Japan's existing pharmaceutical industry was devastated in the Second World War. But the industry recovered quickly, and in 1963, Japan had become the second largest producer of pharmaceuticals after the United States. Unlike its automobile or electronics industries, however, Japan's pharmaceutical industry did not become a global leader. Japan remains a net importer of pharmaceuticals and few Japanese drugs are found outside of Japan. The global pharmaceutical industry is led by firms from the United States, the United Kingdom and Switzerland, rather than those from Japan. This thesis traces the development of the Japanese pharmaceutical industry after 1945, and offers several explanations for why it did not become a world-leading industry. It uses two classes of medicines, antibiotics and anti-cancer drugs, as case studies for exploring the overall history of the Japanese pharmaceutical industry. These case studies were selected because of their importance to health outcomes in post-war Japan. In the immediate post-war period, the leading causes of death in Japan were infectious diseases such as tuberculosis, but in later decades, cancer morbidity and mortality rose. Japan was found to be much more successful at developing antibiotics than anticancer drugs. This thesis shows that, while the Japanese pharmaceutical industry had caught up with its Western counterparts by the mid 1970s, it did not exploit its potential to become a global leader. A few of Japan's leading pharmaceutical firms did develop blockbuster drugs and expand overseas, but most firms remained domestically oriented. The major reasons why Japan did not develop a strong pharmaceutical industry lay in the lack of R and D incentives, the government's protectionist policies, industrial structure, and Japanese medical culture. Other reasons of secondary importance included the industry's historical origins in import houses, national differences in patterns of disease, Japan-specific drug standards, and barriers to entrepreneurship among university academics.

This PhD thesis studies three aspects of competition in pharmaceutical markets using data from the EU, and recommends appropriate policies to address inefficiencies. The first study examines the effect of patent expiry on originator drug prices in the presence of price regulation. Using econometric panel data methods, I find that neither generic entry nor generic market penetration affect the prices of originator drugs downwards. Instead, prices of originator drugs often appear to increase post-generic entry. Findings suggest that no savings to health services should be expected post-patent expiry if the originator product is dispensed, and any savings occur solely from generic uptake. The second study examines whether generic entry leads to a switch in total consumption (both originator and generic) from an off-patent branded molecule to a different in-patent molecule of the same therapeutic class. Using panel data analysis, I find that a switch in consumption post-patent expiry took place for the first ACE inhibitor which went off-patent, and in some cases for the second and third product. Such a switch leads to increased costs because it removes any substitution power from health authorities. The third study examines the effects of parallel trade on price competition. The topic is first approached from a game-theoretic point of view, predicting that parallel trade does not trigger price competition. Descriptive statistics demonstrate differences, if any, between prices of locally sourced and parallel traded products in the presence of different regulatory policies. Finally, the econometric analysis shows that there is upward price convergence in the presence of parallel trade. However, some regulatory interventions may lead to a spread between prices of locally sourced products and parallel traded products. Findings suggest that parallel trade should not always be considered a cost-containment mechanism and other ways to address rising pharmaceutical expenditures should be considered.

This thesis examines adoption of pharmaceutical technologies across the major OECD markets during 1999-2008, a period that has witnessed substantial R&D productivity shortfalls and increasing supply-side pressure on pharmaceutical pricing. The advent of the financial crisis in 2008 has resulted in even more stringent pricing and reimbursement (P&R) regulations to contain costs and ensure value for money in pricing decisions. The central theoretical question addressed, therefore, is how price regulation affects cross-national adoption dynamics of pharmaceutical technologies. I address the impact of regulation on: i) innovative technologies, i.e. patent-protected new molecules that are central to dynamic efficiency, and ii) imitative generic technologies, i.e. lower-priced bioequivalent products that are central to static efficiency. The research in this thesis was motivated by the lack of theoretical framework or empirical evidence on the dynamics of international technology adoption in general and marked delay patterns in the adoption of pharmaceutical technologies observed in practice. It is important to understand the regulatory factors driving these delays given the profound implications of such delays on consumer and producer welfare as well as healthcare provider/payer budgets. The main hypothesis in this thesis is that price controls negatively affect adoption speed for new molecules and generics in markets that employ price controls as these controls reduce incentives to entry and result in knock-on effects in foreign markets because of linkages such as reference pricing and parallel trade. The empirical strategy adopts difference-in-difference and survival analysis using IMS data from 20 markets and controls for heterogeneity in firm and molecule characteristics. Overall findings indicate that adoption of pharmaceutical technologies is slower in price-controlled markets and that firms adapt their launch strategies to changes in pharmaceutical regulations. Expected market size is a highly significant driver of generic launch hazard, which highlights the importance of demand-side policies to promote generic use.

The thesis applies a political economy approach to the study of how institutions and geography explain the development of a commodity chain. Focusing on the Brazilian Amazon from 1870 to 1910, the analysis develops a new theoretical framework constructed by combining standard trade models with institutions and economic geography. There are two levels of analysis: interactions among, and within, different nodes of the commodity chain. A quantitative-driven analysis from macroeconomic data supports inferences from microeconomic behaviour. The thesis provides new information on rubber prices and exports, trader ledgers, estate accounts, newspapers, travellers accounts, and official documents. The research develops a demand- and supply-side analysis of the history of rubber, from tappers to manufacturers. It features the main rubber manufacturing countries, Britain and the USA, and shows how competition prevailed along the chain, translating into a struggle for rubber supply. Rubber was not a homogeneous product. Due to a combination of quantity and quality, the Brazilian Amazon possessed significant market power, market power that shaped the rubber chain. In this light, the thesis investigates how the Brazilian rubber supply chain was organised and how agents profited from its monopolistic position. It also shows that taxation increased the regional welfare and allowed the government to support two related activities: telegraphs and shipping. The thesis proves that violence and coercion were not necessary features of rubber production, as argued by much of the literature. Through a game-theoretic approach, the thesis demonstrates conditions under which production could have occurred without exploitation. In a context of high price-inelasticity of demand and rising prices, production was driven by market forces. Inelasticity of demand was indeed one of the main features of the rubber boom. It shaped production, bargaining power between different nodes of the chain and competition within them, defining the distribution of profits along the rubber chain.

The thesis examines developments in the processed food trade through stores in Ivory Coast from 1956 to 1990. Quantitative and qualitative methods are applied to data drawn from a range of sources, notably government reports, company archives, fieldwork observation and store surveys. The performances of European operated stores are contrasted with those run by Lebanese and African traders by using an adapted interpretation of Hart's (1971) informal sector theory. The thesis examines the often negative views expressed on informal sector activities in the literature and points to previously ignored weaknesses of Western style distribution techniques. It is shown that foreign domination relates not so much to exploitation by Western countries as to the preponderance of Lebanese and foreign African traders. In addition the thesis examines the marketing strategies pursued by processed food importers and manufacturers: regional differences in distribution: the importance of price and brand to product success: and the effects of the media, western culture and economic conditions on consumption. These issues are related not only to the general framework but also to more specific theories and examined through case studies on stock cube and milk product distribution. The thesis concludes that virtually all traders influenced by Western techniques have failed because of inflexible operating methods, excessive overheads and miscalculations on store location and consumer outreach. The advantages to Lebanese and African traders of community networks and their knowledge of consumers have been greatly underestimated. Attempts by the state and private interests to stimulate processed food demand and increase Ivorian participation in distribution have largely foundered on a failure to acknowledge the contrasting fortunes of these two sectors. Finally, these conclusions are related to other sectors in the Ivorian economy and the issue of inappropriate technology in other developing economies.

This thesis is an ethnographic account of the modem readymade garment industry in Nepal which is at the forefront of Nepal's modernisation and entry into the global trade system. This industry was established in Nepal in 1974 when the United States imposed country-specific quotas on more advanced countries and flourished with Nepal's embrace of economic liberalisation in the 1990s. Post 2000 however, it faced two severe crises; the looming 2004 expiration of the US quota regime which would end the preferential treatment of Nepalese garments in international trade; and the local Maoist insurgency imposed serious labour and supply chain hurdles to its operations. Such a common scenario saw different responses from the differing caste and ethnic groups operating within the garment industry. Bahun-Chhetris, the new business elites who had recently joined the industry aided by newly acquired finance, knowledge and skills, could only produce homogenous garments which would not survive the local and global crises. Marwaris and Buddhist Newars, the old business elites with differing political and cultural legacies, went on to produce specialised garments and successfully capture secure and profitable market niches. They achieved this either by using the material knowledge and networks accumulated over generations, or by invoking their cultural identities to legitimise their authority over the scmiotics used to distinguish their products. I examine Douglass North's theory on institutions and Pierre Bourdieu's theory on cultural capital to examine the relationship between formal and informal economic processes, and understand the way they transform throughout economic development. The habitus of transactional knowledge, structure and rules that prevailed in the conventional economy widened once it was exposed beyond its original boundaries. The new habitus has in turn drawn from the culture, history and politics of the old habitus as it set out to embrace new opportunities and threats. Such a transformation of the habitus has important distributional effects on the existing social structure and power balance between various communities within an economy.

Globalisation and Information and Communications Technology (ICT) once appeared to be allies attempting to thwart the notion of the local economy. Recently, and somewhat paradoxically, policymakers and firms appear to be harnessing ICT to foster the development of local economies. To compete globally, firms are frequently looking locally, often by co-locating in industrial districts ('clusters'). Despite similar access to ICT, software, and government policies designed to ameliorate productivity impeding variables, wide gulfs continue to appear in ICT-led productivity between firms in different countries, within the same country, or within the same region or cluster. Attention is increasingly turning to the role that management practices may play in explaining such variations. Concomitant to, or perhaps as a result of this focus, the relationship between ICT and productivity warrants further consideration, with the recognition that ICT by itself cannot affect competitive capacity: it can only be productive if it is appropriately embedded in the organisation and is a function of managerial practices and skills. This dissertation has been undertaken at the nexus of ICT, managerial practices and spatial orientation. It has a firm-level focus and will rectify a current methodological and sampling deficit to provide answers on how and why managerial practices affect ICT both within and between organisational settings, and how this in turn influences productivity. A multiple embedded case study design has been utilised, nested in the aerospace sector in the UK. The research utilises both qualitative and quantitative empirical methodologies and is multidisciplinary, working across the Information Systems Group in the Department of Management and the Centre for Economic Performance at the LSE. Ontologically, the research ascribes to the assumption that technology is neither omnipotent nor uncontested, and impinges on the terms by which individuals interact with one another, influencing the individual-world interaction and affecting the behaviour of the organisation as a social system. Success or failure can ultimately depend on the negotiation of practices, with information systems capable of mediating productivity. By addressing the current lacuna at the overlap of the principal themes being explored, this research makes an original and relevant contribution on a topical issue that transcends borders, culture and language.

This thesis examines the economic development of industrial engineering in Austria-Hungary between 1870 and 1913. The pattern of sectoral change in Austria's machine-building industry is investigated in Chapter Two. New output estimates indicate that mechanical engineering took a course quite different from that suggested in recent historiography. Austria's capital goods sector was subject to prolonged stagnation during the "Great Depression" of the 1870s and 1880s. But during the subsequent two decades mechanical engineering made a large and rising contribution to overall industrial growth. Chapter Three is concerned with the rise of industrial machine-building in Hungary. Based on new output estimates, the chapter traces the phases and origins of a process which accounted for a markedly faster expansion of mechanical engineering than in the Western half of the Habsburg Empire. Chapter Four provides an analysis of the financial and investment behaviour of major machine-building firms. The growth of companies, the pattern of their investment, the volume and forms of finance varied significantly between firms and over time. The main factors accounting for differential rates of company growth were the diverging development of demand in the various machine-building branches, the impact of the business cycles in Austria and Hungary, and individual firms' preparedness to pursue external expansion. The structure, volume, and direction of the Habsburg Monarchy's trade in machinery are examined in Chapter Five. The study of import tariffs and input price diffentials yields results which suggest that, after the turn of the century, the competitive position of Austro-Hungarian engineering was impeded by an inept tariff policy. The thesis argues that the course of industrial engineering lends strong support to the notion of a "Great Depression" in Austria. Once the depression had been overcome, however, the machine-building industry became one of the two main sectoral sources of growth in industry - despite the effects of an unfavourable tariff policy. Machinery output in Hungary grew at a faster rate than in Austria. Yet its impact on total manufacturing growth was somewhat smaller than in Austria since Hungarian industry as a whole also expanded more rapidly.

Firm entry, growth and diversification are central drivers of industrial development. However, firms often perform very differently when facing the same institutional environment. Using original data from field research in Pakistan, I find evidence of diverging firm performance in Pakistan's textile industry during trade liberalisation in which only two thirds of Pakistan's textile firms maintain their pre-liberalisation level of exports and market share is gained by better performers. Using data on firm origins and growth, I show how firm performance is related to pre-founder (or Director) experience which includes education, industry-related employment and industry exposure. Representative case studies show that this experience is manifested in the firm's entry strategy, its initial production and organisational capabilities, and persists via its procedures to improve productivity, quality and marketing. In particular, higher managerial quality results in effective recruitment and incentives which enable workers to improve shop-floor performance. Further, I analyse Pakistan's broader industrial diversification to date and show that an increase in competition during trade liberalisation encouraged firm diversification as profitability of the textile sector fell. However, I find that most textile firms and business groups enter protected domestic industries while, in contrast, the founders of firms in higher value-added sectors such as pharmaceuticals and information technology have greater industry-specific education and experience. This further highlights the role of founder experience in shaping industrial diversification and the firm-level roots of growth. In conclusion, I suggest how policy measures to accumulate industry-related experience and increase firm competition could enable low-income countries to break out of the equilibrium of poor industrial development.

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