with national institutional arenas in which business interest groups operate. The conclusion assesses continuity and change in the relationships between the state and business interests in the field of vocational training.

This article deals with the emergence, presence, and gradual transformation of workplace voice in Britain. Britain is an interesting case because it has sustained one of the longest and most prolonged falls in union representation in the Western world. Some have interpreted this as a move away from institutionalized voice by both workers and employers in the face of global product market competition and attendant needs for greater labour flexibility. The article shows that union collective representation has been supplanted by non-union voice in new workplaces and, where union voice persists in older workplaces, it has been supplemented by non-union voice. The absence of formal voice in a significant minority of workplaces can be linked to certain observable firm characteristics, such as size, network externalities, ownership, and age of enterprise. The article defines workplace voice by partially drawing on insights from consumer theory, industrial organization, and transaction-cost economics.