An Analysis on Institutional Flexibility and Self-propagating Dynamism of IT

本研究的目的是阐明制度柔性与信息技术对经济的影响之间的关系，并得出对信息技术刺激经济增长的一些政策启示。本研究是在观察到发达国家结束于20世纪80年代的工业社会与始于90年代的信息社会之间存在较大差异的基础上进行的。本研究主要集中于：(1)发达国家制度柔性的测量；(2)制度柔性与信息技术之间作用机制的分析模型；(3)制度柔性对信息技术影响的决定因素。本研究的主要政策启示如下：(1)制度柔性对工业社会中的信息技术扩散没有影响，但对信息社会中的信息技术扩散有较大影响。(2)制度柔性对信息社会中信息技术投资的生产率有影响。这意味着在日本等灵活性较低的国家，IT投资并不能改善其经济和社会状况。(3)制度柔性对IT的影响有很多决定因素。国际比较分析表明，最积极的决定因素是人们对不确定性的总体态度，这一态度以创业水平来衡量。

The objectives of this research are to elucidate the relationship between institutional flexibility and economic impact on IT and get some policy implications for economic growth stimulated by IT. This research was induced by the observation that there was large difference between the industrial society which ended in the 1980s in advanced countries and the information society which started from the 1990s. This research is mainly focus on (i) measurement of institutional flexibility in advanced countries, (ii) formulation of an analytical model for mechanism between institutional flexibility and IT, and (iii) identification of determinants of impacts of institutional flexibility on IT.An international network of experts was formulated for executing this research. This network has a variety of experts such as mathematicians, system scientists, and empirical researcher of IT and institutionsThe main policy implications of this research are as follows.(1) Institutional flexibility had no effect on IT diffusion in the industrial society, while it has a large impact on IT diffusion in the information society.(2) Institutional flexibility affects to the productivity of IT investment in the information society. It means that IT investment can not improve its economy and society in the low flexibility countries such as Japan.(3) There are many determinants of impacts of institutional flexibility on IT. The international comparative analysis demonstrates that the most positive determinants is the aggregate attitude of people to uncertainty which measured by the level of entrepreneurship.