In investigating recent changes to the automotive industry production process, such as modularisation, our work emphasises the process of fragmentation of production as a configuring element of inter-firm power relationships, and as an explanatory element in working conditions. From a theoretical framework focused on power relations, we analyse by way of a selected case study how the capabilities of companies and their network positions, together with the agency of labour, shape the power relations that influence the evolution of working conditions. The study does indeed find relevant changes to inter-firm relationships, for example, within networks of assemblers and suppliers, but without a consequent re-balancing of power. This finding serves to explain differences in the evolution of working conditions between distinct companies, these conditions being fully functional to a strategy for profitability and thus difficult to reverse.

This article argues for the need for the empirical analysis of how firms manage repugnance and core-stigmatization. To develop our empirical perspective, we compare the work on repugnance with the existing empirical literature in management on core-stigma and argue that core-stigmatization results from the mobilized repugnance. The core-stigmatized firm faces higher transaction costs. We demonstrate, through a case-study of the strategies of MindGeek/Pornhub in the online pornography market, how transaction costs economics can explain the choice of strategies to deal with core-stigma. Under most conditions, the increased transaction costs lead to vertical and lateral integration of the firm. In a dynamic setting, rival firms might use stigmatization to prevent the entry of a new competitor. Our second case-study on the early decades of the mail-order company Sears, Roebuck, and Company illustrates that repugnance, including racial discrimination, was mobilized by competitors to block the entry of the firm into the market.

Williamson's legacy will be permanently, and deservedly, linked with the theory of the firm. As important, however, is his contribution to our understanding of contracting. My aim here is to describe Williamson's conception of contracting, how it differs from other approaches to contracting, and some implications of that approach for contract design and enforcement. I argue that Williamson's ‘process orientation’ – in which the main dimension along which contracts vary is the extent to which contract adjustments are effected through court ordering versus private ordering – provides alternative interpretations of some conventional contract terms but also sheds light on some otherwise puzzling contractual phenomena.

This paper proposes a new conceptualization of business model (BM) that rigorously exploits the important insights this notion offers and links them to related views developed in economics and business studies. We develop the foundations of a BM concept consistent with the principles of generalized Darwinism (GD) and with contributions already developed within this framework. Thus, we demonstrate the relevance of GD as a unifying framework for developing the evolutionary theory of firm and industry. We suggest analysing BM as a generative replicator hosted by the firm, which structures interactions between the members of this organization and the social entities of its industrial environment. We argue that GD allows us to clarify the nature and boundaries of the BM concept and to specify its relationships to other key evolutionary concepts, such as organizational routines.

We owe Williamson for the formal introduction of hybrid organizations as essential building blocks in ‘the institutional structure of production’. The analysis of these institutional arrangements, which culminated in The Mechanisms of Governance, provided a unified approach to the variety of setting within which transactions are embedded, opening a new perspective on a cornerstone of modern economies. This essay explores the past, present, and future of this breakthrough. First, it reviews the progressive integration of hybrids as a category of their own in the classic ‘make-or-buy’ model, inserting hybrids as an ‘intermediate’ form different from markets in that adaptation cannot be done unilaterally and different from ‘unified organizations’ in that adaptation cannot be done by fiat. Second, it shows how this initial characterization of hybrids, besides providing a coherent approach to empirical research available at the time, gave a powerful impulse to new contributions, identifying more rigorously the fundamental features of hybrids, throwing light on why firms go hybrid, and explicating the governance structure chosen. Last, it offers insights on a research program that remains a work in progress, delineating new terrains to explore and new puzzles to solve.

From production to retail, information systems have become increasingly important in the agrifood system. Retailers use information systems to improve inventory management and increase efficiency in production and logistics. Innovations in agribiotechnology and food safety issues highlighted by incidences related to Starlink corn and “mad cow disease” have raised consumer concerns about their food products. In addition to food safety concerns, consumers are increasingly willing to pay premiums for nonobservable quality characteristics in their food products. This paper outlines a framework for evaluating the implications of traceability for the organization of the agricultural system and highlights potential organizational responses to traceability issues.

Landlord satisfaction levels with agricultural land-leasing agreements are examined with a 1998 sample of Arkansas landowners. Ordered probit models are estimated identifying which factors significantly affect satisfaction levels. Results indicate that the type of lease is not a significant determinant of landlord satisfaction levels. Proportion of landlord's income from leasing, tenant educational background, social capital variables, presence of irrigation equipment, and perceptions about the FAIR Act were found to significantly affect lease satisfaction in at least one of the three satisfaction models estimated. A comparison with an earlier study of Arkansas tenants indicates landlords have generally higher satisfaction levels.

This paper examines the industrialization process of U.S. agriculture by examining the trends in the number of farms, the concentration of production during the last decade, and the dynamics of farm survivability, entry, and exit underlying aggregate statistics. We next examine vertical coordination as part of the industrialization process and highlight contracting in the poultry industry. The analysis provides evidence that production is continuing to be concentrated on a smaller number of farms at a relatively rapid rate, in spite of the stability in the number of farms. Although contracting clearly dominates the broiler industry, it is less prevalent in egg and turkey production, where other forms of vertical coordination are likely established.

Hog farmers' preferences for autonomy are assessed through the use of eight questions dealing with their preferences for general decision making and with respect to specific management actions. Farmers generally preferred to make a higher percentage of the decisions about their operations, especially older producers and those who operated farrowing units. Farmers who placed lower values on autonomy finished hogs, were nearing retirement, valued social relationships with other farmers more highly, had higher off-farm income, or were larger farmers.

Concentration in beef packing has risen dramatically in the past 25 years. We develop measures used to describe feedlot-packer relations: (1) a statistic based on the proportion of its sales a feedlot makes to a given packer, and (2) a measure of the switching behavior of feedlots. The measures are calculated using a confidential data set from the USDA Grain Inspection, Packers, and Stockyards Administration. Relationships are found to be both exclusive and stable. Causes for this rigidity are then examined using regression analysis. Transaction costs are shown to help explain why this market differs from a perfectly competitive one.

Market channel alternatives that include garden centers, landscapers, mass merchandisers, and rewholesalers have contributed to the growth of ornamental crops sales in the United States. The impact of growers' business characteristics on shares of sales to these channels by firm size was estimated using the two-limit Tobit model. Important explanatory variables were regions of the United States, sales of plant groups, kinds of contract sales, and channel diversity. There were important differences in behavior by grower size. Overall, the results indicate a stronger than expected role for the rewholesaler channel as a preferred channel for ornamental plant sales.

The objective of this study is to analyze whether a discount or premium exists for coordination strategies in food processing, wholesale grocery, retail supermarkets, and restaurants. Significant premiums are found for food processor and restaurant vertical integration or diversification strategies. Significant discounts are found for food wholesaler and retail supermarket integration or diversification strategies. Food processors are found to be integrating toward retail supermarkets during this time period.

This article analyzes the effects of international trade policies on an imperfectly competitive domestic market, taking account of consumers, as well as upstream and downstream firms. We first study the impact of a classic import tax decrease and find that this policy harms upstream firms and may decrease domestic fiscal revenues. We then examine the effect of an increase in non-tariff barriers, which reduce the degree of substitutability between domestic and imported goods. This results in an improvement in each agent's situation, as international competition becomes less fierce. Finally, we show that market conditions may exist such that a coupled policy (import tax decrease and non-tariff barrier increase) makes all agents better off. This can explain the proliferation of domestic standards at national level in order to counterbalance the effect of lower tariffs negotiated by governments.

Cet article analyse un jeu simple à deux périodes dans lequel deux producteurs farbriquant un bien homogène se font concurrence pour fournir un distributeur. Nous montrons que si les producteurs sont vulnérables (c'est-à-dire s'ils sont exclus du marché en cas d'une commande insuffisante en première période), ils peuvent alors exploiter cette menace de banqueroute et s'approprier ainsi tout le profit de l'industrie en première période. En effet, le distributeur sera prêt à accepter de payer un prix fort aux producteurs pour éviter leur faillite et maintenir ainsi une concurrence en amont pour la seconde période. Ce résultat reste valable dans le cas d'une structure de marché différente ou de contrats verticaux plus élaborés.

This paper studies duration of inter-firm contracts in a transaction cost perspective. The aim of the paper is to test the propositions that can be derived from a transaction-cost framework. We built a non-truncated database representing the entire contractual relationships of Electricité de France (EDF) with its coal carriers and coal unloaders over the period 1977–1997. Section I explores factors that can explain the choice of contract duration. Section II describes the relationships between EDF and its suppliers. In Section III, we test and confirm most propositions derived from transaction-cost theory that relate contract duration to transaction characteristics. We believe this study to be the first attempt (1) to confirm transaction cost economics propositions using French data and (2) to endogenize asset specificity level at stake in transactions.