I propose to approach economic sociology as the application of social stratification, organizational theory, and the sociology of development to the study of the organization of economic activity. I begin by reviewing the growth of specialty fields in sociology during the postwar period. I then outline the origins and major tenets of a comparative economic sociology that breaks with specializat...

Anticipating future political transitions in East Asia, many scholars worry that Chinese democratization and Korean unification will fuel regional instability. To inform this debate, this article examines theories that make competing claims about the stability of these potential transitions: theories within the ‘‘democratization and war’’ school and economic interdependence theory. I compare th...

Regional economics has a long tradition in analytical research and policy modelling, with the aim to enhance our understanding of regional competitiveness conditions and of the emergence, persistence, and mitigation of spatial socio-economic disparities. Unequal regional development in our open economy has prompted a long-lasting debate on the validity and usefulness of economic growth theories...

Intimate partner violence (IPV) against women is widespread, but its implications for their economic and non-economic activities are understudied. Leveraging new data from 564 ever-married women aged 22–65 in rural Minya, Egypt, we estimated logistic regressions and zero-inflated negative binomial regressions to test spillover, compensation, and patriarchal bargaining theories about the influen...

What are the determinants of altruism? While economists assume that altruism is mainly driven by fairness norms, social psychologists consider empathy to be a key motivator for altruistic behavior. To unite these two theories, we conducted an experiment in which we compared behavior in a standard economic game that assesses altruism (the so-called Dictator Game) with a Dictator Game in which pa...

Property rights theory has common antecedents with contractual theories of the firm such as transaction costs and agency theories, and is yet distinct from these theories. We illustrate fundamental theoretical principles derived from these three theories by analyzing the business case of oil field unitization. Theoretical principles and application of theory to oil field unitization are each su...