In search of institutional complementarities: Comparative Capitalism and economic policy reform

Abstract

The Comparative Capitalism research programme has become the dominant institutional approach with regard to the study of advanced economies. Still, very few scholars use it to develop proposals for economic policy reform. The introductory paper to the special issue discusses how this can be changed. It highlights the considerable institutional differences between contemporary models of capitalism. Moreover, it demonstrates how core Comparative Capitalism notions such as “institutional complementarities” can be used for designing policies. However, it also points to recent developments in Comparative Capitalism research that replace the traditional Varieties of Capitalism preoccupation with micro-economic equilibria through the heterodox macro-economic preference for the balancing out of Growth Models.