Evan Jones

Industrial Structure and Labor Force Segmentation

Recognition of the determining influence of industrial structure on the structure of labor force segmentation constitutes a major advance in the field of labor economics. Nevertheless much recent work has persisted with generalizations emphasizing a relatively simple relation between industrial structure and labor force segmentation, linking the primary labor segment to the monopoly core of industry and the secondary segment to the competitive periphery. It is argued here that each major section of industry exhibits its own form of labor force segmentation, and that this more complex relationship between industrial structure and work force structure deserves greater emphasis.

The Tyranny of A Priorism in Economic Thought

AbstractA Priorism has been the central methodological organising principle in economics for over one hundred and fifty years. This has been the case in spite of persistent dissent, and in spite of persistent disclaimers, not least with the development of economic statistics and econometrics and of the era of positivist methodological prescriptions. A Priorism is manifest in two dimensions: as a self-conscious analytical principle, and as a de facto social practice. Of particular importance are key historic nodes of intellectual crisis and reconstruction, and the evolving means by which a priorism has been reinforced. A priorism as a centripetal tendency in economics has led to a legacy of conceptual incoherence and a subject matter on the verge of appropriation by superior analyses within competing social disciplines.

The Purse Strings and the Policy Process: Bureaucratic Shaping of Industry Policy Capacity after 1945

Much literature in public administration debates the role of the public servant in the policy-making process. Some literature acknowledges an integral role of the public servant in the process. However, this role often remains obscure, due to being couched in abstract terms. The hierarchical structuring of responsibilities and power within bureaucracies imparts the capacity for differential influence. This paper provides a case study of the role of the Public Service Board (power over staffing) and the Australian federal Treasury (power over the purse) in the shaping of the bureaucratic structure. The case study centres on the industry policy bureaucracy in the volatile decade after World War II. In shaping the bureaucratic capacity, the Board and the Treasury exerted a discretionary influence on the policy process itself.

Australian Trade Liberalisation Policy: The Industries Assistance Commission and the Productivity Commission:

The Productivity Commission is Australia’s foremost policy advisory body. Its original incarnation as the Industries Assistance Commission derives from the 1960s push to dismantle the protective tariff regime that underpinned the Australian manufacturing sector. With success in tariff reductions and complementary reductions in rural sector assistance, the Commission’s investigatory role was gradually expanded to cover the entire gamut of government policy. The Commission’s history has generally been treated favourably. This article places the history of the original Industries Assistance Commission in context and takes a critical stance on its and the Productivity Commission’s vision and achievements.

Rural Finance in Australia: A Troubled History

Abstract The last twenty years has witnessed a seismic shift in the provision of and attitude towards differentiated financial facilities for the rural sector. Specialist facilities built up over a century have been dismantled. Official data collection has been narrowed, but anecdotal evidence indicates that segments of the rural economy are no longer being adequately serviced. The paper begins with a treatment of the uneasy relationship after World War II between the rural sector and the trading banks, the dominant segment of the Australian financial sector. There then follows a brief history of alternative financial institutions and instruments catering to the rural sector, especially those at the national level. These developments had, by 1980, ensured the rural sector greater access to credit and on more appropriate terms. Beginning in the 1970s, an ideological shift ushered in much proselytising of the merits of the ‘free market’. The significant report of the Campbell Committee (1981) provided legitimation for subsequent deregulation of the financial sector, which accompanied the gradual dismantling of much of the institutions and instruments specifically addressed to the rural sector. Agricultural economists, economically orthodox in analytical emphasis and worldview, have viewed this dismantling benignly. Because of the key role of this network in mediating rural policy, representative opinion is examined at some length. The 1990s is outlined as a period for which rural finance has become a non-issue for officialdom, and yet dissent has resurfaced. A final section examines specific institutional and cultural structures that have mediated the broad changes affecting the Australian rural sector. Domestic banking culture and ‘free market’ ideology appear to have exerted independent influences in the mediation of credit to the rural sector.

The Employment of German Scientists in Australia after World War II

Soon after the end of World War II the Australian Government brought scientists of defeated Germany to Australia. They were to work in government institutions and private industry to contribute their expertise to improving Australian science and to improving Australias industrial efficiency. The Allied powers occupying Germany were engaged in a scramble to appropriate German expertise for the next phase of the arms race. The Australian Employment of Scientific and Technical Enemy Aliens Scheme (ESTEA) instead channeled its personnel to basic science and industrial research. The personnel were part human reparations, part invited experts. This curious scheme offers insight into attitudes towards industrial regeneration in a previous era, and the importance of context in shaping attempts to alter existing scientific and industrial cultures.

The Industrial Finance Department: An Australian Experiement in Small Business Finance

Small business has an uneasy relationship with the banking sector. In some countries, governments have stepped in to create specialist institutions for small business finance. One such institution was created in Australia after World War II. An Industrial Finance Department was created within a restructured Commonwealth Bank to provide specialist financial assistance to small business. This institution, neglected by historians, grew and survived in an evolving political and often hostile environment. The Industrial Finance Department provides further insight into the politics of financial provision and regulation in Australia.