The Political Economy of Property Rights

A 1997 investigation of the transformation of property rights in post-communist countries and China.

Originally published in 1997, The Political Economy of Property Rights investigates the transformation of property rights in post-communist countries and China. The movement to effective market economies requires the creation of effective supporting institutions. This process is inherently political, and thus should be studied from the perspective of political economy.Originally published in 1997, The Political Economy of Property Rights reports on comparative research into the transformation of property rights in post-communist countries and China. Two important theoretical questions unify the contributions: what aspects of political systems give credibility to systems of property rights? What can be learned from the transformation of property rights in post-communist countries about the large-scale change of economic institutions? The contributors consider the credibility of property rights as arising from the strategic interaction of political and economic actors, and they apply this perspective and test its implications using a variety of qualitative and quantitative methods. Overall, the volume demonstrates the value of coordinated cross-national research by area specialists sharing a common focus on questions of political economy.