Beyond profit and power: state intervention and international collaboration in East-West technology transfer
Economic exchange between OECD and CMEA countries has become increasingly complex. Projects of long duration and complex exchange have political consequences: domestic coalitions form in both East and West to press their governments for protection of the exchange from shifting policies in East-West relations. US government actors, however, have begun to assert that the more-complex arrangements involved in East-West technology trade have a profound impact on social, political, and military-strategic issues in East-West relations. Disputes over the nature of that impact within the US government have led to incoherence in US policy; disputes over the nature of the impact among Western allies have led to a disintegration of collaboration on the political goals of East-West trade within the Western alliance. Contradictory explanations have been offered for these trends. First, it is argued that market considerations increasingly govern East-West trade arrangements; market actors are able to insulate East-West technology trade from politics. Thus, political disputes are not crucial to trade outcomes. Second, it is argued that market arrangements are dominated by political considerations; state power will determine outcomes in East-West technology trade. Each of these explanations is refuted andan alternative thesis is presented: state actors dominate market arrangements, but they learn to incorporate expanding knowledge of the consequences of those arrangements into their decision-making process.
- OSTI ID:
- 5658315
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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