Living Wages, Equal Wages: Gender and Labor Market Policies in the United States
point with a comparative discussion of employment systems in Germany, the United States, France, and Japan. For institutional economists, there is much of interest to be found in this book, but there will also be serious criticisms. For instance, Fligstein gives a nod to "old" institutional economics when he acknowledges that this field was one of the inspirations for his discussion on employment. But Fligstein also criticizes institutional economics for overlooking political processes in the construction of labor markets. However, Fligstein makes this judgment using only a handful of citations written prior to 1971. Clearly, Fligstein overlooks a wealth of relevant institutional work in this area that does take into account political process, such as Marc Tool's The Discretionary Economy, which directly addresses the question of political processes in the structuring of the economy (1979). Further, some institutional economists will be bothered by Fligstein's tendency to focus on market stability as a fundamental feature of modern capitalist societies, which overlooks the messiness and instability inherent in markets that spurs the drive for stability and continuity in the first place. Finally, despite characterizing his approach as political-cultural, the cultural aspects of Fligstein' s framework are drastically undertheorized. Despite the various qUibbles I have with Fligstein's approach, the book is an important effort to develop a coherent framework for understanding the dynamics of market economies and societies. Yet the "architecture" of Fligstein's approach is in need of additional work on its foundations. Given the many similarities with economic sociology, institutional economics can playa role in that effort. Readers of this journal will find much of interest in Fligstein's book and, hopefully, much to improve upon.