| 11. |
- Edvinsson, Rodney, 1971-
(författare)
-
Growth, Accumulation, Crisis : With New Macroeconomic Data for Sweden 1800-2000
- 2005
-
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- This dissertation has two main objectives. The first one is to construct historical macroeconomic series for Sweden using a consistent method throughout the relevant periods, and which rely on modern methods of national accounting. The second objective is to investigate patterns of economic growth, accumulation and crisis in Sweden 1800-2000, based on the constructed data series. New annual data series of Gross Domestic Product and its division into activities (type of production) and expenditures (consumption, investment and foreign trade), Net Domestic Product, stocks of produced assets and consumption of fixed assets are constructed for the period 1800-2000; series of employment, wages, imputed labour income of self employed and surplus for the period 1850-2000; and series of worked hours for the period 1950-2000. Summary tables of the main aggregate variables are presented at the end of the dissertation. The intent is to make the data material available online (also at a more disaggregated level) at: http://www.historia.se. Although the present study criticises the somewhat deterministic vision of many long cycle theories, it also demonstrates that the concept of long cycle can be applied when studying long-term fluctuations in GDP per capita, provided that the notion of a fixed periodicity of long cycles is abandoned. Long-term economic fluctuations are irregular, but so is also the short-term business cycle. Different historical tendencies and trends are investigated. The decline of the relative size of industrial activities in the last half of 20th century was not as dramatic, if unpaid household labour is considered and that many services are industry-related. The Marxist theory of a Tendency for the Rate of Profit to Fall is partly confirmed as a secular process up to the 1970s, but profitability has rebounded in the last two decades of the 20th century. During the 1990s, the investment ratio declined to historically low levels and the volume value of the net stock of buildings and structures fell for the first time since the 1830s. A comparison is also made of depressions in Sweden since 1850. During the 19th century, depressions were largely induced by the agricultural sector, and during the 20th century by industrial activities. However, the transition to the modern business cycle was not sudden but rather protracted. Another finding is that the 1990s depression was somewhat deeper than the 1930s depression in terms of GDP contraction.
|
|
| 12. |
|
|
| 13. |
- Elmhorn, Camilla, 1966-
(författare)
-
Brussels : a reflexive world city
- 2001
-
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- This dissertation analyses the consequences of seemingly placeless processes like the European integration and the increasing economic globalisation on Brussels and the people living there. The study shows that Brussels has become one of our time's most important international political capitals and a leading business node in Europe. European institutions, international organisations, headquarters and subsidiaries of transnational corporations are increasingly locating themselves in Brussels. Simultaneously there has been an influx of transnational professionals working in the international sector.This research shows that with the internationalisation of Brussels there has been concomitant economic restructuring with the emergence of an advanced service economy. The labour market has become polarised between those who have jobs and those who do not. Brussels has also experienced a spatial and socio-economic polarisation along ethnic lines. The thesis explores the connections between these changes and Brussels' international role.Drawing on the world / global city thesis of Saskia Sassen and John Friedmann, a theoretical framework is developed to analyse this. One of the important results of this study is that the world / global city thesis needs to be complemented with a thorough analysis of the place: the political and historical context, and also the role of the local agents, to enable an explanation of the observed development. The interplay between global and local processes needs to be clarified. It is also argued that to properly understand cities with an international role like Brussels, we need to know why international agents locate there. Michael Storper's concepts of 'economic reflexivity' and 'territorial specificities' are used to analyse the rise of Brussels into a reflexive world city - a city vibrating with specific knowledge, produced through inter alia social interaction and critical reflection, that some transnational agents find extremely vital to tap into.
|
|
| 14. |
|
|
| 15. |
|
|
| 16. |
- Franzén, Bo, 1954-
(författare)
-
Folkungatidens monetära system : Penningen mellan pest och patriarkat 1254-1370
- 2006
-
Bok (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- The Monetary System of the Folkunga Era / The Swedish Pence between Pestilence and Patriarchate 1254–1370 This is an economic study of the Swedish monetary system in the transition from the High Middle to the Late Middle Age, i.e. as far back as written sources from market transitions are available. Archaic compulsory institutions – such as slavery and serfdom – were still in use in Sweden in the first half of the fourteenth century; and certainly this obstructed market development in many respects. The coins minted by the regents (1291–1370) appear to have often been valued at even less than the intrinsic value of the silver from which they were minted. In other words the seignorage for the minting regent was negative, a phenomenon that is almost impossible to explain in economic terms. That paradox is even more difficult to comprehend in light of the fact that the production of Swedish pences was considerable during the fourteenth century, and had been ongoing since the 1150s. Sweden is no exception in the European story of the Late Middle demographic and agricultural crises after a surge that had been going on at least since the year 1000. The devastation of farms in Sweden was extensive between 1350 and 1450. The source material prior to 1370 consist of roughly 10,000 charters, on the basis of which some 2,500 market transactions have been found and recorded in a relational database. In addition, approximately 39,000 individuals were mentioned by name in the Swedish charters from the eleventh century to 1375 and 1401–1420, and these names have also been downloaded into the database. Of those personal rows a great majority are from the upper strata; 9 % are women. However, after the outbreak of the Black Death in 1350 the percentage of women went below 10 % and stabilized around 8 %. I hypothesize that the downward trend was a sign that women were hit harder than men by the frequent outbreaks of the plague. There are clear signs of more market relations and fewer compulsory institutions between 1290 and 1370. Most of the market transactions were of two kinds: purchases of real property and loans in which the creditor’s claim was guaranteed in real property. Pawned property, as expected, had a lower value than property on the buying and selling market. Only half of those transactions are described in monetary units of value, with weighted silver being the second most frequent price tag. We find women active in those transactions from the thirteenth century, but the trend has a downward slope, especially in the role as buyer of landed property. This is in accordance with the view that the Reformation and the Counter-Reformation in the sixteenth century were preceded by a protracted period of increasing patriarchal trends. The many and severe outbreaks of the plagues in Sweden might have aggravated those tendencies. So while there was greater freedom thanks to bigger and new kinds of markets, there were also opposing forces of misogyny creating obstacles for women’s taking advantage of that freedom. The Swedish coins had very divergent contents of silver, and new coins generally had less intrinsic silver value than the older ones. Those factors make it more difficult to carry out price history on the period between 1290 and 1370 than on the fifteenth century, when Swedish pences were more stable. Southern Sweden was quicker to develop towards a more commercial society than the northern part of the country. Land prices in southeastern Sweden (Östergötland) seem to have fallen between 1300 and 1370. The deflation in this respect is even greater when monetary prices are converted into silver prices. In the same period, prices in the provinces around Lake Mälaren seem to have soared. In the north in the fourteenth century there was still a lot of land for reclamation and these opportunities might have attracted aristocratic investors with expectations of major profits in the future. The inflation of the land “bubble” in the north continued for two decades, even after the arrival of the Black Death. In spite of the clerical ban on usury at the time, I have been able to reconstruct a dozen rates of interests from the period 1322–1370. The average interest rate during these years was 5 %. Data from this study has been put into an international perspective about human wealth. Swedish Medieval grain prices in silver from 1291 to 1530 were distinctly lower and more volatile than the prices in the more advanced European economies such as England. Low grain prices are a sign of an underdeveloped and not very diversified economy, and the general volatility made any craft outside the agrarian sector a lot more risky an activity in Sweden than in most other countries. In the late Medieval Age there was a clear development in trade and mining, but the economic gap relative to the outside world around did not decrease. This underlines the impression of a primitive society on the periphery of Europe and lagging behind the economic times. One can hardly underestimate the positive role of money as a source of information and means of payment in the markets. From a classic point of view (Eli F. Heckscher), it is presumed that markets came first, money second. From an institutional point of view (C. A. E. Goodhart) money and markets are parallel. The Swedish empirical example gives us a third scenario, i.e. the existence of coins for many generations before markets of any magnitude were created. Key words: Microeconomics, Monetary Theory, Intrinsic Silver Value, Seignorage, Unit of Account, Means of Transactions, Compulsory Institutions, Commercialization, Market Institutions, Prosopography, Women Participation in Markets, Patriarchate, Inflation and Deflation.
|
|
| 17. |
|
|
| 18. |
|
|
| 19. |
|
|
| 20. |
|
|
