Alternative tracks : the constitution of American industrial order, 1865-1917
Author(s)
Bibliographic Information
Alternative tracks : the constitution of American industrial order, 1865-1917
（The Johns Hopkins series in constitutional thought）
Johns Hopkins University Press, c1994
- : hc
- : pbk
Available at / 21 libraries
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National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies Library (GRIPS Library)
: hc686.253||B3800967683
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Note
Includes bibliographical references (p. 217-233) and index
Description and Table of Contents
- Volume
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: hc ISBN 9780801846564
Description
At the heart of "Alternative Tracks" is the question of the relationship between democracy and the modern corporation. The longheld view is that the rise of the modern corporate-industrial order was driven by its inherent tendencies toward centralization and hierarchical structure. In this book, Berk uses the example of the railroad industry to show that the corporate-industrial order of the late 19th century - instead of following this deterministic course - was open to any number of forms and was significantly affected by its interactions with the state. The ultimate shape of the industrial order, Berk argues, depended on interpretations of norms relating to justice and fairness inherent in the law and Constitution of the United States. As the state had to deal with economic questions, it also had to answer basic political questions about the nature of the American polity. For Berk, the concrete form of this deliberation is found in the issue of railroad regulation, where courts had to ensure fair competition and fair distribution of benefits from railroad development.
He concludes that any model of state development - which includes its economic institutions - must allow for historical contingency, law and the ideological predispositions of its key players. Government, if followed, had little influence on corporate development.
- Volume
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: pbk ISBN 9780801856365
Description
"Gerald Berk's Alternative Tracks is a lean but provocative, timely, insightful, and forcefully written challenge to the conventional wisdom about industrial America's political economy". -- Review of Politics At the heart of Alternative Tracks is the historical relationship between democracy. and the modern corporation. Gerald Berk uses the case of the railroad industry to show that industrial centralization and corporate hierarchy did not follow a course solely determined by the efficiency imperatives of modern technology. Rather, collective choice and the state had lasting influence on the development of corporate capitalism. Moreover, the role of government depended less on the exercise of interest-group or class power than it did on the protracted struggle over constitutional norms of fairness and justice relating to corporation and the market. Mediated through the court, Congress, and the bureaucracy, this struggle had profound effects on the organization of railroads, the pattern of urbanization, and the practice of business regulation. "A very impressive work ...Offers the reader real insight into the technical factors and financial arrangements involved in the development of American railroads".
-- Perspectives on Political Science "Berk has offered some powerful questions for future scholars to keep in mind, and no student of railroad history or the history of business can afford to overlook this book". -- American Historical Review "An ambitious effort to make sense of how the modern American state was fashioned". -- American Political Science Review
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